of the Fly and Captain Rycant of the Tryal were to cruise between Flamborough and Yarmouth.  There is also a reference to the Revenue sloop Humber employed in this neighbourhood on Preventive work.  She was a somewhat expensive craft to keep up, as she was frequently needing repairs and renewals.  First, she was to have a new cable which was to cost L20, 14s. 3-1/2d.; and it is a striking reminder of those days of hemp and sail that this bill was paid to the “ropemakers.”  A few months later she had to undergo repairs which amounted to L31, 10s. 6-1/4d., and less than six months afterwards she had to be given a new anchor which cost L18, 8s. 9d.  Three years later she was given a new suit of sails which came to L25, 17s. 1d. but her old suit was sold for the sum of eight guineas.  And finally, in 1744, as she had begun to cost so much for repairing, the Board determined to sell her.

Notwithstanding that the south coast, by reason of its proximity to the Continent and the Channel Isles, was a convenient and popular objective for the smugglers running their goods from France and Holland, yet the Yorkshire coast was by no means neglected.  From Dunkirk and Flushing especially goods poured into the county.  There was a small sloop, for instance, belonging to Bridlington, which was accustomed to sail across the North Sea to one of the ports in Zealand, where a cargo was taken aboard consisting of the usual dutiable articles such as tea, tobacco, and gin.  The return voyage was then made and the goods landed clandestinely at some convenient spot between the Spurn Lighthouse and Bridlington.

Similarly, farther south than the Humber smuggling by illegal importation went on extensively in the early eighteenth century.  Sometimes a Dutch vessel would arrive in Grimsby Roads and succeed in quietly running her goods to the shore.  In the autumn of 1734 the master of the Dutch schuyt The Good Luck of Camphire, alias The Brotherly Love, had succeeded in running as many as 166 half-ankers[4] of brandy and 50 lbs. of tea on the coast near Great Yarmouth, the skipper’s name being Francis Coffee.  He was a notorious smuggler.  But on this occasion both he and his vessel were captured.

Still, matters were not always satisfactory on board the Revenue sloops and smacks, for whenever, at this time, there was an encounter with the smugglers afloat the latter were so violent and desperate that the captors went about their work with their lives in their hands.  Furthermore, it was not altogether a pleasing business to have to fire at fellow-countrymen, many of whom they had known from boyhood.  Then, again, there was not the space on these sloops and cutters, nor the amount of deck room to be found on the men-of-war; and to be cooped up in these comparatively small vessels always on the qui vive, usually near the shore but able to have shore-leave all too rarely, was calculated to make for restlessness.  Added to which a very