THE OREGON DAILY, JOURNAL PORTLAND. SATURDAY ; EVENING, NOVEMBER 7, 1003. GOOD . STORIES . FOR . CHILDREN By WALT McDOUGALE A SEARCH FOR PIRATE TREASURE WHICH ENDED HAPPILY FOR A SMALL BOY. WHO i. "... . AFTER A LONQ AND. PATIENT INVESTIGATION HE DISCOVERED AN ANCIENT HIDING PLACE. AND WAS FULLY REWARDED ; V KEPT HIS THOUGHTS ABOUT HIM ON A winter day, when the snow was falling and the noise of . the surf beating on the shore of the Sound and the whis tling of the wind made the big bare garret echo with peculiar noises alT its-own, two childen were playing among - the broken furniture, old chests and other rubbish stored there. This was one hundred and fifty years ago, and children haT Bo such toys as they have now. A rag-baby, home-nrde, was the best doll any girl had and as' for the boys, I cannot discover . that they had anything beyond a stick talay horsa with or a , Wooden gun whittled out by an obliging brother. : y; ' "' These two children were making believe very hard,' indeed, and were playing Indians and settlers, a game still a favorite all over our land. The ! oy in hiding behind a decayed old sea-chest, , Jron-bound'and black even then with age. felt something pro truding from crnch at the bottom of the chest. - lie drew it , forth, and taking it to the light law that it was a folded piece of ' ' jarchment upon which was written these words: ' 1 Ten paces north of 'ye landing ' place, of Ye Barking Dogge under a pake tree at ye egge of ye highe tide mark 'tis planted. THOS. LAWRENCE (His X Mark). JULIO CONDOM AR. . Although both of the children could read written char acters easily, neither of them attached any importance to this writing; in fact, their mother, who was a woman of little educa tion, considered that it was a riddle of some sort. Sho placed the parchment in the family Bible, intending to show it to "her husband-on his return from sea. lie never returned, ai;d tho two children grew up, were married and had children of their own. , 'And all this time the parchment reposed in thj Bible, for gotten by all. Then, one day, it was rediscovered and it excited s great discussion. Tales of hidden treasure were common along : tho Atlantic coast in the last century, and the mysterious writ- , ing seemed to point directly to some such matter, but so vague was thin wording of tho parchment it was considered impossible to decipher its meoiung, if, indeed, it would have any meaning. Bo after it had been talked over for several weeks by many peo ple,' none of whom were very clever at puzzles, it was finally ' placed amonj the old letters, jewels tnd other -amiiy treasures and almost forgotten. - , Occasionally, as at Thanksgiving time or Christmas, when ell the branches of ihe Lawrence family, for that was their name, were gathered together, the memory of the mystic parchment was revived. Some few facts had thus been committed to tradition.- Thus it was brought out hat-Thomas Lawrence very likely the very first of the name had been a sea captain, and .what moro probable than that he had been a pirate in those dark Id ays when fairly good men followed that calling without fear of reproach! - It is known that commissions were often given by kings and queens of unblemished character to certain captains to prey upon the Spaniard or the Frenchman whenever and wherever they met them. And when in the collection of the Connecticut Historical Society there was found another paper signed by Thomas Law rence," the rame being a well-drawn map of " the Spanish Main, Interest -was revived in the time-stained document m a sandal wood tax in Grandma Iwrence's bedroom. , . "The Barking Dogge" was fondly supposed by the family to have b?en tho name of the old mariner's ship, and many were i the wishes breathod that her "landing place" might be learned. More than a century passed, and then Mr. Amos Lawrence, who was a college graduate, put his intellect to the task of col lecting and publishing all the facts regarding the traditional captain. But even 'ie found little-that could be regarded as certain. ' ' Although for many years he diligently searched ancient rec ords to learn from what port sailed "The Barking Dogge" and who her owners were, he never found her n-me in any shipping list He traced every other ship with which his ancestor had ever been connected, and unearthed many, a strange bit of his tory regarding that ancient mariner, and bis voyage3 iu Holland, Madagascar, Ceylon, Cadiz and Brazil, but no lign cf a Dogge, either silent or barking, did he eve? encov iter. ; i At last he died, leaving all his papers, including the mysteri ous