In the nearest house was a shrewd, observant servant-girl, and the lights, the way they moved about at night in the rooms of the villa--not in the bedrooms, but downstairs, at times when every one else was asleep--aroused her suspicions. Her bedroom window commanded the villa of Gosling and Co., and wake at what time she might or however early in the morning before daybreak, there the lights were. She resolved on keeping watch; and she stationed herself where, unseen, she could observe proceedings. Towards midnight she saw dark figures emerge from Mount Pleasant and make their way to Stoke Church. Follow she did not. Her courage was not equal to that; but she waited and watched till the figures stole back, and on this occasion she distinctly saw sacks being carried on the backs of two of the men. She now remembered that she had often noticed packing-cases and casks being taken from the villa to the water’s edge and placed on a barge apparently waiting there for its load. In the morning the girl told her master what she had seen, and he at once apprised the police. These latter now placed themselves behind the wall at night to watch what would happen; they were rewarded one night after there had been a couple of funerals in the churchyard. The constables saw the men dig and shovel for about ten minutes; heard them strike a coffin-lid, and proceed to force it up. Then by the faint light they saw them remove a corpse and put it into a sack. Thereupon one of the men came out of the yard as a scout to see that the coast was clear. After that they hoisted the body over the churchyard wall and made towards Mount Pleasant. As the constables on this occasion were but two and there was a considerable gang in the villa, they returned to Devonport, where they collected a sufficient force of watchmen and special constables, and surrounded the building, where the resurrectionists were enjoying a refreshing sleep after their labours. Scaling the wall by means of a ladder and advancing in their stocking-soles, they entered the various bedrooms, and secured four men and two women, pinioned and gagged them. They were taken completely by surprise. In the kitchen were found two sacks. In one was the body of a girl of eighteen, in the other that of an elderly man. The cupboards and drawers were stocked with extracted teeth and implements of dentistry for drawing them. When on the following morning it was noised in Devonport that a confederacy of body-snatchers had been captured, the greatest excitement prevailed. The relatives of all who had died and been buried within a couple of years and more crowded the cemetery demanding that the graves of their kinsfolk should be examined. The graveyard turned out to have been a mine well worked. Grave after grave was opened, and dishevelled shrouds and mutilated bodies, teethless jaws, revealed to the distracted relatives of the dead that the graves had been violated.