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thereafter, sufficient traces remained to enable the curious in such matters to detect the parts where the Tap and its entrance once were.

Boats and bathing machines - Mounted officers - A smuggler shot - South Colonnade

The town was not long before it had boats and bathing machines, some of which were put to uses for which they were not originally constructed. I am assured that once on a time a few fervent spirits - that is to say, a few tubs of spirits - which had been out all night, were too bashful to face the anchor-buttons of the Blue-jackets by daylight, and so they got themselves locked up in one of the machines until the next approach of sombre night. I cannot personally vouch for the truth of this, but I know that on the 28th or 29th of July 1830, the Government officer Solomon Beville, with an expert crew, seized the pleasure-lugger "St. Leonards" with 42 tubs and four men, the latter being afterwards sent to serve five years in the Navy as a punishment. I am not in Mr. Thomson's secret as to where he got his materials for his comedy of "Joe and the Smugglers" which had a week's successful run on the Pier; but those who witnessed it will recognize the last scene in which Capt. Hawkseye frees the captured smugglers on condition of their serving their country, as in a measure similar to the condition imposed by the Government on the four men captured in the St. Leonards lugger. The energy displayed by Mr. Beville in making seizures was as effective as it was resolute, and this is shown in the narrative of his exploits in the chapters devoted to Hastings. Yet it was during the first few years of the new town's existence, that transactions were carried on to a greater extent and with greater risk than previously, notwithstanding that the means for detection and capture were considerably augmented. On the 8th of March, 1831, twelve horses and mounted patrols arrived to assist the Preventative officers and men, and some of these might be seen every evening passing through St. Leonards by twos to traverse the inland roads, parallel with, or leading down to, the coast. Even this did not suffice, as I shall show further on, to put a stop to the contraband traffic, and in less than twelve months after the arrival of these horse-patrols, a further detective force made its appearance. This consisted of 36 dragoons, who, after staying a short time, were replaced by 40 of the Rifle Brigade. On Sunday, the 27th of November, 1831, a smuggler, named Head, was shot at Bopeep, and died soon after from the effects. On the previous 5th of January, a ball was fired from a revenue cutter, which was sailing three-quarters of a mile from the shore. The ball, a six-pounder, struck the beach between St. Leonards and the White Rock, but nearer to the latter than the former. A man who was walking near the spot had a narrow escape. The ball, after ploughing up the beach, lodged in an embankment, from which it was afterwards extracted and exhibited.

In the year 1831 the Conqueror Hotel was conducted by Mr. Mollard from the Crown and Sceptre Hotel, at Greenwich, but as "the race is not always to the swift nor the battle to the strong," so in Mr. Mollard's experience there occurred a too practical an illustration of the proverb. It was said that no one more than he deserved success; yet, as the Crown and Sceptre had in some way fallen from his grasp, so was he equally not a conqueror on the Conqueror's own domain. After a comparatively brief reign, this respected chief abdicated his throne, and others took his place. His successors were respectively Mrs. Collins, Mr. Jay, and Mrs. Johnson; the last-named of whom, after carrying the hotel on for some time with remarkable energy, converted it into a Boarding-house. Even then the success of the establishment was perhaps less thorough than its spirited proprietress desired, and, as this was not the only estate in St. Leonards over which she had command, the original "Conqueror" became a "Brunswick" in other hands, and was further reduced to the rank of a private lodging-house. But in the Jubilee year of the town's existence, when so many restorations were being effected, the house in question became to some extent reinstated. Those who are interested in the early history of St. Leonards and do not happen to know the whereabouts of the original "Conqueror" will now find it designated the "Brunswick Boarding-house," conducted by Mrs. Gates. Like the Victoria Hotel, it once had a Tap in the basement, and which, also like that of its rival, was approached from the north side, thus descending, nominally and literally, into the "Shades" below. The principle front of the hotel was, as it still is, of a semicircular form, and directly facing the more formal façade of the "Harold". The proximal but opposite sites of these early hotels remind one of the equally near and opposing forces of the Conqueror William and the vanquished Harold, and the simile appears more perfect when it is recalled that the "Harold" like its human and regal prototype, was finally beaten, whilst the dynastic prestige of the "Conqueror", under the modifications here described, exists to this day. In an album kept at the Victora Hotel was written by an anonymous poet some lines, the opening stanza of which ran thus :-

I slept, and a vision arose to my sight;
All was darkness around; the black mantle of night
Enveloped each object that stood on the plain
Where the Conqueror triumphed & Harold was slain

It may be well imagined that the town, as I have before intimated, was of considerable importance at the end of the third year, and that the anonymous poet whose lines I have quoted, was justified in his further description, thus;

I awoke, and St. Leonards stood full in my view;
My dream was prophetic; the vision was true.
In her beauty she stands by Old England's broad sea,
And Aladdin revives, my dear Burton in thee!

