This shows us, pretty clearly, that some one must have written Rattenbury’s reminiscences for him. He probably was incapable of such book-English, and certainly would not have spoken anything else than the broadest of Devonshire speech. However, he describes how he drew the sergeant into a parley and how, while it was going on, he jumped through a trap-door into the cellar. “I then threw off my jacket and shirt, to prevent any one from holding me, and having armed myself with a reaping-hook and a knife, which I had in my pocket, I threw myself into an attitude of defence at the entrance, which was a half-hatch door, the lower part of which I shut, and then declared that I would kill the first man that came near me, and that I would not be taken from the spot alive. At this the sergeant was evidently terrified; but he said to his men, ‘Soldiers, do your duty; advance and seize him.’ To which they replied, ‘Sergeant, you proposed it; take the lead and set us an example, and we will follow.’ No one offered to advance, and I remained in the position I have described for four hours, holding them at bay.” The sergeant sent for aid, but before that arrived the women of Beer rushed in with an artful story of shipwreck, attracting the soldiers’ attention. Rattenbury, seizing the opportunity, dashed among them, half-naked, and escaped to the beach, where he hastily took boat and went off to his own vessel, and safety. In 1806 he, his crew, and his cargo of spirit-tubs were captured by the _Duke of York_ cutter, when returning from Alderney. He was fined £100, and with his companions was sentenced to the alternative of imprisonment or service on board a man-o’-war. They chose the sea, and were accordingly shipped aboard the brig _Kate_, in the Downs; but soon, while the officers were all more or less drunk, he found an opportunity of escaping, and was presently home again. The smuggling exploits of this master of the art were endless. Perhaps the most amusing—to the reader, at any rate—is that incident at Seaton Hole, where, one dark night, going up the cliff with a keg on his back, one of a cargo he had just landed, he was so unfortunate as to stumble over a donkey, which began to bray so horribly that, what with his trumpeting and the noise of the smuggler’s fall, a Revenue officer, sleeping at the post of duty, was aroused, and seized forty kegs, nearly the whole of that run. After serving three terms of imprisonment for smuggling, and for being unable to pay a fine of £4,500, Rattenbury’s many adventures came to an end in 1833. His later years were devoted to fishing and piloting, and between whiles, to composing his reminiscences. In those pages you read this rather pitiful little note: “The smuggler gratefully acknowledges the kindness of the Right Honourable Lord Rolle, who now allows him one shilling per week for life.” What lavish generosity!