not get this thought out of my mind, and it works me up into a
great state of excitement. Then objections crop up--this one among
others: the bottle might be swept against the rocks and smashed ere
ever it could get out of the tunnel. Very true, but what if, instead
of a bottle a diminutive, tightly closed keg were used? It would not
run any danger of being smashed and would besides stand a much better
chance of reaching the open sea.

_September 20_.--This evening, I, unperceived, entered one of the
store houses containing the booty pillaged from various ships and
procured a keg very suitable for my experiment.

I hid the keg under my coat, and returned to the Beehive and my cell.
Then without losing an instant I set to work. Paper, pen, ink, nothing
was wanting, as will be supposed from the fact that for three months I
have been making notes and dotting down my impressions daily.

I indite the following message:

"On June 15 last Thomas Roch and his keeper Gaydon, or rather Simon
Hart, the French engineer who occupied Pavilion No. 17, at Healthful
House, near New-Berne, North Carolina, United States of America, were
kidnapped and carried on board the schooner _Ebba_, belonging to the
Count d'Artigas. Both are now confined in the interior of a cavern
which serves as a lair for the said Count d'Artigas--who is really Ker
Karraje, the pirate who some time ago carried on his depredations in
the West Pacific--and for about a hundred men of which his band is
composed.

"When he has obtained possession of Roch's fulgurator whose power is,
so to speak, without limit, Ker Karraje will be in a position to carry
on his crimes with complete impunity.

"It is therefore urgent that the states interested should destroy his
lair without delay.

"The cavern in which the pirate Ker Karraje has taken refuge is in the
interior of the islet of Back Cup, which is wrongly regarded as
an active volcano. It is situated at the western extremity of the
archipelago of Bermuda, and on the east is bounded by a range of
reefs, but on the north, south, and west is open.

"Communication with the inside of the mountain is only possible
through a tunnel a few yards under water in a narrow pass on the west.
A submarine apparatus therefore is necessary to effect an entrance, at
any rate until a tunnel they are boring through the northwestern wall
of the cavern is completed.

"The pirate Ker Karraje employs an apparatus of this kind--the
subma