17 
CHAPTER II. 
TREASURE-TROVE.-THE STOET OP THE COCOS ISLAND.—AN OLD 
PIRATE.-THE DIVINING-ROD IN THE NEW WORLD.-1 AWAKE 
AND FIND MTSELP FAMOUS.-CAPTAIN DOW.-M. ZELTNER.- 
CH1RIQUI INSCRIPTIONS.-THEIE SINGULAR RESEMBLANCE TO 
THE ANCIENT BRITISH.-A BOLD THEORY. 
You never pass a Spanish place, I fancy, without 
hearing one of two things. There are either rich 
mines in the immediate neighbourhood, merely requir¬ 
ing skill and capital to develope them, or there is 
a vast amount of treasure buried somewhere in the 
town, and only waiting to be discovered by somebody. 
Panama, with its numerous ruins and romantic history, 
has upon the latter theme many a good story to tell. 
Tradition can point out dozens of spots where some¬ 
thing worth having will turn up, if one digs long and 
deep enough. One of these, supposed to contain part of 
the property of the Society of Jesus, and buried on the 
sudden expulsion of the order from Spanish America, 
was not very long ago ransacked by a mysterious 
stranger. He took up his residence close to the old 
c 
