adventures and hairbreadth escapes had rendered me unusually wary, and
perceiving a number of people, among whom were two or three sheriff's
officers, approaching my house, I at once interpreted their mission,
and climbing through a trap-door leading on to the roof of the
building, nimbly made my way to the end of the row, and slipping down
a waterpipe easily eluded my enemies. London, however, being now too
hot to hold me, I booked passage on board the _Peterkin_, a Thames
trading vessel of some eighty tons, and sailed for Boston. My flight
had been so hasty that I brought very little with me--nothing in fact
except the clothes I stood in--a stout winter suit of home-spun brown
cloth, a cloak, and a pair of good, strong leather leggings--a purse
of fifty sovereigns (all I had), a knife, pistol and two copies of my
precious book, the third copy, alas! I had left behind in my hurry."

After giving a few unimportant details as to his life on board ship,
Maitland went on to say:--

"Owing to a succession of storms the _Peterkin_ was driven out of her
course, and after narrowly escaping being dashed to pieces on the
Florida reefs, Lat. 24-1/2 deg. N., Long. 82 deg. W., we ran ashore with the
loss of only two lives--the second mate and cabin boy--on the Isthmus
of Yucatan, close to the estuary of a river.[1] Here we were forced to
spend nearly a year, during which time I made several journeys of
exploration into the interior of the continent. In the course of one
of my rambles amid a dense mass of tropical foliage, I suddenly found
myself face to face with a gigantic stone Sphinx, which I at once
recognized and identified. It was Tat-Nuada, an Atlantean deity,
elaborately described in one of the burned books. Much excited, I set
to work, and, after clearing the base of the idol of fungi and other
vegetable growth adhering to it, discovered a superscription in
Atlantean dialect to the effect that the image had been set up there
by one Hullir--to commemorate the destruction of Atlantis, of which
catastrophe Hullir believed himself and his family, _i.e._ his wife
Ozilmeave and daughters, Taramoo and Niketoth, and the crew of his
yacht, the _Chaac-molre_ (ten in number), the sole survivors.

"Here, then, to my unutterable joy, was strong corroborative evidence
of the great disaster narrated in detail in the manuscripts I had
found in Inisturk Island. The existence of Atlantis was now thoroughly
substantiated. On all sides of