randies, which were afterwards
conveyed clandestinely to English ports, especially to Liverpool, as
already we have noted, and also to Glasgow, Dumfries, as well as to
Ireland. In the days when there were sloops at Liverpool doing duty
for the Crown they used to set forth and do their best to stop this
running, "but as it is a very dangerous station, a seizure is scarce
heard of."

As illustrative of the achievements of smugglers at that time let us
mention that it was reported officially from Yarmouth that on July 11
fifty smugglers had run a cargo of tea and brandy at Benacre in
Suffolk, and only a fortnight later a band of sixty smugglers landed
another contraband cargo at the same place, while a gang of forty got
another cargo safely ashore at Kesland Haven. A week later a still
larger band, this time consisting of seventy, passed through Benacre
Street with a large quantity of goods, a cart and four horses. The
smugglers at Kesland Haven had been able to bring inland their cargo
of tea and brandy by means of fifty horses. In one month alone--and
this at the depth of the winter when cross-channel passages could not
be expected to be too safe for small sailing craft--nine smuggling
cutters had sailed from the port of Rye to Guernsey; and it was
estimated that during the last half of the year there had been run on
to the coast of Suffolk 1835 horse-loads of tea as well as certain
other goods, and 1689 horse-loads of wet and dry goods, to say nothing
of a large quantity of other articles that should have paid duty.
These were conveyed away up country by means of waggons and other
vehicles, guarded by a formidable band of smugglers and sympathisers
well armed. Notwithstanding that the Revenue officers were in some
cases aware of what was going on, yet they positively dared not
attempt any seizures. And in those instances where they had undertaken
the risk they had been frequently beaten and left cruelly wounded
with bleeding heads and broken limbs.

One reliable witness testified that whereas it was computed that at
this time about 4,000,000 lbs. of tea were consumed in this kingdom,
yet only about 800,000 lbs. of this had ever paid duty, so that there
was considerably over 3,000,000 lbs. weight of tea smuggled in.
Therefore on this one item of tea alone the loss to the Crown must
have been something enormous. Multiply this by the long years during
which the smuggling went on, add also the duties which ought to have