Cutlass and Cudgel

"Cutlass and Cudgel" by George Manville Fenn is an adventure story set in a time when ships patrolled the seas, and is full of smugglers and sea dogs. Archibald Raystoke, a young and curious midshipman, gets caught up in a dangerous plot with pirates and smugglers after being captured while working on a ship in Wessex called "White Hawk". The tale begins when Archibald, together with a funny sailor called Dirty Dick, is on watch and they encounter a cow that has fallen off a cliff. Their job of hunting smugglers gets strangely sidetracked into milking the cow. As the adventure escalates, there is an inevitable shift when Archibald is captured by smugglers, where he later becomes friends with Ram, who is a member of the rogues, showing that friendships can be made in the most unexpected places.