upper lip and the great striped chest snapped at us like a wild animal came the huge lid into its place and the glasses on the swinging rack sang and with the shock the mate sat down on the edge of the table and shivered like a frightened horse you ve saved my life captain said he so this was the secret of the striped treasure chest of old don di and this was how he preserved his ill gotten gains from the and i green flag etc the province of be the thief ever so cunning he could not tell that golden from the other articles of value and the instant that he laid hand upon it the terrible spring was and the were driven into his brain while the shock of the blow sent the victim backwards and enabled the chest to close itself how many i wondered had fallen victims to the ingenuity of the of and as i thought of the possible history of that grim striped chest my resolution was very quickly taken carpenter bring three men and carry this on deck going to throw it overboard sir yes mr not superstitious as a rule but there are some things which are more than a sailor can be called upon to stand no wonder that made heavy weather captain with such a thing on board the glass is dropping fast sir and we are only just in time so we did not even wait for the three sailors but we carried it out the mate the carpenter and i and we pushed it with our own hands over the there was a white of water and it was gone there it lies the striped chest a thousand deep and if as they say the sea will some day be dry land i grieve for the man who finds that old box and tries to penetrate into its secret a shadow before the th of july found john a ruined of the stock exchange upon the th he was a very man and yet he had effected the change leaving the little irish of which could have been bought outright for a quarter of the sum which he had earned during the single day that he was within its walls there is a romance of yet to be written a story of huge forces which are for ever and of bold operations of breathless suspense of failure of deep which are baffled by others still more subtle the mighty debts of each great european power stand like so many columns of for ever rising and falling to indicate the pressure upon each he who can see far enough into the future to tell how that column will stand to morrow is the man who has fortune within his grasp john had many of the gifts which lead a to success he was quick in observing just in prompt and fearless in acting but in there is rs the element of luck which however one may it still remains like the blank at a constantly present upon the and so it was that bad the green flag etc come to grief on the best he had in the funds of a south american republic in the days before south american had been found out the republic and lost his money he had the shares of a scotch railway and a four months strike had hit him hard he had helped to a coffee company in the hope that the public would come along upon the feed and gradually away some of his holding but the political sky had been clouded and the public had refused to invest everything which he had touched had gone wrong and now on the eve of his marriage young clear headed and energetic he was actually a had his chosen to make him one but the stock exchange is an indulgent body what is the case of one to day may be that of another to morrow and is interested in seeing that the stricken man is given time to rise again so the burden of was lightened for him many shoulders helped to bear it and he was able to go for a httle summer tour into for the doctors had ordered him rest and change of air to restore his shaken nervous system thus it was that upon the th of july he found himself at his breakfast in the fly blown coffee room of the george hotel in the market square of it is a dull and room and one which is usually empty but on this particular day it was as crowded and noisy as that of any london hotel every table was occupied and a thick smell of bacon and of fish hung in the air heavily men in and out spurs riding crops were in and there was a general atmosphere of horse a shadow before the conversation too was of nothing else from every side heard of of of of of of a hundred other terms which were as unintelligible to him as his own stock exchange would have been to the company he asked the waiter for the reason of it all and the waiter was an astonished man that there should be anyone in this world who did not know it it s the horse fair your honour � the greatest horse fair in all it lasts for a wake and the folk come from far an near � from england an scotland an if you look out of the your honour you ll see the horses and it s your honour s conscience must be or you wouldn t so sound that the didn t rouse you with their clatter had a recollection that he had heard a confused murmur which had itself with his dreams � a sort of steady beating and � and now when he looked through the window 