We passed Key Vaca and a string of other keys be- 

 fore coming in sight of Long Key bridge. There we com- 

 menced to see clearer water ahead. Opposite Matecumbe 

 it was possible to make out the bottom fifteen feet below. 

 About then, the wind, which had been blowing gently in 

 from the sea, began to freshen, and light waves broke 

 against our bow. 



Ahead of us was the light that marked Hen and 

 Chickens reef. In its vicinity, we had reason to beheve, 

 lay the vnreckage of several ships from a Spanish silver 

 fleet, which had gone down in the hurricane of 1733. Also 

 in this same area, we had been told, was a pile of cannon 

 balls lying on the sandy bottom in plain sight. It was here 

 we hoped to make our first find. 



Several fishing boats were making their slow way 

 £iround the reef as we approached, but we found as we 

 got nearer that the water so close to shore was too riley 

 for us to distinguish the bottom. We changed course to- 

 ward the open sea and, bucking ever-increasing waves, 

 headed Eryhokne toward a marker on a reef several miles 

 out, which bordered the Gulf Stream. The cannon balls 

 had been seen in a patch of white sand about a quarter 

 mile inside the reef. We cruised near the reef and dropped 

 the hook. 



Ed and Captain Budd lowered the glass-bottomed 

 boat — ^not without considerable trouble, due to the rough 

 seas — and we started out. Ed ran the outboard and I 

 stretched full length in the bottom of the boat, gazing 

 through the glass. We boimced and cavorted over the 

 waves. Every now and then the bow of the boat would 

 come completely out of water, and then slap down upon a 

 new wave with such a bang that I expected the Plexiglas 

 bottom to splinter any moment beneath me. 



Back and forth we plowed, from the reef to Eryholme 

 and back again, each time steering for a different section 



The Florida Keys 39 



