130 WITHIN AN HOUR OF LONDON TOWN. 



neck an' crop. In the big kitchen fireplace they 

 found a large flagstone level with the floor, with 

 an iron ring let in the middle ; on the top of it 

 was another stone. Our fires is never out, win- 

 ter nor summer, ye know; we burns wood. The 

 fire burns flat on the hearth ; an' when ye comes 

 down in the morning there's allers live embers 

 there; all ye has to do is to put some spray on, 

 and rake them up a bit. That smugglin' lot kept 

 the embers over they stones, an' sometimes they 

 burned a bit ; but their regular fire was in another 

 place. 



"The landlord had the stone grubbed up, and 

 underneath they found a cellar. The stuff they 

 got there they divided amongst 'em, and the gang 

 duresn't say nothing about it, for the gentry round 

 said as they should be hunted down like foxes ; 

 though, as a rule, they never meddled with them as 

 lived near : 'twas mostly the gentry's houses furder 

 as suffered. 



" One o' they drove up to London in his car- 

 riage, an' he see the head people at Bow Street 

 his valet it was told us and a while arter that some 

 new, rough-lookin' customers was sin moochin' an' 



