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Updated: May 20, 2025
Let it be noted here that the above three instances of disaster occurred in the day time, and the contrast of the following case will appear all the stronger. One very dark and stormy night in October, 1858, the small lifeboat of Dungeness put off through a heavy sea to a wreck three-quarters of a mile from the shore. Eight stout men of the coastguard composed her crew.
It would be impossible to paint the frightful agony of the actors in this scene. Croustillac saw that his plan for flight was out of the question, because the slightest signal from the coastguard would prevent the departure of the Chameleon.
The boy turned to run without a word of reply, but he could not help observing, as he turned, the compressed lips, the expanding nostrils, and the blazing eyes of his friend, who almost quivered with suppressed excitement. For some time George Aspel stood beside the men of the coastguard while they set up their apparatus and fired the rocket. To offer assistance, he knew, would only retard them.
They entered the roadstead; but as they drew near in order to cast anchor, a little cutter, looking like a coastguard formidably armed, approached the merchant vessel and dropped into the sea a boat which directed its course to the ladder. This boat contained an officer, a mate, and eight rowers. The officer alone went on board, where he was received with all the deference inspired by the uniform.
Suspicion soon attached to these fleet Cawsand fishing-boats, and when they set forth on their apparently innocent purpose, the coastguard men were in a state of irritated expectancy; they knew too often that they were being fooled, yet their task of prevention was both difficult and perilous.
My father, at that time I believe a simple, happy country squire, but showing strong signs of his Romany ancestry, had often warned her of the risk she ran, and one day he had the agony of seeing her from the cliff locked in the cove, and drowning before his eyes ere a boat could be got, while he and the coastguard stood powerless to reach her.
It is a remarkable fact that the sons of each of these men have all risen to high positions in commerce, literature, art, and politics, and those that still survive are proud to acknowledge that they owe their position to the splendid example and beautiful home-life which they were taught to live when children. Guarding the coast was not the only occupation of the Preventive Coastguard.
When our Coastguardsman with the black beard reached the scene, he found, as he had expected, that his comrades of the Coastguard had not been idle. They had brought down the famous rocket apparatus, with which so many lives are saved every year on our stormy shores. The wreck was in a very different position from that in the bay.
The fog also was decidedly in their favour, for it would help to screen them from the observation of any wakeful and inquisitive coastguard. In fact, the unusual combination of wind and fog seemed like a special sign of good omen to their adventure.
It's surprising to me how light some folks will talk with a Providence, for all they know, waiting round the corner to take them at their word. I put my head in at the Working Man's Institute last night, and there was the new Coastguard officer talking like a book, arguing about Woman Suffrage in a way that made me nervous.
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