parchment, to his son Elias, who never thought rgain about the matter, but went into the whaling business. The family wealth had' been pretty nearly exhausted by his father's re searches in so many lands, and it was necessary to earn some money instead of dreaming about a problematical pirate's hidden store of jrold. - " : Elias claimed that the writing -was merely a memorandum of his ancestor, and thought it probably referred to the setting out of some new or foreign tree or plant, a common performance with our thrifty forefathers, who, unlike-the people 6f .the pres ent day, planted or huilded for their successors", enjoyment or ; ;profit. ' ' - v Alas for the hopes and plans of Elias t The whaling business, as perhaps all children know, was knocked sky-high by the dis covery of kerosene ott, and thereafter the poor innocent whales were allowed to swim the silent seas almost unmolested, and ; jlilias became very poor indeed. , 4LAt laatlia found IhaLoiall his .wealth nothing jemained but h small farm on the shore of the Sound. Upon this, land stood the same old farmhouse in the garret of which had been found, bo long before, the ancient parchment'. v v " r It was a ramshackle, mossy, leaky house that shook with every gale, but its, timbers were still sound and firm, whilo the1? rooms were as large as most modern houses. placed it in an old, rusty pocketbook where it bad ro , posed for many years, r 4 Ml think it's a waste of time bothering about it. Fer haps my grcat-grcat-grand-, father was a pirate, as they say, but how can you expect any treasure that he buried could remain undiscovered all these years! Like as not, 'twas buried, somebody's dug 'it up -and spent it a hundred years since. The best way is to for get all about it." But the school teacher, who was very rcmantio and very fond of all sorts of puzzles as well did bother about it a great deal. Yet there was so liule tangible to work upon that he made no progress toward solving the problem. Little by little he pro cured all of the documents that Amos Ltwrence had gathered, and Perry was compelled to listen to Mr. Smeed's speculations day after day until the boy at last knew every fact that his grand father had gathered, as well as all of his adventures while seeking for records of the lost ship, "The Barking Dogge.'' r - Perry had no wild ideas regarding hidden treasure; all ho wished was to obtain an education so that he might in time be come State Geologist or State Chemist. But the poor school teacher had a motive in his search. v Mr. Smeed was in love, poor man I Miss Ennis, who was as sistant to the village milliner, had long ago bewitched him, and yet his salary was so pitifully small that he dared liot ask her to share it with him. She would willingly have given up all her future, and, as Mrs. Samuel Q. Smeed, cheerfully assisted him in spending this salary, but Mr. Smeed was not aware of that fact, i . Up to date his nearest approach to a confession cf love had been a daily walk past the milliner's after school and a shy glance within, where sat the trim figure of Miss Ennis, her golden head leaning over as she deftly converted sixty cents'' worth of straw, feathers and wire into a twenty-five dollar hat from Paris. Mr. Smeed yearnid for wealth with a hunger that was en tirely unselfish, for he wished to bestow it 11 upon Miss Ade laide Ennis. but schoc'. teaching has never yet made any man wealthy unless he has invented some new method of making it more unpleasant for children, and he could not do that So he did hanker after the pirate's hidden gold, and, even as ardently as had Amos Lawrence, pondered over the" problem of where the ship "Barking Dogge" had made her landing. A Rust-Eaten, Iron-Bound Chest the Pirates' Treasure Was Revealed ; " Here Elias moved with his family and endeavored, to earn a Scanty living by raising vegetables, catching fish and gathering sof t clams" for the mr.rket. He had a son namedTerry, who was es bright end, clever, a lad as the Lawrence family ever had in it, . although his father said he was a dreamer like his grandfather, Amos Lawrence. ., ' " , When he found that his school days had ended ere they had really begun, Perry was not disheartened. He kept right on. Studying just as if hewTts certain of going to college when tho time arrived, although when one is steering a clam boat' or clean- . ing fish i. is difficult to acquire knowledge. Perry's especial fond ness for history, chemistry and geology had been noted by his teachers, and one of them, himself a poor inan,: devoted much of his spare timejn sailing with Perry and instructing