Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1922-02-10
SPANISH By H R4N555z
DOUBLOONS : :::::=

! cutlass, and a chased silver shoe
buckle. / shall take the buckle home
to Helen-and yet now trivial it will
seem, with all else that / have to Of
fer her! Nevertheless she will prize
| it as my gift, and because it comes
from the place to which some kind
angel led me for her sake.
Il left the cave and hurried back to
! the cabin for spade, walking on air,
breaking with snatches of song the
terrible stiffness of the woods, where
one hears only the high fitful signing
Of the wind, or the eternal mutter Of
the sea.
Back in the cave, / set to work
feyerishly, making the light sand fly.
At the end Of half an hour, at a point
| close to the angle of the wall my
spade struck hard surface. 1t lay,
| should judge, under about two feet
of sand. Soon had laid bare patch
of dark wood which rang under my
knuckles almost like iron. A little
more, and had cleared away the
sand from the top of a large chest
with convex lid, heavily bound in
brass.
"Furiously flung the sand aside
until the chest stood free for half it's
depth-which is roughly three feet. It
has handles at the ends, great hand
wrought loops of metal l tugged my
| hardest, but the chest seemed fast in
its place as the native rock. ]
laughed exultantly. The weight meant
gold-gold! I had hammer and chisel
with me, and with these forced the
massive ancient locks. There were
three Of them, one for each strip Of
brass which bound the chest. Then ]
| flung up the lid.
mo glittering treasure dazzled me.
saw only a surface of stained cam
vas, tucked In carefully around the
edges. This / tore off and flung aside
-eclipsing poor Benny, who was
most interested spectator of my
strange proceedings. Still no CLEAN Of
gold, merely demure rows Of plump
brown bags. With both hands I
reached for them. Oh, to grasp them
| all! / had to be content With two, be-
cause they were so heavy, so blessedly
| heavy!
II spread the square Of canvas on
the sand, cut the strings from the bags
and poured out-gold, gold! All fair
shining golden coins they were, not
paltry silver piece among themI And
they made a soft golden music as
| fboxy Foil IN, n rrInrio,1c, x,oIIovy hooYl &
81 don't know how long sat there,
playing with my gold, running it
through my fingers, blinking the coins
together in my palm. Benny came and
shifted at them indifferently, unable to
understand his masters preoccupatiOn.
He thrust his nose into my face and
parked, and said as clearly as with
words, Come, hunt pigP
Benny [ said, wen leave the
pork alone just now. We have work
enough to count our money. We're
rich, old boy, rich, richl'
"Of course, I don't yet know exact
| ~ what the value of the treasure is.
have counted the bags in the chest;
| there are one hundred and fOrty-eight.
Each, so far as | have determined,
contains one thousand doubloons,
which makes total Of one hundred
and forty-eight thousand. Estimating
| each coin for the sake of even figures,
at a value of seven dollars-a safe
minimum-you get one million, thirty
six thousand dollars. And as many
of the coins are ancient / ought to
reap a harvest from collectors.
Besides the coin, / found, rather
surprisingly, laid between the upper
layers of bags, silver crucifx about
nine inches long. It is of very quaint
old workmanship, and badly furnished.
It's money value must be very trif1ing,
compared to the same bulk Of golden
coins. I think it must have had some
special character of sacredness which
led to it's preservation here. 1t is
strange to find such a relic among a
treasure so stained by blood and
crime.
(To BE CoNTINUED)