One of Mr. Hawker’s parishioners, Peter Barrow,[*] had been, for full forty years, a wrecker, but of a much more harmless description: he had been a watcher of the coast for such objects as the waves might turn up to reward his patience. Another was Tristam Pentire,[*] a hero of contraband adventure, and agent for sale of smuggled cargoes in bygone times. With a merry twinkle of the eye, and in a sharp and ringing tone, he loved to tell such tales of wild adventure, and of “derring-do,” as would make the foot of the exciseman falter, and his cheek turn pale. During the latter years of last century there lived in Wellcombe, one of Mr. Hawker’s parishes, a man whose name is still remembered with terror—Cruel Coppinger. There are people still alive who remember his wife. Local recollections of the man have moulded themselves into the rhyme:— Will you hear of Cruel Coppinger? He came from a foreign land: He was brought to us by the salt water, He was carried away by the wind! His arrival on the north coast of Cornwall was signalised by a terrific hurricane. The storm came up Channel from the south-west. A strange vessel of foreign rig went on the reefs of Harty Race, and was broken to pieces by the waves. The only man who came ashore was the skipper. A crowd was gathered on the sand, on horseback and on foot, women as well as men, drawn together by the tidings of a probable wreck. Into their midst rushed the dripping stranger, and bounded suddenly upon the crupper of a young damsel who had ridden to the beach to see the sight. He grasped her bridle, and, shouting in some foreign tongue, urged the double-laden animal into full speed, and the horse naturally took his homeward way. The damsel was Miss Dinah Hamlyn. The stranger descended at her father’s door, and lifted her off her saddle. He then announced himself as a Dane, named Coppinger. He took his place at the family board, and there remained till he had secured the affections and hand of Dinah. The father died, and Coppinger at once succeeded to the management and control of the house, which thenceforth became a den and refuge of every lawless character along the coast. All kinds of wild uproar and reckless revelry appalled the neighbourhood day and night. It was discovered that an organised band of smugglers, wreckers and poachers made this house their rendezvous, and that “Cruel Coppinger” was their captain. In those days, and in that far-away region, the peaceable inhabitants were unprotected. There was not a single resident gentleman of property and weight in the entire district. No revenue officer durst exercise vigilance west of the Tamar; and, to put an end to all such surveillance at once, the head of a gauger was chopped off by one of Coppinger’s gang, on the gunwale of a boat.