fficer's shoulder-knot.

The modern coastguardmen never expect to find such an animal as a
smuggler: all contraband business is done by dint of craft and not by
daring. Firemen and engineers scoop out coal from the bottom of a ship's
bunkers and fill the space up with tobacco. Sometimes a clever carpenter
will actually hollow out a beam in the forecastle or a block of wood
which is used as a stool; the whole article looks perfectly solid, and
the Custom-house officers are apt to pass it by. But our friend the
coastguard had been used to the old-fashioned smugglers--desperate men
who would let fly a ball on the very slightest provocation.

Before the piping times of peace came he had known what it was to charge
with a party right amongst a gang of desperate fellows who were bumping
kegs ashore.

When in the grey of the evening the low black lugger crept stealthily
towards the shore, the coastguard had been used to stalk the gliding
vessel like some wild beast. He could not row off and board her, because
the lugger would have spread her brown wings and flown away into the
uttermost dark. The coastguardsmen had to catch the smugglers in the act
of bringing their goods ashore, and in order to do this he had to
contend against a conspiracy of the villagers, who were always ready to
lend their horses and their labour to those who were cheating the king.
No amount of logic could ever persuade the small farmer that smuggling
was in any way immoral, so the coastguard had to combat the cunning of
the bold sailors who ran across from Cherbourg, and the still greater
cunning of the slouching fellows who signalled his movements from the
shore. This was his training, and when the time came for smuggling to be
given over entirely to merchant seamen instead of being carried on by
desperadoes, the change left the old officer still ready and resolute,
and quick with his pistol.

It was well for the Revenue that one at least of their servants retained
the habits and instincts of the ancient race of preventive-men.

One night, just as the tide was flowing, our friend stepped out of his
cottage and looked across the bay. Suddenly he saw a light, which
flashed for a short time and then was darkened; another flash came and
then another; the flood was pouring south in a sombre stream; there was
not a gleam on the water, and the whole sea looked like a huge dark
abyss. From the depths of the troubled blackness the coastguard saw
another li