On January 17th he carried forty-three casks, a bale of silk and a hundredweight of tea to Pendeen, dumping some odds and ends outside Gwithian as he passed by. And so it went on.
The consumption of cheap spirits among the miners was enormous. John Wesley, to whose credit can be placed almost the whole moral regeneration of the Cornish tinner, describes them as “those who feared not God nor regarded man,” accuses them of wrecking ships and murdering the survivors and of taking their pleasure in “hurling, at which limbs are often broken, fighting, drinking, and all other manner of wickedness.”
In winter their pastimes were restricted to fighting and drinking—principally drinking—in furtherance of which Ortho did a roaring trade. Between the beginning of January and the end of March he ran an average of five landings a month without any one so much as wagging a finger at him. The dragoons arrived at Christmas, but instead of a regiment two troops only appeared and they speedily declared a policy of “live and let live.” Their commanding officer, Captain Hambro, had not returned to his native land after years of hard campaigning to spend his nights galloping down blind byways at the behest of a civilian riding officer.
He had some regard for his horses’ legs and more for his own comfort. He preferred playing whist with the local gentry, who had fair daughters and who were the soul of hospitality. He temporized good-humoredly with the collector, danced quadrilles with the fair daughters at the “Ship and Castle,” and toasted their bright eyes in excellent port and claret, the knowledge that it had not paid a penny of duty in nowise detracting from its flavor. Occasionally—when he had no other appointment and the weather was passable—he mounted his stalwarts and made a spectacular drive—this as a sop to the collector. But he never came westwards; the going was too rough, and, besides, St. Just was but small potatoes compared with big mining districts to the east.
For every cask landed at Monks Cove, King Nick and his merry men landed twenty either at Prussia Cove, Porthleven, Hayle or Portreath—sometimes at all four places simultaneously. Whenever Capt. Hambro’s troopers climbed into their saddles and took the road to Long Rock, a simple but effective system of signals flashed ahead of them so that they found very little.