farther and farther down, and sudden revelation of the truth.—rising superior to circumstances.—the “pot of money,” and other buried treasures.—they take all these exhumed treasures to dr. porter.—singular reception of the excited visitors.
in deep excitement they continued to dig in silence, and thus came gradually nearer to the object of their search. at last the loose earth was all thrown out, and only the old hardbound soil was left; while there, at the bottom of the cavity, lay exposed a portion of an iron surface, dented now and scratched by the blows which it had received. it was very rusty; the rust, in fact covered it in great scales, showing that it must have been buried there for many years. as yet only a few square inches of the surface were visible, and it was impossible to tell as yet what it was. but they all felt sure that it was an iron chest.
bruce now took his pickaxe, and began loosening the hard-bound earth that surrounded the hole.
“it’s lucky it’s so near the surface,” said bart.
“i suppose he hadn’t time to bury it any deeper,” said phil.
“no,” said arthur; “he must have been hurrying off, you know.”
“perhaps we won’t be able to lift it,” said tom. “what’ll we do then?”
“we’ll have to get solomon and captain corbet,” said phil.
“for that matter,” said bart, “we can rig up blocks and pulleys, and hoist it up. we’ll have to dig all around it, though.”
“we may not have it done to-night.”
“if it’s very heavy, we won’t.”
“but we must.”
“o, yes, it wouldn’t do to leave it till morning.”
“can’t we get lights?”
“if we do get lights, we’d better postpone it till midnight.”
“but we ought to do as much as we can by daylight.”
“o, of course, while the daylight lasts, we’ll keep at it.”
bruce now laid down his pickaxe, and they went to work with their shovels, and at last the loose earth was thrown out once more. they had now uncovered what seemed like one side of the top of the box, and its edge was plainly apparent. the rest of it was still covered by the superincumbent soil.
“that’s the edge of the box,” said bart. “we didn’t hit it fair in the centre.”
“it’s a good-sized box, too.”
“and it’ll be awfully heavy.”
“i wonder if it is much larger.”
“we’d better uncover the rest of it, so as to see the size of it. there don’t seem to be any kind of rivets here, or anything of that sort.”
“o, you can’t tell. it’s so covered with rust.”
“countersunk rivets on an iron plate would be quite concealed if they were all covered with scales of rust.”
“come, i’ll dig more on this side,” said bruce, taking up his pickaxe again. a few blows directed against the other side served to loosen the earth there, and the eager boys soon threw it out, and laid bare more of the surface. bruce worked away with his pickaxe at the same time. there was now room for only two to work. the others looked on with beating hearts.
“hallo!” cried bruce, suddenly.
“what?” asked bart.
“why, the top’s loose!”
“loose! hurrah! we can lift it off then, and get into the box.”
bruce said nothing, but stooped down. bart, who had been digging, stooped down, too. the other boys crowded around.
bruce dug his fingers into the earth by the edge of the iron, and rattled it with his hands. then he tried to lift it up.
it moved!
as it moved, he worked his fingers underneath it, and raised it up on its edge.
he said not one word, but lifted it up, and held it before the eyes of the “b. o. w. c.”
and as they looked at it they were struck dumb, and stood paralyzed with amazement and disgust.
for there, in bruce’s hands, held up to the light of day, the iron lid of the iron money-chest, that coffer lid that concealed so much treasure, buried long ago by the fugitive frenchman, to be exhumed by their fortunate hands,—that iron lid which had been the source of so much excitement and hope, had resolved itself into nothing better than a rusty old ploughshare!
again holding it till he was tired, bruce handed it solemnly to bart.
“here, bart,” said he, “i’ll give all my share to you.”
“and i present all that you give me and all my own to tom,” said bart, taking it and passing it on to tom.
tom took it and handed it to arthur.
“i make it over to you, arthur,” said he.
“and i make it over to phil,” said arthur.
phil took it.
“very well,” said he. “i hereby give and bequeath all my right, title, and interest, in and to the said ploughshare, to the academy museum, its curators and officials, to have and to hold forevermore, amen, and anything to the contrary thereof in any wise notwithstanding.”
by this time the boys had recovered from their astonishment, disappointment, and disgust.
“that comes of being so sanguine,” said bart. “boys, why would you allow yourselves to grow so excited?”
“fancy a fugitive acadian solemnly burying his plough.”
“it was all he had, poor wretch, i dare say.”
“but why bury it in his cellar? why not in his potato field?”
“for my part, i don’t believe in the acadian french.”
“i think they’re humbugs.”
“and this is all that remains of the wealth of ‘benedict bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer in grand pré!”