him. The two were boon companions, although Mr. Smeed seemed many years older than the boy. In fact, ho was but twentyrfour and jwas a good deal of c boy still , : . One day while anchored off Charles Island, a tiassy gem jthat adorns the Connecticut coast, Perry happened to mention the family tradition, and Mr. J3meed's curiosity was so arouseVl ' that nothing but a sight of the ancient parchment would satisfy him. Nothing so romantic had ever come his way, and when they returned home tha't night Perry asked. his father if le remem Jbered where the document had been placed. . With much difficulty Elias Lawrence managed to recall its kiding-plaoe and tmearth'it, spreading it out on the kitchen table ' for tb school teacher's inspection.' ;' ' - Mr. Smeed read it carefully, closely studying the handwrit ing and staring at it as if he expected to wrench its hidden mean- ing by boring holes into it with his brown eyes.7At last he said .iwith a sort pf sigh; - r :';ir ": vl "It's beyond me 1 I wonder where The Barking Dogge landed! If that were ascertained, perhaps the rest wotild be easy enough." , t,;. : w. -j-'Li?:, roi.':. "Oh, pshaw I That's what my father thought, and he, spent nil hia time, as well as his money, trying to discover that very : thing," growled Perry's fathe:, as he folded the parchment and 7 He grew pale and thin from loss of sleep, and often while Perry sailed the Alice, their humble clamming ship, across the rippling waters of the Sound, the teacher sat in a brown study with his eyes roving along the distant shore as if seeking some sign of the ancient landing. , At such times he occasionally related dome tale of the Span ish Main, and Perry was thrilled. with the narration of the awful deeds of Morgan, Blackbeard, Montbars the Exterminator," Do Lussan, who became a pirate to pay his bills, Dieppe, Mansf elt and the infamous Olcnnois, who beheaded ninety men all in one day, r The fact that an ancestor of his could have been a member of such a bloody and inhuman profession was not a very cheer ful thought, and .Perry refused to admit it for a moment, but tho teacher had gone pirate-mad. ' ' The boys told Perry that at school he had introduced a course of reading of the "Lives of the Buccaneers," much to their delight and the quick result of which was the prompt appearance off shore on, the next Saturday afternoon of several long, low, rtkish craft of. various cges, all flying home-made black flags - bearing the-awful skull and cross-bones in white. All of the delighted children took as rosy a view of a pirate's career as did Mr. Smeed, so long as'the pirate was ef the distant past yet when they began t a board each other's fraft in mimic fray and. bloody fights resulted Mr, Smeed saw his errori- The result of a more than usually savage encounter between ' tho Bloody Pelican, commanded by Bill Jones, whose real name ; was Orlando Girms, and the Flame of Fury, under Captain 'Blackbeard, once called Herman Wirz, brought the teacher's peculiar views to the attention of the village School Board, , and after he had been talked to by a committee he was notified that his services would not be needed next year. So the mysterious parchment had brought woe to another innocent man, just as if a legacy of disaster followed whoever became interested in deciphering its meaning. Mr. Smeed told of his disastrous finish as Perry took him across to the house where he was to board that week, and he con fessed to the boy why he had so yearned to find the treasure. "Well," remarked Perry, "as .vacation will begin pretty soon -and you would have had to get a job of some sort to keep you going through the summer, I guess it's not so awful bad as it looks." 1 "I'd like to procure some kind of employment about here," resumed Mr. Smeed, "even if there is no prospect of getting the school again next fall." . "TherOiis only one man anywhere about that hires help," Perry broke in,, "and that's old maa Quoggins,'on the Point. He employs men in the summer time to sail catboats for the summer boarders." I did think I'd go into that myself this summer," he added.1 "If beats clamming and fishing." Mr. Smeed asked Perry to sail over to the Point, end they in terviewed Mr. Quoggins, with the result that he promised to en gage Mr. Smeed in July. Perry was much interested in this gruff-looking old man, whose shaggy brows ccncealed a pair of kindly eyes, 'for he had always been terribly afraid of him. " When Mr. Smeed told the old man what had caused the School Board to dispense with his services he roared : : : "Why, gol bing them! O' course they dont want them