ideas were to be carried out; he therefore ordered
the stump to be pulled up, the obstruction removed, and the post driven
down again in the same position.

The seamen thereupon laid hold of the post, and, all hauling together,
it soon came out; and with shovels and crowbars they began to break down
the sand and enlarge the hole, so as to get at whatever was in the way
and remove it.

It was not long ere the shovel of one of the men struck upon something
hard, and the man, dropping upon his knees, went to work to scrape the
sand away with his hands, presently laying bare to view what was
apparently part of a spar of some kind, not old or worm-eaten, but
seemingly almost new. Having located this, they started to clear the
sand away from the whole length of the piece of timber, and, while doing
so, found that there were two other poles or spars laid alongside it.
After an hour's hard work the three spars were unearthed, and proved to
be the three poles of a set of sheer-legs, which had evidently only
quite recently been hidden.

Roger then instructed the men to start probing in the sand, to see
whether there might be anything else buried, and he himself took a boat
and pulled away over the bay to the _Elizabeth_ to inform Cavendish of
his discovery.

He found the captain lying in his bunk nursing his recent wound, and
informed him of the circumstance, asking also what he should do in the
matter.

"You have dug out of the sand what you think is a set of sheer-legs, eh,
boy?" said the captain, raising himself in his berth on one elbow. "And
have you found anything beside?"

"No, sir," said Roger in reply, "there was nothing else dug up when I
left; but I told the men to probe the sand, whilst I came off to you, to
see if there was anything else there."

"Well," responded the captain, "I must look into this. I will get up
and come ashore with you; but just go and call the surgeon first; I wish
him to bind this wound of mine up again before I leave the ship."

Roger did so; and, the surgeon having dressed and bound up Cavendish's
hurt again, the two descended the ship's side and, getting into the
boat, were rowed ashore.

When they reached the beach they saw that the men had already lifted out
the three sheer-leg poles and laid them on the sand, and now a gang of
men were hauling upon a rope attached to something still in the sand.

When Cavendish and Roger came up to the spot they saw that the top of an
iron