h to its
proper place, with the chest on the top of it, so that a minute eye
could not have told that it had been disturbed.

Next morning as usual the owner came, bringing with him two labourers,
who set to work filling the chest with wheat from the vat, evidently
with the intention of making it weighty, he little suspecting that his
treasure, which he supposed was underneath, had been divided amongst
his tenants. After that we thought we were pretty right from
detection, but we were mistaken, for in the morning our restless owner
again made his appearance with the two labourers. I should think that
that night he must have dreamt of our manoeuvre, for he now shifted
the wheat back again into its place, moved the chest, and raised the
earth and the broken jar, but found the bird had flown. I shall never
forget the rage the man was in. I thought he would have torn the hair
off his head; in fact, he did tear some up by the roots, but he must
have found that a poor way of showing his spite. He cried, "_Ladrone!
Ladrone!_" which was his way of expressing "Thief! Thief!" but finding
that we did not take much notice of him, he reported his loss to the
colonel, or rather went off to him with that intention; but as the
colonel did not understand his language, I was sent for, as by that
time I was pretty well acquainted with it; and on my replying to the
question as to what the Portuguese wanted, that he required a corporal
and three privates to guard a stack of wood, the colonel told me to
let him know that he had nothing to do with it. I told the Portuguese
that it was no use his making a noise about the money, as it must have
been only a little change that he could not conveniently recover,
unless he could bring proper witnesses to prove he had put the money
there.

That only appeased him for the night, however, for he came bothering
the colonel again next morning. The colonel again sent for me and
asked me what on earth this man wanted now, so I was then obliged to
admit the truth. I asked him if he would forgive me for telling him an
untruth overnight, and on his consenting, I told him the Portuguese
had lost a quantity of money, which he put down at seven thousand
dollars. The Portuguese's answer to the question who had placed the
money there was that he had himself, but he could bring no witnesses
to show that he had really done it, so the colonel said he could have
nothing to do with the affair. However, the following