chil dren to leara any kind o' piracy 'cept takin' summer boarders an' ; being hackmen an' the, like along, slfere I Serves you right fer puttin' other notions inter their heads I Ho, ho I He, he 1" Perry; asked Mr. Quoggins for some information regarding the business of pleaaate-boating, and to his surprise tlu old boat- -man gave him much valuable advice, telling him that if he wished he could use his wharf to land passengers.. Perry was so grateful that he gave the gruff bid man such a glance of thankb that Mr, Quoggins looked aft- him with a smile. ' - "ThatVi nice boy," he said to his wife, as Perry, and tho "I guess it would be pretty hard to stood, would it not!" said Perry. find out where the tavern teacher departed. "He keens his winders clean 1" By that he meant that Perry's eyes were clear and shining with truth and honesty. Two or three days after, when the lad was busy with his lines, as the weakfish were run ning plentifully, old Mr. Quog gins sqiled up alongsjdo and drew his cat-boat up into the wind, holding her there like a horse hitched to -a post, al though the tide ran like a mill- race. "Thought perhaps ye might sell a few fish to me," he. said, smiling, lie merely wished to catch another glance from the lad's clear eyes, as a matter of fact. "I never asked your name," ho added. When Perry told him his name, Mr. Quoggins was surprised. "Why, you must be a sort o' relation o' mine, for my granthcr married a Miss Lawrence. Are you 'Lias' son! Well, well I No wonder I was kinder drawn toward ye. We are cousins! Ain't never heard of it before, eh! Well, bless, your heart; didn't you never hear o' how Becky Lawrence ran away, or rather sailed away, with my grandpop, and how 'Squire Lawrence chased them with a sloop armed with a brass gun. clean to Bermudy! lie wasn't going tor have his gal marry no such name es Quoggins ! Ho! hoi ho! I want you ter come over to my house and read some o' the letters thrt your grandpop wrote about that matter. "Oh, I have a mighty lot of old papers! Some o' them f,oing back to the very first settlers 'round here. Like to ree them!" Perry assured him that he would be pleased to examine them, but really he was merely being" polite, for he had heard so much about old documents that he hated the, sight of them. Yet his politeness was the means of his restoring the fortunes of the Lawrences, for when he went, a few days afterward, to look at Mr. Quoggins' old letters, he found among them a paper that aroused in him the fever, even as Mr. Smeed's had been aroused There, among a mass of old, stained, creased end tattered pieces of paper and parchment C .ting back for two centuries and more, reposed the key to the whole problem ! It was an especially stained and ragged sheet of paper, yellow as saffron with age, and the writinir unon it was scarcely learible. .vet as Perry rather carelessly turned them all over the date upon this one was plain enough to catch his aye. It : ad: "October Tenth, 1669," and as it was perhaps the very oldest piece of paper the boy had ever seen, it arrested his attention, and with some difficulty he managed to decipher the faint writing. It read thus: ; . ' . October Tenth, i66g. Tom Lawrence, Dr., to Jacob Quoggins: To four sides venison ....... 3 shillings To two ducks 6 pence To painting sign of Ye Barking Dogge jind reparing two tables at ye Tavern -. . ". , , 13 shillings 8 pence Received Payt. JACOB QUOGGINS." "The Barking Dogge!" exclaimed Perry. "A signboard! Was there a tavern called 'The Barking Dogge!' " he asked aloud, an J Mr. Quoggins replied: "I reckon if it's writ down there that there was, my boy 1" "Did you ever hear of such a tavern anywhere around here !" asked the boy. "No, I never did ; but that ain't saying there wasn't any. If my great-great-grandpop signed a receipt for money an' men tioned sich' a tavern it surely was somewhere not far from here. . Lnever heard tell of his painting signs, and never Jtnew that we had an artist in the fambly before. I'll bet that's where my little Liza gits "her taste fer painting from I" , "I wonder how I could find out about it!" said Perry. "Well, I can't see what use 'twould be to know about a tar- era that's been gone fer two centuries, more'n likely. But if you're set 'pon knowing, there's Sammy Spelter, up at the Court House he's a cousin 0' mine and yours, too and what he don't know about antiquities o' this coujrfry ain't worth gatherin' up. You jest go to Cousin Sammy and tell him I sent you, and tell him whose son you be arid I guess he'll tell you all he knows." Perry immediately, and without saying anything