e fixed:

"I see you anchored under a little settlement. You are rowing ashore.
Dere are little pathways running up among de coral rock, and a few white
houses. And, yes! Dere is a man in overalls, on de roof of a building,
seeming like a little schoolhouse. He waves to you; he is getting down
from de roof to meet you. But his face is in a mist, I can't see him
right. Now he is gone."

He stopped and waited awhile. Then he resumed:

"Seems to be a forest; big, big trees--not like Nassau trees--and thick
brush everywhere; all choked up so thick and dark, can't see nut'n. Wait
a minute, dough. Dere seems to be old houses all sunk in and los', like
old ruins. Can't see dem right for de brush. And wait--Lord love you,
sar, but I'se afraid--I seem to see a big light coming up trough de
brush from far under de ground--just like you see old rotten wood
shining in de dark--deep, deep down. Didn't I tell you de Lord gave me
eyes to see into de bowels of de earth?--it's de bowels of de earth for
sure--all lit up and shining. Praise de Lord!--it am de gold, for
certain, all hidden away and shining dere under de ground--"

"Can't you see it closer, clearer?" I exclaimed involuntarily; "get some
idea of the place it's in?"

The old man gazed with a renewed intensity.

"No," he said presently, and his disappointed tone seemed to me the best
evidence yet of his truth, "I only see a little golden mist deep, deep
down under de ground; now it is fading away. It's gone; I can only see
de woods and de ruins again."

This brought his visions to an end. The spirits obstinately refused to
make any more pictures, though the old man continued to gaze on in the
decanter stopper for fully five minutes.

"De wind of de spirit bloweth as it listeth," said he at length, with
the note of a more genuine piety in his voice than at the beginning; and
there was a certain hushed gravity in his manner as we said good-bye,
which made me feel that there had been something in his visions that had
even surprised and solemnised himself.

CHAPTER IV

_In Which We Take Ship Once More._

The discovery which--through my friend the dealer in "marine
curiosities"--I had made, or believed myself to have made, of the
situation of Henry P. Tobias's second "pod" of treasure, fitted in
exactly with Charlie Webster's wishes for our trip, small stock as he
affected to take in it at the moment.

As the reader may recall, "Short Shrift Island" lay a few