the cove just after dark, and before the turn of the tide, as, in the event of the Black Prince attempting to land her cargo there, it would be made with the flow of the tide, and in the darkness.
The cove was reached and found to be deserted. Oliver showed the way, and the boat was driven up on the shingle and conveyed into the smugglers' cave behind the rock curtain. No one was there. Evidently, from the preparations made, the smugglers were ready for the run of the cargo that night.
"Now," said Will, one of the Preventive men, "us hev' a' labored uncommon. What say you, mates? Does us desarve a drop of refreshment or does us not? Every man as does his dooty by his country and his king should be paid for 't, is my doctrine. What do y' say, Gearge? Sarve out the grog?"
"I reckon yes. Sarve out the grog. There's nothing like grog—I think it was Solomon said that, and he was the wisest of men."
"For sure; he made a song about it," said one of the coastguard. "It begins:
"'A plague of those musty old lubbers,
Who tell us to fast and to think,
And patient fall in with life's rubbers,
With nothing but water to drink.'"
"To be sure," responded Wyvill, "never was a truer word said than when Solomon was called the wisest o' men."
