Note 32 — FIGHTING SMUGGLERS.

Nevertheless instances abound of extraordinary ingenuity even in the faint-hearted directions. “When,” says a writer whose book now dates back many years, “I arrived the first voyage from Bombay, I had a few rows of Cornelian beads which I had purchased there for some friends at home. For some time they lay snug enough in the toe of an old shoe, at the bottom of my chest, until we got in the river, when I gave them to the second mate to place in greater security. Next day, as the men were receiving rations, the word was passed that the searchers were alongside. At the instant the second mate came running to me with my beads. He had not been able to discover a good place to conceal them. I ran to the steward; he took them, and lifting up one of his lockers, where lay a large snake coiled up like a top-sail sheet, he lifted up its terrific head and threw my beads under its straw. The searchers came, overhauled the steward’s traps and lifted up the lid of the locker. The snake put forth its forked tongue—the lid dropped from the searcher’s hand!”