to Mr. Smeed, repaired to the Court House and soon found Mr.11 Spelteri who, when he learned Perry's errand, was interested at once. "There's an old bk of records of the very first settlement that is kept in the safe as a curiosity, more than anything else," f aid he. "We will examine that first." "Well, that depends." reDlied ' the clerk. TerhaD there may bo soij relics of it although I know almost every old build ing hereabouts.' You know, all that part of this village relapsed into almost its original condition of wild land many years ago. Even old ruins crumble away pretty fast in our cliaate. I im agine that the changes have been so great that only a geologist could ascertain just where the river entered the Sound so long ago as 1602." , . - . : novo ni.uuu.-u tfRuaogy ior iwo years, saia xerry. "Then you would enjoy the task of tracing .he ancient shoreline. I confess that I wouldn't know how to set about it" "I know very well," replied Perry, confidently; tad thanking , Mr. Spelter fo his kindness, he repaired at once to the shore. Hero in a very short time he found that tho little ttream that now would scarcely float a good sized cat-boat once was deep and broad, the marks of i'l swift current showing en rocks far from tho present shore. He found, too that for ages past it had been carrying down arth and stones, spreading soil all along the meadows until the river bed had been raised and its mouth pushed far back inland. It was impossible to estimate exactly how far tho river had receded each century, but he soon discovered, far distant from the present shore-lino, some ancient logs that showed they onca were the piles of either a bridge or a wharf. It was truly aston ishing to think that water had once flowed here, but it was cer tain that these logs had been immersed in water, as they were worm-eaten. Next, quite by accident, just where he had made sure was an. old beach, ho came upon tho foundation 0 a vanished building. the rough-hewn stones revealing where an ancient cellar had been,and it was right on tho old-time water's edge. Other big stones extended out toward the water. Lnd Perry made sure that this was an ancient landing, perhaps the laud ing 01 uie xavern. T-i.: a . it. ,1 , i.j . t uuu&iuk 10 we norm ne saw a gnarieu ana iwisiea 03 k, av tree so venerable that its boughs were torn and be:-t and Ha great trunk hollowed to a mere shell It was exactly ten paces north of the lino of water-worn stones that lav stretched toward the present water line. He paced the distance several times, and then became so excited that he felt he had better sit down. Just thpn TVrrv'a fAihnr rnm along with hia nnta nn a wheelbarrow, and when he had told him of his discovtry he said with veVy little show of interest : "Well, if you've found the landing-place and can manage ta find the pirate's treasure you'll have one comfort It's on one ANn Inns. f rnt 4 1 i a Iia.a miui. lii1nti.. r i n Tt i n . . n f t farm, although it ain't worth ton cents for forming " Perry t. 2d awoy to find Mr. Smeed and to give Lis wonder ful riews. To say that the teacher grew excited would be a mild statement, for he ran all the way back to tho old oak Ho con- fi.TriAfl a!1 nf Pprrv'a tripnripa ami wan aura that hn haA found the long lost landing-place. They hastened for shovels and then Perry said: "Wherell we begin to dig?" "Well, tho paper said it was buried under the oak, and ai that must mean near its trunk or thereabouts, it would, now per haps be completely enfolded among its wide spreading roots. I think, as we have the axc,s we might as well explore directly be neath the trunk of the tree." ... Jt , Perry had smote tho wood and said: '4 "It's about as rotten as punk. I think it will be easy." But it was more difficult than he had anticipated, for old as was the tree, its wood was firm and tough, and they cut and , twisted end dug and pulled for hours without unoovering a hint of treasure. Then, just as Perry was beginning to weaken in his faith, the teacher's shovel struck something. - . : He reached down and held it up. It was en ancient flint-lock' pistol, crumbling and rusted, but it was proof. They dug eagerly, again. In a few minutes the corner of an iron-bound chest showed. ' " I think that never did two shovels work faster than did theirs for ten minutes, when before them lay fully revealed a pirate's chest if ever there was one! One bang upon its rusty lock and hinges and off flew the heavy oaken lid, revealing its contents. The chest seemed filled with reddish clay, but a few swift movements of the teacher's " hand uncovered the earth that three