Later on, when we reached Teneriffe, we did send some of the crystals home, and when we arrived at Bahia we were informed by letter of the result of the assay and of the exact market value per ton of the stuff.
But I will not keep any of my friends who may read this book in suspense. They need not apply to me for an early allotment of shares in the great syndicate. We have not made our fortunes just yet. I will anticipate by giving the assayist’s report. It ran thus:—“Volcanic hornblende. Commercial value—nil.”
But we did not waste much time in building our castles in the air, and returned to business.
Looking from the summit of our hornblende peak the whole island lay stretched out before us like a map, and we could easily distinguish all the features of the Little Piton, which seemed to be about two miles away. On the Admiralty chart the coast and shoals of the Great Salvage are correctly drawn; but this cannot be said of the plan of the Great Piton: this is utterly unreliable. The survey does not profess to be more than a superficial one, but great changes must have occurred here since it was made. There are not wanting signs that the sea has encroached a great deal on the land, and that it is still doing so. In the first place the island is not three miles long, as shown on the chart; its length cannot exceed one mile and a half. The shores, again, are far more irregular in shape, the outer islands and shoals more numerous, than the chart indicates. Perhaps these last have been cut off the island by the sea since the survey. We perceived that the sea was breaking all round the island on far projecting promontories and shallow reefs; but, strangely enough, where the chart does mark one well-defined continuous reef joining the Great Piton to the Little Piton, there appeared to be a broad open channel of deep water.
We saw one likely-looking bay to the southward of our camp, so, while we were waiting for the yacht, we three of us set to with our shovels, and dug parallel trenches in the sand at right angles to the shore, working upwards from a short distance above high-water mark. We did not dig these trenches to a greater depth than three feet, for we then came to a hard soil which to all appearance had never been disturbed. We found it pretty hard work under that fiery subtropical sun, unaccustomed as we were to the use of pick and shovel.
In the afternoon the yacht appeared off the island; so we signalled to her with the flag in the preconcerted manner: “Come to an anchor.” “We will pass the night on shore.” And, whereas eight or more waves of the flag were to signify that we had found a likely place for the hidden treasure, we waved most energetically for quite two minutes—a sanguine signal that must have led my companions on board to conclude that we had at least discovered the first of the chests of dollars.
The yacht came to an anchor off the bay at which we had first landed. The mate came off to us in the dinghy, and I told him our plans and instructed him to send other hands off to us in the morning, together with all necessary stores. He then returned to the yacht, while we passed the night in our hut in the company of the innumerable sleepless fleas.
Early on the following morning—September 15—the boat came off with five more of my companions, which raised our shore-party to nine.
We then shifted our camp from the torture hut of fleas to a sandy spot further to the southward under Hart Hill, and here we pitched the two emigrant tents which had been brought for Trinidad. The boat returned to the yacht for the stores, and brought back to us all the picks, shovels, and crowbars, a forty-gallon tank of water, and plenty of provisions, including a savoury stew of Salvagee rabbits, for our sportsmen had had good luck on the previous day.
After the camp had been put in order the whole party set forth to survey the southern shore, and each, having read the Spaniard’s narrative, gave his opinion as to the most likely spot.
Then we arranged a methodical plan of action, and his portion of work was allotted to each man. We dug trenches in parallel lines in some places, in others we drew them in A shapes, gold prospector’s fashion, generally working in a sandy earth, but sometimes through shingle.
The surface of the island has, no doubt, undergone many changes since 1804, the year in which it is alleged that the treasure was buried. It was therefore often difficult to decide to what depth the trenches should be dug; for we came to a hard, darker soil, which some of us considered to be of ancient formation, undisturbed for centuries, while others were of opinion that loose sand mixing with vegetable matter could easily have consolidated into this in the course of eighty years. When we had dug the trenches as far down as we intended we sounded the earth to a still greater depth by driving in the crowbars at short intervals. At one time some excitement was caused by the discovery of bones, but our doctor pronounced them to be the bones of a whale and not of a human being.
By dinner time we had dug a goodly array of trenches; for we were working energetically despite the burning sun.
While we were enjoying an interval of rest after the midday meal and smoking our pipes, I took those of
