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Memoirs of a Smuggler is an autobiographical curiosity being a compilation from the Diary of a noted smuggler still living, JOHN RATTENBURV, of Beer, a fishing-village on the coast of Devon, between Sidmouth and Lyme Regis; and the fame of whose exploits gained him the title of " The Rob Roy of the West." The adventures, though numerous, and full of danger and vicissitude, are monotonous in character ; and being unconnected by the thread of a story, do not carry the reader onward like fiction : but they are interesting as facts; and may furnish the novelist with materials to work up, and the political moralist with proofs to show how profitless as well as dangerous and demoralizing is the trade of smuggling. JOHN RATTENBURV is a humane and fearless man, and a skilful pilot, as well as a bold and dextrous smuggler. His portrait represents a physiognomy characterized by honesty, mildness, shrewd intelli- gence, and quiet determination. It is worthy of note, that the only thing on his conscience seems to have been the breach of a voluntary engagement with an American captain who had been kind to him ! And this is a man whom necessity and the revenue- laws made a smuggler of. By the way, the horror and aversion that our hero and his fellows have of being sent on board a man- of-war, dues not say much for the King's service in the Navy. Tha little book being published for the old smuggler's benefit, we hope its sale will produce him wherewithal to comfort his old age, in addition to the pension of a shilling ',weekly allowed him by Lord Rou.a.
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