They got under way and, practice making perfect, were soon high and dry on the beach, and the _Nancy Lee_ dragged up and comfortably moored. The children seated themselves in a ring, and Hugh cautiously knocked off the neck of the bottle with a stone. He drew out a paper, which had been carefully rolled round a thin bamboo stick and tied with a red ribbon. There was no date on the paper, nor was there any sign to show where the bottle had been thrown in, but written in large, clear round-hand was the following message: IF THE FINDER OF THIS BOTTLE WILL SEARCH THE CAVE UNDER _THE DUKE'S NOSE_ HE WILL FIND SOMETHING TO HIS ADVANTAGE. "Hidden treasure," said three boys all at once. "Where is The Duke's Nose?" asked Dick. "Never heard of it," answered Hugh, looking hard at Jerry, whose nose was distinctly aquiline and promised to be more so in the future. "You aren't a duke by any chance, I suppose?" he asked. "No, old sport, I'm not," Jerry answered, with a grin, "and if I were, the only treasure you would find in the cave under my nose would be some jolly sharp teeth, and they wouldn't be at all to your advantage either." "It's probably among those rocks over there," Mollie suggested; "I expect if we went there and walked round we would see something that looked like a duke's nose." "But there aren't any big enough to have a cave under them," said Prudence; "they are all quite little rocks." "It will be a bit of the cliff, most likely," said Dick, "in fact it is almost bound to be if there is a cave." The others agreed that this was probable. "What do you think the hidden treasure will be?" asked Grizzel. "A sack of diamonds and rubies?" "I hope not," said Jerry, "for, if it is anything of that sort, we will have to give it up. If we were caught trying to sell diamonds we'd be copped at once, and the bobbies would think the bottle story was all made up. I expect we'd all be put in jail, and it would be jolly awkward for Dick and me when we got back to school. I think I see the Old Man's face when we explained that we couldn't come because we were in an Australian prison in the year 1879 for stealing diamonds. I don't think!" "Schoolmasters and mistresses are extraordinarily stupid sometimes," said Mollie reflectively. "They are so hard to convince, even about quite simple things, if they don't want to be convinced. But I shouldn't care for diamonds myself. I'd like a swanky tennis-racket." "I'd like a revolver, latest pattern," said Jerry. "I should like a first-class camera," said Hugh. "I'd like a pure-bred bull-dog," said Dick. "I'd like a nice little model sewing-machine," said Prue. "I'd like six pairs of stilts," said Grizzel, "and then we could all walk home on them."