“perhaps he intended it as a quiet hint to show those who were in a hurry to get rich the true source of wealth. the plough is that, you know; so the copy-books all say, at any rate.”
“well, i’m glad we’ve got even this. it makes arch?ologists of us. we’ll make it a present to the museum, the doctor’ll be delighted. perhaps he’ll give us an extra holiday. every scale of rust will be precious in his eyes; and he’ll paste a nice label on it, with all our names immortalized, and the date of the discovery. it will be the chief treasure of the museum. where’ll david diggs’s crystal be, or billymack’s moss agate, or jiggins’s petrifactions, beside our plough?”
“i wonder if we couldn’t find something else, so as to make a handsome thing out of it. an old rusty nail would be better than nothing.”
“that’s a capital idea,” cried bruce, seizing his pickaxe again. “never say die, boys. we’ll go back covered with glory, after all, and our names will be handed down to future generations of boys yet to come to the old place.”
saying this, bruce began working away once more with his pickaxe; and the others, excited by this new idea, and the prospect of gaining some kind of a reward for all their toil, took their shovels again, and waited till bruce should loosen the earth sufficiently for them to dig it.
at length this was done, and they began to shovel it out. they had not worked five minutes before tom cried,—
“hallo! here’s something, at any rate.”
saying this, he stooped down and picked something out of the ground, which he showed the boys. they examined it eagerly, and saw that it was a colter, probably belonging to the plough, from which the ploughshare had been taken. scarcely had he handed this to the boys than he saw lying at his feet an iron bolt. this encouraged them all the more. the colter and the bolt were placed beside the ploughshare, and they worked on vigorously, each one hoping to make some discovery of his own.
in a little while bruce struck something, which, on examination, proved to be the end of a chain. after diligent labor he succeeded in detaching it all from the ground, and laid it down upon the grass. it was an ox chain, about six feet long.
this, of course, only increased their excitement; so they all went to work again.
at last phil, with all his strength, dragged something out of the ground, and with a shout put it down beside the other things. it was a small iron pot, which had been used for cooking. it was now full of earth, and phil, seizing the colter, began to pick it out.
“this is the famous pot,” cried phil, with a laugh; “but the money inside has all turned to dust because we dug it in the daytime.”
“money?” cried arthur. “don’t laugh about money. what do you say to that?”
and he held out on his open palm three very dirty coins. what they were they could not tell, whether silver, or iron, or what. they looked like very dirty round stones. the boys took them and examined them carefully. bart drew his knife, and scraped off the rust and canker.
“more of old benedict bellefontaine,” said he, at last. “we can’t make anything out of him. see here!”
and holding out the coin, he showed where he had scraped it. there they could read, faintly marked, letters, which formed the following:—
un sou
they were somewhat disappointed at this, and scraped the other coins, but found them all copper.
“pooh!” said arthur; “what’s the odds? to an archaeologist isn’t a copper coin as precious as a gold one? of course it is. hallo, phil! haven’t you got that pot cleaned out yet? i’ve got an idea. i’ll put these sous in the pot, and then we can say that we’ve found a pot of money. we’ll be generous, too—we’ll give it all to the museum.” phil’s pot by this time was empty, and arthur laughingly threw the sous into it. after this they began their search again, and enlarged the hole in hopes of finding more around the sides. and in this they were successful, for they found, near, a dozen more copper coins, which made a very respectable appearance in the pot, and in addition to these, about a dozen bits of iron—nails, spikes, and bolts.
“hallo, boys! look here!” cried bart, suddenly. he held in his hand an old, discolored bone. “talking about relics,” said he, “here’s a relic of the original owner. the question is though, is it a human bone?”
“pooh!” said arthur; “it’s an ox bone, or a horse.”
“not a bit of it,” said bart. “i’m determined that it shall be benedict bellefontaine.”
“it’s a horse’s bone,” said phil.
“no,” said bart; “i’ll keep it carefully, and let the doctor have it. it will be the most precious article in the museum.”
it was now growing too dark to work any longer. the sun had set, and they were satisfied with the result of their labors. so they gathered together their treasures, and set out for the academy.
these treasures seemed to them to be by no means despicable.
they were,—
1 ploughshare,
1 colter,
4 bolts,
1 chain,
1 iron pot,
3 nails,
2 bits of iron,
2 spikes,
13 copper coins,
1 bone.
and any one who has ever been connected with a small museum, or has ever been acquainted with those who are connected with a valuable institution like that, will easily understand the value of articles like these, exhumed direct from the cellar of an old acadian house.
the boys felt no doubt whatever as to the value of their treasure. in fact, they grew so excited over it that they began at last to think what they had found far better than what they hoped to find; and so it resulted that those who had gone out to find gold came back rejoicing in rusty iron.
on reaching the academy they went at once to dr. porter’s house. they found the doctor at home, and were ushered up at once to his study.
the boys said nothing, but gravely, and in impressive silence, laid down their treasures on the doctor’s study table. it was covered with books and papers; but they were too oblivious of every thing, and too much absorbed in the contemplation of their own things, to think of that.
so bruce entered first, and placed on the doctor’s table, right over some handsome volumes of euripides, just received from london, the rusty, dirty old ploughshare.
