130 WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 



good. Now the wind never blew that was strong 

 enough to please the thatcher. If the hurricane 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 " y elm- 

 ing" that is, 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 natu- 

 rally 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 

 genealogy 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 pos- 

 sible. More than one family well-to-do for the ham- 

 let or village, where a small capital goes a long way 

 are said to have originally derived their prosperity 

 from assisting the storage or disposal of smuggled goods; 



