House, there was not unnaturally a tremendous fuss, and eventually the
King's proclamation promised a reward for the apprehension of the men
concerned in the deed. Nothing happened for months after, but at last
Diamond was arrested on suspicion and lodged in Chichester Gaol. We
can well imagine the amount of village gossip to which this would give
rise. Chater was heard to remark that he knew Diamond and saw him go
by with the gang the very day after the Custom House had been broken
open. When the Collector of Customs at Southampton learned this, he
got into communication with the man, and before long Chater and Mr.
William Galley were sent with a letter to Major Battin, a Justice of
the Peace for Sussex. Galley was also a Custom House officer stationed
at Southampton. The object of this mission was that Chater's evidence
should be taken down, so that he might prove the identity of Diamond.

On Sunday February 14, then, behold these two men setting out for
Chichester. On the way they stopped at the White Hart Inn, Rowland's
Castle, for refreshment. But the landlady suspecting that they were
going to hurt the smugglers, with the intuition of a woman and the
sympathy of a mother decided to send for two men named Jackson and
Carter. For this Mrs. Paine, a widow, had two sons herself, who though
nominally blacksmiths were in fact smugglers. Jackson and Carter came
in, to whom the widow explained her suspicions, and these two men were
presently followed by others of the gang. Before very long they had
got into conversation with Galley and Chater, and plied them with
drink, so that they completely gave away the nature of their mission,
and after being fuddled and insulted were put to bed intoxicated.
After a while, they were aroused by Jackson brutally digging his spurs
on their foreheads and then thrashing them with a horse-whip. They
were then taken out of the inn, both put on to the same horse, with
their legs tied together below the horse's belly. They were next