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It lies over that way, I could take you to the very place. The schoolmaster was a noble-looking young man too, a devil-me-care blade of a fellow, with a turn for poetry, they said, and a merry man too, and much in request for a song at The Moonrakers of an evening. Many 's the night I've heard the windows rattling with the good company gathered round him.
He walked quickly across the fields separating Westminster from the City of London, hoping to reach Cheapside before the lads of the Dragon should have gone out again; but just as he was near Saint Paul's, coming round Amen Corner, he heard the sounds of a fray. "Have at the country lubbers! Away with the moonrakers! Flat-caps, come on!" "Hey! lads of the Eagle! Down with the Dragons! Adders!
"I don't mind telling a story against ourselves. Did any of you ever hear why the Downton people are called `Moonrakers'? They themselves don't mind hearing the story. Once upon a time, some Downton men had sunk some tubs in a big pond, and they were hard at work all night raking them up. While they were still engaged, who should come by but a party of custom-house people.
He walked quickly across the fields separating Westminster from the City of London, hoping to reach Cheapside before the lads of the Dragon should have gone out again; but just as he was near St. Paul's, coming round Amen Corner, he heard the sounds of a fray. "Have at the country lubbers! Away with the moonrakers! Flat-caps, come on!" "Hey! lads of the Eagle! Down with the Dragons!
Wiltshire people say that the original "Moonrakers" were Wiltshire folk of Cranborne Chase, and the story goes that a party of horsemen crossing a stream saw some yokels drawing their rakes through the water which reflected the harvest moon.
"If the one be a maremaid," whispered Ben to his companion, "the other must be a mareman. Shiver my timbers, if it ain't a curious confab! Moonrakers and skyscrapers! what can it mean?" "I don't know," mechanically answered the boy. "Anyhow," continued the sailor, apparently relieved by the reflection, "It ain't the big raft.
On being questioned they confessed that they were trying to rake "that cheese out of the river:" with a shout of laughter at the simplicity of the rustics the travellers proceeded on their way. The humour of the joke lies in the fact that the "moonrakers" were smugglers retrieving kegs of rum and brandy and that the horsemen were excise officials.
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