ng-hole, as it were: the escape of confined air
through such a vent would be apt to draw water along with it. By the
way, let's have a look at this same chest: it looks solid enough to hold
something valuable."

"I would like, in the first place, to hear what General Trednoke has to
say about what I have told him," said Freeman, clearing his throat.

"Miriam," said the general, "do you wish to be married to this young
man?"

The old soldier was sitting with her hand in his, and he turned to her
as he spoke. She threw her arms round his neck, and pressed her face
against his shoulder. "He is to me what you were to mamma," she said, so
that only he could hear.

"Then be to him what she was to me," answered the general, kissing her.
"Ah me, little girl! I am old, but perhaps this is the right way for
me to grow young again. Well, if you are of the same mind six months
hence----"

"Worse; it will be much worse, then," murmured the professor. "Better
make it three."

The chest was made of some alloy of steel and nickel, impervious to
rust, and very hard. It resisted all gentle methods of attack, and it
was finally found necessary to force the lock with a charge of powder.
Within was found another case, which was pried open with the point of
the general's bowie-knife.

It was filled to the brim with precious stones, most of them removed
from their settings. But such of the gold-work as remained showed the
jewels to be of ancient Aztecan origin. There was value enough in the
box to buy and stock a dozen ranches as big as the general's, and leave
heirlooms enough to decorate a family larger than that of the most
fruitful of the ancient patriarchs.

"I call that quite a respectable dowry," remarked Meschines. "Upon my
soul, Miriam, if I had known what you had up your sleeve, I should have
thought twice before allowing a 'civil engineer'--do you remember?--to
run off with you so easily."

At dawn, they prepared the body of old Kamaiakan for its interment. In
doing this, the professor noted the peculiar appearance of the corpse.

"The flesh is absolutely withered," said he, "especially those parts
which were uncovered. It must have been subjected to the action of some
destructive vapor or gas, fatal not only to breathe, but to come in
contact with. I have heard of poisonous emanations proceeding from the
ground in these regions, but I never saw an instance of their effects
before. That skull that you say you found,