The hotels to which reference has been made were, as may be imagined, on the eastern part of the Marina, contiguous to which were the thirteen houses of South Colonnade, at that time also known as the Marina, and which with the Archway Lodge, accounted for the now apparently missing fourteen numbers of the latter range of buildings.

At one end of what, in further remarks, I shall call the South Colonnade - the name by which it is now designated - there was a rival grocery store to that of Mr. Mawle, who, in a smaller way, was the first grocer in that range of buildings. The rivals of Mr. Mawle were Messrs. Breeds and Troutbeck who had a much larger establishment at High Street, hastings, where I remember there was a silvered gas reflector which dazzled the eyes of all beholders. It was there that a servant of Mr. Troutbeck was severely burnt, through the setting fire to her clothes. This occurred on the second Sunday of the second month after the first stone of St. Leonards was laid, and therefore at a time ere the rival town had tempted Messrs. B. and T. to try their fortunes with a branch shop. It was, however, not later than 1829 or '30 that this temptation took effect, but the Fates looked coldly upon the enterprise, and failure was the result. The successors were Messrs. Jolly and Viner, grocers, of George Street, Hastings. At that time the route from the Old Town to the new lay over the Priory Bridge, through White Rock street, over the White-rock hill (a steep and rugged projection on the site of the present Pier and Baths, with a faggot road on each side), along a low and crooked way (which was protected from the sea, not by walls and groynes as at present, but by high ridges of beach), and past the valley of Warrior's Gate and Gensing, where the chalk-sloops usually laid up during the winter. The younger members of the community can have no idea of how arduous was the work of conveying heavy goods by hand or truck over such a via media. There were no railways in those days, and the supply of provisions and other necessities, after being brought to Hastings by the trading sloops, had to be taken to St. Leonards in some such way as described.

I was then living on the ground known as "America", or "Dissolved Priory", and as this was nearly midway between George Street, Hastings, and the Colonnade, St. Leonards, - at which former place I was engaged in a daily routine of labour, - it was my opportunity to earn a few pence on my way home by assisting Messrs. Jolly and Viner with a truck-load of grocery from George street to the top of the White-rock eminence, there to leave them to trudge the rest of the way as best they could. Their branch shop was at 2 South Colonnade (which is now Mr. Dale's), while Mr. Knight a shoemaker occupied No 3; Mr ones, and eating-house keeper, was at No. 4; Mr. Hubbard, a baker, at 5; Mr. Walter, No. 6; Mr. Mitchel, a broker, No. 7; Miss Bignall, a lady, No. 8; Mr. Campbell, the poet, No. 10; Mr. Beck, draper, No. 11; Mr. Mawle, 13; and Mr. Tm Brown, a facetious wine merchant, No. 14. It was the wife of Mr. Mawle, at 13, who was the mother of the first-born child in St. Leonards, as before described. Mr. James Mann and Mr. Stanton Noakes were the first tradesmen with an establishment in the town. They commenced business as shoeing and jobbing smiths on the 5th of December, 1828. But at the same time and for nearly two years thereafter, it was my practice, as book-keeper to William Woolgar, of the Blacksmith's Arms, in the Holy Trinity parish, to go weekly to the pay-tables of some of the St. Leonards builders with bills for smith's work done at Hastings. Mr. Alexander Walter, who first commenced business at 6 Colonnade in 1829, was in 1834, appointed as fruiterer and greengrocer to their Royal Highnesses the Duchess of Kent and Princess Victoria. He died around the year 1845, and the business was continued by his widow until February 7th, 1867, when she, too, died, after which time the business was carried on by her son-in-law, James Bovis, for several years and afterwards taken over by Miss. Dengate. The death in 1878 of Mrs. Philadelphia Roberts, reminded me that she and her husband were also among the earliest residents at the South Colonnade. They came from Winchelsea to St. Leonards in the first or second year after the town was commenced, but soon relinquished their small business at the Colonnade for superintendence of the Royal Baths. These they conducted for many years and gained the lasting esteem of their patrons. Mr. Roberts, who died before his wife, was one, with Messrs. Peerless, Chester, Mann, Ranger and other old inhabitants, who assisted in bearing the venerable founder of St. Leonards to his grave. After a time, Mr. and Mrs. Roberts removed to 43 Marina, which they conducted as a lodging house, while their daughter carried on the business of a pastrycook and confectioner. This daughter (Mrs. Addison) died in 1877, leaving her husband to continue a business to the success of which he had largely contributed. The mother retained her faculties almost unimpaired till the last, and died at the ripe age of nearly 83.

More departures from original designs - Incendiarism - Newspapers &c.

Although I was intimately acquainted with Mr. and Mrs. Roberts while they conducted the Baths, and also on visiting terms with their successors, Mr. and Mrs. Cozens, I do not recollect -