upon a dark night, and, lying among the bracken, I have seen as many
as seventy mules and a man at the head of each go flitting past me
as silently as trout in a stream. Not one of them but bore its two
ankers of the right French cognac, or its bale of silk of Lyons and
lace of Valenciennes. I knew Dan Scales, the head of them, and I
knew Tom Hislop, the riding officer, and I remember the night they
met.

"Do you fight, Dan?" asked Tom.

"Yes, Tom; thou must fight for it."

On which Tom drew his pistol, and blew Dan's brains out.

"It was a sad thing to do," he said afterwards, "but I knew Dan was
too good a man for me, for we tried it out before."

It was Tom who paid a poet from Brighton to write the lines for the
tombstone, which we all thought were very true and good, beginning -


"Alas! Swift flew the fatal lead
Which pierced through the young man's head.
He instantly fell, resigned his breath,
And closed his languid eyes in death."


There was more of it, and I dare say it is all still to be read in
Patcham Churchyard.