The officer plunged both hands suddenly into the golden mass and tried to lift up heaping handfuls as though it had been pebbles and sand. The extraordinary weight prevented him, and he allowed the yellow dust to sift back between his fingers. “How heavy it is!” was his only comment. “I have seen enough,” he added presently, as he smoothed down the surface of the gold, so that the captain could replace the cover. When the screws had been tightened again in their places, the two men left the treasure-room and went on deck. The collector had nothing to say until he prepared to go ashore. He was sober and rather distrait as he bade the captain good-day. “I must beg your pardon, sir,” he said, “for my bit of temper at the office. You must admit that what you told me was calculated to make a man incredulous. You have the most wonderful ship and the most wonderful cargo that ever came to Southampton or any other British port. This is a memorable day for me and for all England, too, I make no doubt.” The London papers printed with reservations the next morning a long Central News telegram from Southampton describing the new marvel of the seas. Such a feat as that of the unknown American ship _Mystery_ was incredible, declared the sage London editors. Nevertheless they dispatched their naval experts to Southampton by the earliest trains to expose the hoax. Before they arrived, the precious cargo of the _Mystery_ had been safely landed, sent to London by special train, and was duly lodged in the vaults of the Bank of England before any rumor of its existence had reached the city. The eminent gentlemen who expose so relentlessly in the columns of London’s great dailies the shortcomings of the British admiralty did not seek out at once the ship they had come to investigate, when they reached Southampton. They sought instead the collector of customs who had been quoted as authority for the tall story which had been sent to the papers the night before. When they found him they began asking insinuating questions which speedily caused that functionary, still rather nervous after the shocks to his system the day before, to fly into a violent temper. “Don’t you think we had better send for his physician at once? The man is mad,” sarcastically observed a correspondent to one of his fellows.