d, and the men aboard
could be used to transport the copper to the sea.

In this way the expedition would serve a double purpose. No one
attempted to go contrary to the wishes of Blakely on matters which
touched upon the commercial ventures in which they were engaged.

John was only too glad that Blakely had hit upon that idea, as he was
anxious to visit that part of the coast, contiguous to the copper
deposit, and what was more, he wanted to see the place where Blakely
found the missive which the boys had translated.

As there was still a week before the _Wonder_ would sail for its
northern port of call, both of the ships wended their way to the east,
skirting the coast as closely as possible, John on the _Pioneer_ with
the boys.

They now had an opportunity to see the Great South Mountains from the
sea. They remembered when they last saw them on land, during the
campaign against the Illyas, and also the wonderful village on the
western side of the mountains. What would their present wanderings bring
forth?

That evening they landed within a cove, both vessels being brought as
near the shore as possible.

"We can safely go in close this evening, because the tide is now out,"
said John.

Sutoto, while he had navigated the vessel, and had shown remarkable
skill, was, nevertheless, not well versed in tides and the action of the
moon.

Quick to learn, he asked John why the tides thus changed. John explained
the reason that the tides flowed in and out twice during each
twenty-four hours, or a little less than that time, so that high water,
or low water would always be at a time a little later each day, and then
stated that it would be an easy matter to so make the calculations that
they would be able to tell ahead for a whole year just when during each
day the highest or lowest water would be.

While waiting on the ship during the hours of the evening they were
interested in the magnificent fire flies which they saw on the shore and
along the mountain side. This was not an unfamiliar sight to them as
they had witnessed such scenes many times before.

But now they saw such sights as they had never before observed. They
must have been giant glow birds, because some of the lights flew at
least hundreds of feet emitting continuous streams of light, and this
was not all, many of the lights were colored, particularly red and blue
or simply faint tinges of those tints.

"I have often thought that there is nothing mo