yond the dreams of
avarice. Promise me that you will go thither, and bring away as many as
you can conveniently carry about your persons in the event of your being
compelled to quit the oasis at short notice."

"I promise. Nevertheless, I see no probability--"

"We are discussing possibilities not probabilities, my son. And during the
last few days I have had forebodings, if I were superstitious I should say
prophetic visions, else had I not broached the subject. Regard it, if you
like, as an old man's whim--and keep a look-out on the sea."

"Why particularly on the sea?"

"It is the quarter whence danger is most to be apprehended. If some
Spanish war-ship were to sight the oasis and send a boat ashore, either
out of idle curiosity or for other reasons, a report would be made to the
captain-general, or to whomsoever is now in authority at Lima, and there
would come a horde of government functionaries, who would take possession
of everything, and you would have to go. But take your pen and note down
the particulars that will enable you to find the diamond mine."

Though Angela and I listened to the abbe's warnings with all respect, they
made little impression on our minds. We regarded them as the vagaries of
an old man, whose mind was affected by the feebleness of his body, and a
few weeks later he breathed his last. His death came in the natural order
of things, and, as he had outlived his strength, it was for him a happy
release; yet, as we had loved him much, we sorrowed for him deeply, and I
still honor his memory. Take him all in all, Abbe Balthazar was the best
man I have ever known.

Shortly after we laid him in the ground I made a visit to the diamond
ground, the situation of which the abbe had so fully described that I
found it without difficulty. But the undertaking, besides proving much
more arduous than I had anticipated, came near to costing me my life. I
took with me an _arriero_ and three mules, one carrying an ample supply of
food, and, as I thought, of water, for the abbe had told me that a
mountain-stream ran through the valley where I was to look for the
diamonds. As ill-luck would have it, however, the stream was dried up. Had
it not been that I did not like to return empty-handed I should have
returned at once, for our stock of water was exhausted and we were two
days' journey from Quipai.

I spent a whole day seeking among the stones and pebbles, and my search
was so far successful that I pic