“That’s another p’int.  I’ll tell you all about it, gal, and you’ll see the importance of keeping the secret.  This Daggett—­not the one who is out in another schooner, another Sea Lion, as it might be, but his uncle, who died down here at the Widow White’s—­well, that Daggett told more than the latitude and longitude of the sealing islands—­he told me of a buried treasure!”

“Buried treasure!—­Buried by whom, and consisting of what, uncle?”

“Buried by seamen who make free with the goods of others on the high seas, ag’in the time when they might come back and dig it up, and carry it away to be used.  Consisting of what, indeed!  Consisting principally, accordin’ to Daggett’s account, of heavy doubloons; though there was a lot of old English guineas among ’em.  Yes, I remember that he spoke of them guineas—­three thousand and odd, and nearly as many doubloons!”

“Was Daggett, then, a pirate, sir?—­for they who make free with the goods of others on the high seas are neither more nor less than pirates.”

“No; not he, himself.  He got this secret from one who was a pirate, however, and who was a prisoner in a gaol where he was himself confined for smuggling.  Yes; that man told him all about the buried treasure, in return for some acts of kindness shown him by Daggett.  It’s well to be kind sometimes, Mary”

“It is well to be kind always, sir; even when it is misunderstood, and the kindness is abused.  What was the redemption but kindness and love, and god-like compassion on those who neither understood it nor felt it?  But money collected and buried by pirates can never become yours, uncle; nor can it ever become the property of Roswell Gardiner.”

“Whose is it, then, gal?” demanded the deacon, sharply.  “Gar’ner had some such silly notion in his head when I first told him of this treasure; but I soon brought him to hear reason.”

“I think Roswell must always have seen that a treasure obtained by robbery can never justly belong to any but its rightful owner.”

“And who is this rightful owner, pray? or owners, I might say; for the gold was picked up, here and there, out of all question, from many hands.  Now, supposing Gar’ner gets this treasure, as I still hope he may, though he is an awful time about it—­but suppose he gets it, how is he to find the rightful owners?  There it is, a bag of doubloons, say—­all looking just alike, with the head of a king, a Don Somebody, and the date, and the Latin and Greek—­now who can say that ’this is my doubloon; I lost it at such a time—­it was taken from me by such a pirate, in such sea; and I was whipped till I told the thieves where I had hid the gold?’ No, no, Mary; depend on ’t, no action of ’plevy would lie ag’in a single one of all them pieces.  They are lost, one and all, to their former owners, and will belong to the man that succeeds in getting hold on ’em ag’in; who will become a rightful owner in his turn.  All property comes from law; and if the law won’t ’plevy money got in this way, nobody can maintain a claim to it.”