his landlord, went so
far as to acknowledge that he had his reasons for thinking so; although
Greenleaf, on finding himself treated, and watched, and questioned more
narrowly than he liked, managed to drop something about having sailed under
the Brazilian flag. And, on being plied with liquor one day, with listeners
about him, he went into some fuller particulars, which set them all agog.
These, reaching the ears of Colonel Jones, led to an interview, from which
he gathered that Greenleaf was one of a large crew commissioned by the
Brazils in 1826; that, after cruising a long while in a latitude swarming
with Spanish vessels of war, they got reduced to twenty-five men, all told.
That one day they fell in with a large, heavily-laden ship, from which they
took about three hundred and fifty thousand dollars, in gold and silver,
and a massive gold cross, nearly two feet long, and weighing from fifteen
to twenty pounds, belonging to a Spanish priest; but what they did with the
crew and the passengers, or with the ship and the priest, did not appear.
That, soon after getting their treasure aboard, they saw a large sail to
windward, which they took to be a Spanish frigate; and, being satisfied
with their booty, they altered their course, and steered for a desolate
island near Guadaloupe, where, after taking out three hundred doubloons
apiece, they landed, with the rest of the treasure packed in gun-cases, and
hooped with iron; dug a hole in the earth and buried it; carefully removing
the turf and replacing it, and carrying off all the dirt, and scattering it
along the shore. That they took the bearings of certain natural objects,
and marked the trees, and agreed among themselves, under oath, not to
disturb the treasure till fifteen years had gone by, when it was to belong
to the survivors. That, having done this, they steered for the Havana, and,
after altering their craft to a fore-and-aft schooner, sold her, and shared
the money. Being flush, and riotous, and quarrelsome, they soon got
a-fighting among themselves; and, within a few months, by the help of the
yellow fever, not less than twenty-three out of the whole twenty-five were
buried, leaving only this Greenleaf and an old man, who went by the name of
Thomas Taylor, and who had not been heard of for many years, and was now
believed to be dead.

A fortune-teller was consulted, and put into a magnetic sleep, and, if the
description they had painted of the man they were afte