ar it. I lost no time in
descending. I wore, of course, the usual diver's suit, but I took with
me no tools nor any of the implements used by divers when examining
wrecks, but carried in my right hand a brilliant electric lamp connected
with a powerful battery on the schooner. I held this by an insulated
handle, in which there were two little knobs, by which I could light or
extinguish it.

The bottom was hard and smooth, and lighting my lamp I began to look
about me. If I approached the bracelet I ought to be able to see it
sparkle, but after wandering over considerable space, I saw no sparkles
nor anything like a bracelet. Suddenly, however, I saw something which
greatly interested me. It was a hole in the bottom of the ocean, almost
circular, and at least ten feet in diameter. I was surprised that I had
not noticed it before, for it lay not far from the stern of our vessel.

Standing near the rocky edge of the aperture, I held out my lamp and
looked down. Not far below I saw the glimmer of what seemed to be the
bottom of this subterranean well. I was seized with a desire to explore
this great hole running down under the ordinary bottom of the sea. I
signaled to be lowered, and although my comrades were much surprised at
such an order, they obeyed, and down I went to the well. The sides of
this seemed rocky and almost perpendicular, but after descending about
fifteen feet they receded on every side, and I found myself going down
into a wide cavern, the floor of which I touched in a very short time.

Holding up my lamp, and looking about me, I found myself in a sea cave,
some thirty feet in diameter, with a dome-like roof, in which, a little
to one side of the center, was the lower opening of the well. I became
very much excited; this was just the sort of place into which a bracelet
or anything else of value might be expected to have the bad luck to
drop. I walked about and gazed everywhere, but I found nothing but rocks
and water.

I was about to signal to be drawn up, when above me I saw what appeared
to be a flash of darkness coming down through the well. With a rush and
a swirl it entered the cavern, and in a moment I recognized the fact
that a great fish was swooping around and about me. Its movements were
so rapid and irregular, now circling along the outer edge of the floor
of the cavern, then mounting above me, until its back seemed to scrape
the roof, that I could not form a correct idea of the size of the