280 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



tilled. Gissler battled more than once with the 

 Costa Rican authorities, who granted concessions 

 to other treasure-hunters, forgetful of, or disre- 

 garding, his prior claims. People are always 

 springing up with something that they assert is 

 infallible information about the Cocos hoard. A 

 stray newspaper item will call forth letters boast- 

 ing of secret clues, obtained in mysterious ways. 

 A few years ago the casual announcement that a 

 professor from a mid-western university was go- 

 ing to the South Seas in search of museum material 

 brought him a letter from a man in Maine, offer- 

 ing to obtain for him a chart of Cocos showing 

 where he could find sixty million dollars. Those 

 who speak of Cocos never stint themselves on mil- 

 lions. There was even an attempt to find the treas- 

 ure with a divining-rod, and this year the papers 

 have told of the latest search which is to be con- 

 ducted by an Englishman, "using the latest scien- 

 tific inventions for finding buried treasure." If the 

 reporters quote him accurately, (which is open to 

 question) it seems doubtful if he will even find the 

 island, as Cocos seems to be confused with Cocos- 

 Keeling; he might look in the wrong ocean, since 

 the location of the treasure island is given as "on the 

 fringes of the sinister Sargasso Sea." At any ratie, 

 the modern scientific developments will be inter- 

 esting. 



It was not until the Arcturus returned to New 

 York from her six months' cruise that we discov- 

 ered Captain Gissler. We had heard of him, of 

 course, as has everyone who knows anything of the 



