at this will be
noted to our credit on the table of advancement (and in this connect
I may mention the names of the three men, Thomas Coke, Edward Loval,
Timothy Pierce, and the boy Joseph McDougal, whom I recommend as
having done their duty in the face of peril), I have the honour to
sign myself,

"My Lords and Hon. Commissioners of H. M. Excise,
"Your obedient, humble servant,
"Henry Baskett (Supervisor)."

The other view of this transaction I find more concisely expressed in a
memorandum written in an old note-book belonging to my Uncle Tom.

"Baskett held out for forty best French, but we fobbed him off with
twenty-five low-grade Rotterdam--the casks being leaky, and some packs
of goods too long left at Rathan Cave, which is at the back of the
isle, and counted scarce worth the carrying farther. The night fine and
business most successful--thanks to an ever-watchful Providence."

The reader of these family memoirs will perhaps agree with me that, if
any one could do without an ever-watchful Providence troubling itself
about him, that man was my Uncle Tom.

While, therefore, we in the House of Marnhoul were in the wildest
alarm--at least Agnes Anne was--forces which could not possibly be
withstood were mustering to hasten to our assistance. The tarry jackets
of the _Golden Hind_ would doubtless have rushed the front door with a
hurrah, as readily as they would have boarded a prize, but Lalor
Maitland ordered them to bring wood and other inflammable material. At
least, so I judge, for presently I could see them running to and fro
about the edges of the wood. They had now learned the knack of keeping
in shelter most of the way. But I did not feel really afraid till I saw
some of them with kegs of liquor making towards the porch. There they
stove them in, and proceeded to empty the contents on the dry branches
and fuel they had collected. The matter was now beginning to look really
serious. To make things worse, they were evidently digging out the
bottom of our cellar-stair barricade, and if they succeeded in that they
would turn our position and take us in the rear.

So I sent down Agnes Anne (she not being good for much else) to the
cellar to see how things were looking there, bidding her to be careful
of the lantern, and to bring back as many of the five muskets as she
could carry, so that I might keep the fellows in check above.