Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-04-03
CHAPTER XXI.
WE EXPLODE THE MINES.

I don't design to weary you with close account of our proceedings. How we opened the main deck hatch, rigged up tackles, clapping purchases on the falls, as the cap stan was hard frozen and immovable; how we hoisted the powder barrels on deck, and then by tackles on the foreyard lowered them over the side; how we filled number of bags which we found in the forecastle with pow der; how we measured the cracks in the ice, and sawed couple of spare studdingsail booms into lengths to serve as beams whereby to boise the barrels and bags-would make but sailors talk, half of which would be un- intelligible and the rest wearisome.
 The French,nan worked hard, and VIC snatchcd only half an hour for our dinner The split that had happened in the ice during the night showed by daylight as a gulf be- twiXt eight and ten feet wide st the seaward end, thinning to a width of three feet, never less, to where it ended, ahead of the ship, in a hundred cracks in the ice that showed as if a thunderbolt had fallen just tbere looked into this rent but it was as black as a well past a certain depth and there was no gleam of water. When we went over the side to roll our first barrel of powder to the spot where we meant to lower it, the Frenchman marched up to the figure of Trentanove, and, with no more reverence than boy would show in throwing stone at jackass, tum- bled him into the chasm. He then stepped up to the body of the Portuguese boatswain, dragged him to the same Assure and rolled him into it.
 ''There!" cried he; ''now they are properly buried"
 And with this he went coolly on with his work.
 I said nothing, but was secretly heartily disgusted with this brutal disposal of his miserable shipmateS' remains. However, it was his doing, not mine; and confess the removal of those silent witnesses was a very great relief to me, albeit when considered how Tassard had been awakened, and how both the mate and the boatswain might have been brought to by treatment, felt as though after manner the Frenehman had com mitted murder by burying them SO
 We got our supper and sat smoking and discussing our situation and chances. Tas- sard was tired, and this and our contempla- tion of the probabilities of the morrow so- bered his mind, and he talked with certain gravity He drank sparely and forbore the hideous recollections or inventions he was used to bestow on me, and indeed could find nothing to talk about but the explosion and what it was to do for us. was very glad he did not again refer to his project to bury the treasure and carry the schooner to the Tortugas The subject fired his blood, and it was such nonsense that the mere naming of it was nauseous to mo. Eight and forty years had passed since his ship fell in with thu ice, and not tenfold the treasure in the hold might have purchased for him the sight of so much as single bone of the youngest of those associates whom he idly dreamed of seeking and shipping and sailing in command of. Yet imbecile as was his scheme, having regard to the half century that had elapsed, clearly witnessed the menace to me that it implied. His views were to be read as plainly as if he had delivered them First and fore