“hallo!” cried the doctor. “why! what!—”
but before he could finish his sentence, tom came up, and laid down a dozen old spikes and nails. both of them turned and looked proudly at the doctor.
“look here, boys,” cried the doctor, standing up; “what—”
he was interrupted by phil, who came forward between him and the first boys, carrying an iron pot, which he triumphantly placed on a handsomely bound hebrew lexicon.
“what in the world—” began the doctor again, but was again interrupted by arthur, who solemnly placed the colter on a new edition of longinus, and then put the chain on some late english quarterly reviews. just as the doctor was about to burst forth, bart came immediately before him, and, with a face radiant with delight, laid down, right on the doctors blotting pad, that horrible, discolored, and disintegrated old bone.
0173
for a moment it seemed that the doctor would burst forth in a fury. to him this behavior was the sublimity of unparalleled impudence; the act was so absolutely unequalled in its quiet audacity, that it actually made him dumb with amazement. the ploughshare, the colter, the iron pot, the rusty spikes and bolts, the old chain,—all these were so many stages up which his astonishment went to a climax which was fully attained when bart put down the abominable old bone.
this was too much.
then the doctor burst forth.
but not in fierce and furious indignation, and vehement and violent denunciation. it struck him in another way. it was his sense of the ridiculous that was affected. he forgot the ruin done to his precious editions of the classics, and his mind could only grasp the innocent, smiling faces of these five young rascals who had come into the awful seclusion of his own study to pile up his inviolable study table with old iron and old bones.
and so it was that the doctor burst forth into an uncontrollable fit of laughter,—not a common laugh, but one which was sent forth from the very depths of his nature,—all absorbing, overwhelming. peal after peal, irrepressible. it was contagious, too. the boys caught it. they tried to restrain themselves at first. they tittered. they began to see themselves the absurdity of their act. the thought overcame them, and they all burst forth, too. the whole company thus went off into fearful explosions—cataclysms, in fact, of laughter.
it roused the house.
the family came running up to see the cause.
the doctor could not utter a word. tears were running from his eyes; he could only point in silence to the old iron and old bone. the contagion seized upon the family also, and they all went off into the general laughter.
at length the boys took the things off the table, and put them on the floor. gradually the doctor recovered his self-control, and asked the boys what it all meant. they told him all about it. he listened to them with a serious face, which, however, was occasionally disturbed by a tendency to another outburst, as again and again the thought of the past scene forced itself back. finally, he managed to get the whole story, and by that time his laughter passed, and was succeeded by a new sensation.
it was one of intense delight at such discoveries. now they appeared before him, not as old iron and old bone, but in their true character. he was an enthusiastic antiquarian, and all connected with the acadian french excited his passionate interest. he looked affectionately at the ploughshare. he handled the colter tenderly. he examined one by one, with minute inspection, the spikes and the bolt. he scanned narrowly and admiringly the iron pot. he passed every link of the rusty chain through his fingers. he lingered long and lovingly over the coins, closely examining every one of them. he looked at the bone with an intense curiosity, mingled with deep sympathy for the unfortunate race of which it was the reminder.
he threw himself into his admiration over these with the same abandonment of feeling that had characterized his laughing fit. it was a proud and a delightful moment for the boys when they found that their discoveries were so highly prized. the doctor declared that there was nothing in the museum to be compared with them, and finally sent for messrs. simmons and long. these gentlemen soon appeared, and exhibited an interest in these acadian relics which was fully equal to that of the doctor.
but the wonder was, to all of them, how in the world the boys had happened to think of digging in that particular place. they questioned them closely, though good humoredly, about this; and bart, after vain efforts at eluding the questions, finally told the whole story.
bart told that story in such a whimsical way, and with such an eye to effective representation, that in five minutes he had all his audience in another roar of laughter, worse than the first. he mimicked captain corbet with his mineral rod. he told about the lights and the magic ceremonies. he took off solomon capitally, and finally spoke of the donkey’s bray, and its result, concealing nothing of their own terror. bart went on, interrupted all the time by the laughter of his hearers, and at last succeeded in bringing his story down to the moment in which he was speaking.
