Money Island | Page 8

was not made, and they said this had been the fourth day of labor on the Island.
The conclusion was reached that, either the surrounding water had encroached upon that portion of the Island where the treasure had been buried, and had thus imposed an almost impossible barrier to its being unearthed; or that the chests had become imbedded beneath the massive roots of two dwarfed old oaks which stood gnarled and storm-worn in the centre of the island. To the task of removing these trees the men felt entirely unequal after their days of work; and, therefore, it was decided to wait a day or two, and approach the task of doing so, if at all, with renewed spirit.
Upon invitation, we boys accompanied the men to their camp and had supper with them. We were entertained by stories of adventure and travel, of sea voyage, of Indian warfare; and, finally, after several requests of Mr. Landstone, with the story of Money Island. He said he would tell it upon condition that its secrecy would be kept inviolate, at least for many years. So, in the weird light of a large pine-wood fire among the trees, we had the story of Money Island, told in the living voice of a capital story-teller, in almost the same words as are used in the MS he gave me that night, and which has now been publicly printed.
When Mr. Landstone finished, we boys sat in breathless amazement, overcome by the glamour of romance which the story had thrown around the mysterious little island.
The old sailor forgot his pipe, which turned over and dropped its contents to the ground. "Aye, sir," he exclaimed, "we will surely uproot those trees in the morning!" And that became the decision of us all.
I remember that, after a long pause, I asked, to reassure myself, "Mr. Landstone, do you really believe that story?" He laughed and said, "Well, you see I am on an undertaking I have had in mind for nearly fifty years. Yes, I believe those chests are there."
That was enough. I did not sleep an hour that night; and the next morning we were early at the task of searching for the treasure. And a stupendous undertaking it proved to be. All day we labored at one tree. The roots were massive and wide-spread, and the work of cutting and removing them required the utmost exertion. Finally, just before sunset, we completed the task, and began to dig for the treasure in the earth below.
Already water had begun to percolate into the hole, and ere we had gone much deeper, it flooded it so that we found it impossible to continue the excavation. Then we resorted to our sounding rod again for a last ray of hope, and almost immediately it struck something hard! Our spirits rose within us.
I tore off my clothes, and jumped into the water. After working for some time, with the aid of a shovel, I brought to the surface a piece of rusty sheet iron. Nothing more could be found. We gathered round the worn sheet of metal, and held a solemn consultation.
The conclusion was reached that the piece of iron which we found was in reality a part of one of Captain Kidd's chests, which had become rust-eaten and crumbled, and which had been torn asunder by the growing roots of the tree, and parts of it carried in various directions by them as they had spread, scattering the contents through the ground.
We became animated with a new purpose; and the old sailor seized a shovel and began vigorously to throw more earth from the excavation; but darkness was falling, and we urged him to wait until the next morning.
"What about the sand already thrown out?" some one exclaimed at this juncture. The suggestion had hardly been offered before we all bent forward, and thrust our hands into the pile of wet, black sand lying about us.
I at once felt something round and suggestive. "Look at this!" I cried. It was a blackened gold coin! In the darkness we hurriedly sifted the sand with our fingers; and each one soon found several pieces of money.
With feverish energy, we thus labored until late in the night, meeting with constant success; and, when we stopped, every one had a precious pile to carry back to the shore. The coins were all corroded and misshapen through the action of the salty mud in which they had lain, and the disturbance caused by the roots of the trees. A few silver coins were found, but all were in a very worn condition; some being little more than ragged discs of the thickness of paper. Others, or the remains of them, crumbled into a black powder at the touch of our fingers. The gold was