ve knots per hour with ease, although the wind had
scarcely weight enough in it to lift the heavy cloths of her courses.
As the night closed down upon us, however, the breeze acquired a little
more life, and we increased our pace until, at four bells in the first
watch, we were reeling off our eight knots by the log. About midnight
we passed through quite a large fleet of craft, homeward-bound; and when
day dawned, some seven or eight vessels were in sight ahead of us,
steering to the southward.

At eight o'clock that morning we crossed the Line, by my reckoning; and,
the breeze holding bravely, we had an opportunity to test our sailing
powers against the craft ahead of us; a most exhilarating race
resulting, in which, to the intense satisfaction of all hands on board
the _Esmeralda_, that tidy little barque eventually proved the victor.

Now, it must not be supposed that, because I have abstained from any
mention of the cryptogram since the outset of the voyage, I had
forgotten all about it; on the contrary, it occupied nearly all the
attention I could spare from the ordinary business of the ship, and the
claims of my passengers upon it. But, so far, without the slightest
useful result. When we crossed the Line I was just as far from its
interpretation as I had been when I first abstracted it from its place
of concealment in the sword-belt of my respected ancestor. Many an hour
had I spent in the privacy of my own cabin, with the precious document
outspread upon the little folding-table secured to the bulkhead, framing
tables of letters corresponding with the figures of the cryptogram, and
trying every possible combination I could think of, but not a particle
of sense could I make of it; indeed, I had failed to get any result that
bore even the most remote resemblance to anything like a language. I
even at last went to the length of telling Sir Edgar and Lady Desmond
and Miss Merrivale of my difficulty; and, acting upon the laughing
suggestion of the latter that the attempt to solve the puzzle would be a
welcome recreation, made three copies of the first line of the document,
and handed one to each of them, in order that they might have an
opportunity of trying their wits upon it. This was on the day that we
crossed the equator; and, during the whole of that day, when their
attention was not diverted by the overtaking of one or another of the
craft in company, and the frequent exchange of signals--and, indeed, fo