centuries had sifted in upon the treasur. and there, gleaming dully, was gold that filled the chest to the brim. They took up coin after coin and read their dates with! amazement. There were coins of 1423, 1546, 1612, 1492; in fact, coins so old that the teacher was astounded, for he well knew that this treasure was pot only precious because tho coins wera gold, but because they were such rare and perhaps simply unique specimens that . collectors would pay many times the worth of the metal for them. So it proved,-In iact, when it became known that at last the famous "Barking Dogge" treasure had been unearthed, and what a wonderful find it had proved to be, uery numismatist or coin collector in the world was eager to procure specimens, and they flocked to the Lawrence home filled with anxiety lest others had gotten ahead of them, for coin-collectors are greedy folk and extremely jealous of each other. . They found that even the teacher had not dreamed of the value of the treasure Perry and he had exhumed, for there wore coins in the chest that existed nowhere else in the world, for old coins are melted again and again as the centuries pass. You , may have a gold dollar in your pocket or on a chain that onca lay in the palm of a Phoenician or a Roman storekeeper of the days of Numa Pompilius. - - - - He produced the ancient volume, its wooden covers bound in calfskin worn thin with centuries of handling, its pages yellow and time-stained, but the writing still legible. Together the man and boy turned over the flimsy pages, upon which were recorded, by long-forgotten clerks, the sales of land and other matters put on record by the government of each place. Here were shown who were taxed and eho bought land from the Indian owners, and pasted in the book were many priceless papers signed with historic names, many of them those of Indian chiefs who drew little animals, or totems, opposite. their written names. -Perry found it extremely-difficult to read the ancient form of handwriting, with its extravagant flourishes, and he wrestled bravely with the spelling,' also, for our forefathers spelled pretty much as they pleased. Suddenly, just as he was becoming dis couraged, Mrv Spelter said: "Aha! Here it is!" then he riad aloud: "Juno 8 1662. 1 . "this day was granted to Enock Lawrence by ye Honbl. Coun cil ye Land lying south of his tavern of Ye Barkyng Dogge wh. stands on ye shoree where ye river falls into ye Sound; the samo Land being Publick Domaign. Said E. Lawrence to maintain for fifty ycares a ferry acrost said stream for alle comers except ye 8auvages." : v : - - . ' ' V-:'-' " ' -; v-" -v . .' ' "There's Our tavern!" ejaculated Mr. Spelter, "and it's funny I never noticed that entry before. It is quite evident that the Lawrences began life as innkeepers, my lad, although they bo came mighty men in these parts.". - ; " " "' ' Here the ardent collectors found coins of the Caesars o forgotten Spanish kings, of Greek tyrants, of Byzantine emper ors, doubloons, moidores, pieces-of-eiglit of Queen Elizabeth, Macedonian, Bactrian, Hebrew, Hungarian and Russian coins, with dates ranging from two centuries before the Christian Era to that of King Charles the Second I - r - The treasures set the collectors crazy and they quarreled Ilka" wolves. When at last Perry had sold all that he desired to parti with, he had two million, four hundred thousand and ninety seven dollars in the bank, - - -v r- Down at the bottom of the chest was a leather bag filled with' diamonds and in it a paper containing this writing: "I gained, this treasure in lawful combat with ye, bloody sailors of Spain, and frotn Arthur Flym, siirnamect ye Scourge of ye Main, by ye skillful casting of ye dice. If by mischaunce I miscarry and recover it not I hereby stats that an interest of a thirdeisin ye same to Julio Gondomar my Captain and to bz my son-in-laxv if he survives the- pres ent expedition. THOMAS LAWRENCE. Accompanying this paper was a piece of shriveled parch ment on which was written these names and figures: "Santo Espirato, 1102 pounds 'silver. "Diago Gonzales, 900. . "Nina Speranza, 11,993 marks. - "Conquistadore, 5000 in gold. "Santa Cruz del Maria, feOOO. , "Theresa, 1800 mostly gold." v ' Perhaps these were the names of ships which the.cM ! if e toeer had captured, -but' that remains to bo lcrned. At. 1 received from Perry the position of private tutor at !,!,- ; N cry, so that he saw his way clear to proposing.) Ml i 1 . , and they were married that summer .in o-! r tint th,: t - miht have everything tff hi mind while IVrrv s-i. ; iv ; for colics . ' JYALT.U.LJluALL