The Smuggler: A Tale. Volumes I-III

It is wonderful what improvements have taken place in clocks and watches during the last half-century; how accurately the escapements are constructed, how delicately the springs...

It was in the gray of the morning--and very gray, indeed, the morning was, with much more black than white in the air, much more of night still remaining in the sky than of day...

At Hythe, to make use of a very extraordinary though not uncommon expression, the coach stopped to sup--not that the coach itself ate anything, for, on the contrary, it disgorge...

The sky was clear and bright; the moonlight was sleeping in dream-like splendour upon the water, and the small waves, thrown up by the tide more than the wind, came rippling alo...

There was an old house, built in a style which acquired the mint-mark of fashion of about the reign of George the First, and was considered by those of the English, or opposite...

It is sometimes expedient in telling a tale of this kind, to introduce the different personages quietly to the reader one after the other, and to suffer him to become familiar w...

To a very hungry man, it matters not much what is put upon the table, so that it be eatable; but with the intellectual appetite the case is different, and every one is anxious t...

On entering the drawing-room, towards which Sir Edward Digby immediately turned his steps, he found it tenanted alone by Mrs. Barbara Croyland, who sat in the window with her ba...

There is a strange similarity--I had nearly called it an affinity--between the climate of any country and the general character of its population; and there is a still stronger...

Before I proceed farther with the events of that morning, I must return for a time to the evening which preceded it. It was a dark and somewhat dreary night, when Mr. Radford, l...

We must change the scene for a while, not only to another part of the county of Kent, but to very different people from the worthy Widow Clare and the little party assembled at...

We will now, by the reader's good leave, return for a short time to Harbourne House, where the party sat down to breakfast, at the inconveniently early hour of eight. I will not...

It was a custom of those days, I believe, not altogether done away with in the present times, for magistrates to assemble in petty sessions, or to meet at other times for the di...

What a varying thing is the stream of life! How it sparkles and glitters! Now it bounds along its pebbly bed, sometimes in sunshine, and sometimes in shade; sometimes sporting r...

We must now return to the town of Hythe, and to the little room in the little inn, which that famous borough boasted as its principal hostelry, at the period of our tale. It was...

I wonder if the reader ever wandered from Saltwood Castle back to the good old town of Hythe, on a fine summer's day, with a fair companion, as full of thought and mind as grace...

The man who follows a wolf goes straight on after him till he rides him down; but, in chasing a fox, it is always expedient and fair to take across the easiest country for your...

The colonel of the dragoon regiment rode into Hythe coolly and calmly, followed by his servant; for though, to say the truth, he had pushed his horse very fast for some part of...

Towards half-past ten o'clock at night, the Inn at Hythe was somewhat quieter than it had been on the evening before. This was not a punch club night; there was no public dinner...

The cottages round Dymchurch, and the neighbourhood of the Gut, as it is called, showed many a cheerful light about eleven o'clock, on the night of which we have just been speak...

We left our friend, Mr. Mowle, in no very pleasant situation; for although the generosity of the Major, in neither divulging the discovery he had made, to the rest of the smuggl...

We must turn, dear reader, to other persons and to other scenes, but still keep to that eventful day when the smugglers, who had almost fancied themselves lords of Kent, first m...

During the whole forenoon of the 3rd of September, the little village of Woodchurch presented a busy and bustling, though, in truth, it could not be called a gay scene. The smar...

All things have their several stages; and, without a knowledge of the preceding one it is impossible to judge accurately of any event which is the immediate subject of our conte...

The house of Mr. Zachary Croyland was not so large or ostentatious in appearance as that of his brother; but, nevertheless, it was a very roomy and comfortable house; and as he...

It was two o'clock when Sir Robert Croyland left his daughter; and Edith, with the aid of her maid, soon recovered from the swoon into which she had fallen. At first she hardly...

We mast now return for a time to Harbourne House, where, after Sir Robert Croyland's departure, his guest had endeavoured in vain, during the whole morning, to obtain a few minu...

About six o'clock on the evening of the same day, the cottage of Mrs. Clare was empty. The good widow herself stood at the garden gate, and looked up the road into the wood, alo...

Sir Robert Croyland himself did not return to Harbourne House, till the hands of the clock pointed out to every one that went through the hall, that it was twenty minutes past t...

There are periods in the life of some men, when, either by a concatenation of unfortunate events, or by the accumulated consequences of their own errors, the prospect on every s...

Sir Edward Digby did not take advantage of the opportunity which Mrs. Barbara's absence afforded him. This may seem extraordinary conduct in a good soldier and quick and ready m...

The reader has doubtless remarked--for every reader who peruses a book to any purpose must remark everything, inasmuch as the most important events are so often connected with i...

Having now led the history of a great part of the personages in our drama up to the same point of time, namely, the third morning after the defeat of the smugglers, we may as we...

After parting with Sir Edward Digby at Woodchurch, Henry Leyton had ridden on at a quick pace to Park-gate, and thence along the high road, to Cranbrook. He himself was habited...

Such as we have described in the last chapter, were the fatal events to which Sir Edward Digby had alluded in the few words he had spoken to Zara Croyland; and it may be needles...

About an hour before the event took place, which we have last related, Edith Croyland sat in a small drawing-room at the back of Mr. Radford's house, in which she had been kept...

There was a solitary light in an upstairs window of Farmer Harris's house; and, by its dim ray, sat Harding the smuggler, watching the inanimate form of her upon whom all the st...

There was a large lugger lying off at no great distance from the beach, near Sandgate, and a small boat, ready for launching, on the shore. At the distance of two or three miles...