110 Smuggling. 



roughs up the straw on all the ricks in the parish, 

 unroofs half-a-dozen sheds, and does not spare the 

 gables of the dwelling-houses, why he has work for 

 the next two months. He is attended by a man to 

 carry up the ' yelms,' and two or three women are 

 busy ' yelming ' i.e., separating the straw, selecting 

 the longest and laying it level and parallel, damping 

 it with water, and preparing it for the yokes. These 

 yokes must be cut from boughs that have grown 

 naturally in the shape wanted, else they are not tough 

 enough. A tough old chap, too, is the thatcher, a 

 man of infinite gossip, well acquainted with the gen- 

 ealogy of every farmer, and, indeed, of everybody 

 from Dan to Beersheba, of the parish. 



The memory of the smugglers is not yet quite ex- 

 tinct. The old men will point out the route they 

 used to follow, and some of the places where they are 

 said to have stored their contraband goods. Smug-" 

 gling suggests the sea, but the goods landed on the 

 beach had afterwards to be conveyed inland for sale, 

 so that the hamlet, though far distant from the shore, 

 has its traditions of illicit trade. The route followed 

 was a wild and unfrequented one, and the smugglers 

 appear to have kept to the downs as much as possi- 

 ble. More than one famity well-to-do for the 

 hamlet or village where a small capital goes a long 

 way are said to have originally derived their pros- 

 perity from assisting the storage or disposal of smug- 

 gled goods ; and the sympathies of the hamlet would 

 be with the smugglers still. 



The old folk, too, talk of having the ague, and say 

 that it was quite common in their early days ; but it 

 is rare to hear of a case now. Possibly the better 



