en subjected to the action of fire. Zaffre, digested in
_aqua regia_, and diluted with four times its weight of water, is
sometimes employed; a green tint results. The regulus of cobalt,
dissolved in spirit of nitre, gives a red. These colors disappear at
longer or shorter intervals after the material written upon cools, but
again become apparent upon the reapplication of heat.

"I now scrutinized the death's-head with care. Its outer edges--the
edges of the drawing nearest the edge of the vellum--were far more
_distinct_ than the others. It was clear that the action of the
caloric had been imperfect or unequal. I immediately kindled a fire,
and subjected every portion of the parchment to a glowing heat. At
first, the only effect was the strengthening of the faint lines in the
skull; but, upon persevering in the experiment, there became visible,
at the corner of the slip, diagonally opposite to the spot in which the
death's-head was delineated, the figure of what I at first supposed to
be a goat. A closer scrutiny, however, satisfied me that it was
intended for a kid."

"Ha! ha!" said I, "to be sure I have no right to laugh at you--a
million and a half of money is too serious a matter for mirth--but you
are not about to establish a third link in your chain--you will not
find any especial connection between your pirates and a goat--pirates,
you know, have nothing to do with goats; they appertain to the farming
interest."

"But I have just said that the figure was _not_ that of a goat."

"Well, a kid, then--pretty much the same thing."

"Pretty much, but not altogether," said Legrand. "You may have heard
of one _Captain_ Kidd. I at once looked upon the figure of the animal
as a kind of punning or hieroglyphical signature. I say signature,
because, its position upon the vellum suggested this idea. The
death's-head at the corner diagonally opposite, had, in the same
manner, the air of a stamp, or seal. But I was sorely put out by the
absence of all else--of the body to my imagined instrument--of the text
for my context."

"I presume you expected to find a letter between the stamp and the
signature."

"Something of that kind. The fact is, I felt irresistibly impressed
with a presentiment of some vast good fortune impending. I can
scarcely say why. Perhaps, after all, it was rather a desire than an
actual belief;--but do you know that Jupiter's silly words, about the
bug being of solid gold, had a rem