The Kootenai herald. [volume] (Kootenai, Idaho) 1891-1904, 1894-01-20

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ference of the crew, who threatened to
report their conduct and their cruelties
as soon as they entered port. This
made them let up little, but it also
set them to thinking. Learning that
they might get into the clutches of the
law If they carried Luke TO Charleston,
where he could make a complaint, they
determined to maroon him.
A course was steered for the cluster
of islands mentioned, and on reaching
them the captain had himself and Luke
pulled ashore on pretense of seeking
some shell gatherers.
The island that the captain selected
was about five miles from the nearest
neighbor and entirely uninhabited. 1t
was only about a mile across in any di-
rection, but fairly well wooded and
contained a fine spring of fresh water.
Shortly after getting into the woods,
out of sight of the sailors in the yawl,
the captain informed Luke that he was
to be left there and threatened to kill
!
Luke was rather pleased than other
wise and the captain finally showed up
on the beach and reported the boy to
have run away from him and concealed
himself. The boat was ordered to pull
off al once, and when Luke Smith crept
down to the beach it was to behold the
schooner three miles distant. The
first thing he did, as he Afterwards
told me, was to hunt for fresh water.
He not only found the spring, hut he
discovered an abundance of wild fruit
in the woods, and along the shore he
found oysters in plenty. One of the
sailors, probably mistrusting the cap
tain's intentions, had secretly furnished
the boy with sheathknife, some mat
ches, fish line and handful of salt
1t was about 10 o'clock in the fore
fore midnight he had satisfied. his hun
ger for the first time in weeks and built
himself shelter. That was his intro
duction TO Crusoe life, which lasted
until ONAOOGA IL 1JulAnS lnC SlA
months no one landed at the island
and he saw no sail within three or
four miles. His bill of fare consisted of
fruits, berries, roots, oysters, fish and
wild onions. He caught several turtles,
but not knowing how to prepare them
he could not use them. Now and then,
to vary his diet, he killed a bird, but
the only species he could lay hold of
were rather rank instaste.
The sth day of August was memora-
BILE for Luke Smith. A heavy sea had
been beating on the west side of the
island for two days previous, and the
tide had been unusually high. Along
the western shore, just at average
high water mark, was a continuous
bluff five or six feet high. AS Luke
walked along the beach on the fore
noon of the 8th, with the tide out, he
noticed that the bluff had been badly
cut into in places. At one spot a great
tree had been uprooted and carried off
by the waves, and as the boy looked
into the hole thus left he saw what APP.
peared to be a wooden box about 16
inches square. 1t took all his strength
to lift it out of the sands, and searching
about he discovered four more just like
it. They were iron bound cedar boxes,
and were full of gold and silver coins
and had no doubt been buried for 90
years or more.
The money was nearly all Spanish
and counted up nearly SIS, 900 to the box.
Who buried it will never be known, but
there are those who connect it with a
Cuban filibustering expedition of years
ago.
Luke Smith was taken off the island
by revenue cutter on the day 1 have
named, and of course his money went
with him. Had it been almost any
other craft he would probably have
been robbed of goodly portion. The
captain of the cutter not only landed
him at Pensacola, but stood by him
until the courts appointed a legal
guardian.
Luke was at once sent to school and
in due time to college, and today he is
one of the brightest lawyers in Louis
Vile. The captain who left him on
Doubloon island, as it is now called,
expecting him to die of starvation,
heard of the treasure find, as did hun