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Rh seized his hat and his heavy riding-coat which lay in the hall, and dashed down the lawn cutting across to the left, just as a party of soldiers came riding fast up the hill in full pursuit of the smugglers.

"A dd coxcombical puppy!" cried one of the husky squires, as he watched the stalwart figure of the young lieutenant making his way rapidly past the window. "What does he want setting up his joodgment against ours, and presuming for to think he's a better subject of his Majesty than what we be?"

"Let 'un be! Let 'un be!" said the third squire, grimly. "There's no need to worrit ourselves about him. If he doesn't get a bullet in his head before many days be over, why, you may eat me for a Frenchman, and bury my bones at the cross-roads."

And the rest of the company, with only one protesting voice, that of Parson Langney, who said the lad had no fault but youth, and he hoped he would come to no hurt, filled up their glasses and smacked their lips over the famous port, and never asked themselves whether it had paid duty; for, indeed, there was no mystery about that.