wn to Santa Barbara. That is
a sort of Asbury Park and Coney Island combined, so I have been told."

Dick Rover and the cabman soon returned. The trunks were piled on
the carriage and the boys got in, and away they bowled from the
station in the direction of the Oakland House.

It was about ten o'clock of a clear day in early spring. The boys
had reached San Francisco a few minutes before, taking in the sights
on the way. Now they sat up in the carriage taking in more sights,
as the turnout moved along first one street and then another.

As old readers of this series know, the Rover boys were three in
number, Dick being the oldest, fun-loving Tom next, and sturdy-hearted
Sam the youngest. They were the only offspring of Anderson Rover,
a former traveler and mine-owner, who, at present, was living with
his brother Randolph and his sister-in-law Martha, on their beautiful
farm at Valley Brook, in the heart of New York State.

During the past few years the Rover boys had had numerous adventures,
so many, in fact, that they can scarcely be hinted at here. While
their father was in the heart of Africa, their Uncle Randolph had
sent them off to Putnam Hall Academy. Here they had made many friends
among the boys and also among some folks living in the vicinity,
including Mrs. Stanhope and her daughter Dora, a girl who, according
to Dick Rover's idea, was the sweetest creature in the whole world.
They had also made some enemies, the worst of the number being Dan
Baxter, a fellow who had been the bully of the school, but who was
now a homeless wanderer on the face of the earth. Baxter came from
a disreputable family, his father having at one time tried to swindle
Mr. Rover out of a rich gold mine in the West. The elder Baxter was
now in prison suffering the penalty for various crimes.

A term at school had been followed by an exciting chase on the ocean,
and then by a trip through the jungle of Africa, whence the Rover
boys had gone to find their long-lost father. After this the boys
made a trip West to establish their parent's claim to the gold mine
just mentioned, and this was followed by a grand trip on the Great
Lakes in which the boys suffered not a little at the hands of the
Baxters. On an island on one of the lakes the Rover boys found a
curious casket and this, on being opened, proved to contain some
directions for locating a treasure secreted in the heart of the
Adirondack Mountains.

"We must locate that treasur