; they partook of the repast in silence;
but at length it became evident that they were thinking of the
mysterious manuscript. Featherstone was the first to speak.

"A deuced queer sort of thing this, too," said he, "this manuscript.
I can't quite make it out. Who ever dreamed of people living at the
South Pole--and in a warm climate, too? Then it seems deuced odd, too,
that we should pick up this copper cylinder with the manuscript. I
hardly know what to think about it."

Melick smiled. "Why, it isn't much to see through," said he.

"See through what?" said the doctor, hastily, pricking up his ears
at this, and peering keenly at Melick through his spectacles.

"Why, the manuscript, of course."

"Well," said the doctor, "what is it that you see? What do you make
out of it?"

"Why, anyone can see," said Melick, "that it's a transparent hoax,
that's all. You don't mean to say, I hope, that you really regard it
in any other light?"

"A transparent hoax!" repeated the doctor. "Will you please state why
you regard it in that light?"

"Certainly," said Melick. "Some fellow wanted to get up a sensation
novel and introduce it to the world with a great flourish of trumpets,
and so he has taken this way of going about it. You see, he has
counted on its being picked up, and perhaps published. After this he
would come forward and own the authorship."

"And what good would that do?" asked the doctor, mildly. "He couldn't
prove the authorship, and he couldn't get the copyright."

"Oh, of course not; but he would gain notoriety, and that would give
him a great sale for his next effort."

The doctor smiled. "See here, Melick," said he, "you've a very vivid
imagination, my dear fellow; but come, let us discuss this for a
little while in a common-sense way. Now how long should you suppose
that this manuscript has been afloat?"

"Oh, a few months or so," said Melick.

"A few months!" said the doctor. "A few years you mean. Why, man,
there are successive layers of barnacles on that copper cylinder which
show a submersion of at least three years, perhaps more."

"By Jove! yes," remarked Featherstone. "Your sensation novelist must
have been a lunatic if he chose that way of publishing a book."

"Then, again," continued the doctor, "how did it get here?"

"Oh, easily enough," answered Melick. "The ocean currents brought it."

"The ocean currents!" repeated the doctor. "That's a very vague
expression. What do you mean? Of