e telegrams sent. Then off our
friends hurried, and were soon on the way down the Mississippi once more.

About ten miles below New Orleans is the entrance to Lake Borge Canal,
an artificial waterway connecting the Mississippi with Lake Borge,
which opens, through Mississippi Sound, into the Gulf of Mexico. The
captain of the small steamboat had an idea the men who had stolen
the launch were making for this canal, and he was not mistaken.
Arriving at the canal entrance, our friends learned that the launch
had been taken through very early in the morning.

"Well, this ends the search so far as I am concerned," said the
steamboat captain. "I suppose you want to go on somehow."

"Can't we send word to the other end of the canal?" asked Sam.

"Yes, we can telephone to the station there," answered Harold Bird,
and this was done without delay.

"Want the launch _Venus_, do you?" came back over the wire. "She went
through some hours ago.

"Where did she go to?"

"Somewhere on the lake."

This was all the satisfaction they could get, and bidding the steamboat
captain goodbye after paying him off, the Rovers and their friends
looked around for some means of getting to Lake Borge, a distance of
seven or eight miles.

A barge was going through, and they were soon on board. They urged
the owner to hurry and offered him big pay, and as a consequence
before noon they reached the lake. Here they ran into an old fisherman,
who told them that the persons in the launch had had a quarrel with
two officers of the law and had sailed off in the direction of Bay
St. Louis.

"This is certainly getting to be a long chase," remarked Tom. "First
thing we know we'll be following them all the way across the Gulf of
Mexico."

"Well, I am willing," answered Dick, promptly.

"And so am I," added Harold Bird. "I intend to bring them to justice
if I possibly can."

Again there was a consultation, and the old fisherman told them how
they might reach Bay St. Louis, a town of considerable importance on
Mississippi Sound. The trip took some time, and on the way they looked
around eagerly for some sight of the launch, but the craft did not
appear.

At Bay St. Louis came a surprise. The launch had entered the harbor
on fire and those on board had had to swim for their lives. The craft
had been running at full speed, had struck a mud scow and gone under,
and was now resting in eight feet of water and mud.

"Was she burnt very much?" asked