"Just read on," he cried in that great, bluff, hearty fashion of his; "just read on. In my opinion nothing could be finer for the friends of England than this plain, unvarnished story of Father Thomas Bonaventure and his three companions. Why? do you ask. In my opinion for the most obvious of reasons. This document furnishes an absolute proof that when it was written--some centuries ago--the sacred lake belonged to an Englishman. Well, the point will next arise--can anybody else, or any other country, produce an earlier proof of ownership? If not, the issue is certain. The British Crown will seize it as the property of one of its subjects who died intestate; and, however much the good people of Mexico may writhe and wriggle--however much Spain may talk of the rights of pre-emption and other legal subtleties--backed up by our friends the Jesuits we shall stand as firm as a rock. `The lake is ours,' we shall assert. `We shall find it and exploit it, and anybody who dares to oppose us will be swept out of our path.'" Now this certainly was quite a new view of the uses of the documents, and I am bound to say that no sooner was it put before us in these terms than we realised its significance. Neither Casteno nor I was one of those obstinate, stiff-necked, thin-lipped individuals who take about six hours to see any point which they have not chanced to hit on for themselves. As a matter of fact, we were quite willing to admit that we had both of us got so lost in the actual story of the Jesuits' travels as to forget the bearing of their discoveries on to-day's events and hopes. As a consequence, we turned again to the work of translating with quite a new object and aspect, not to discover so much whether good luck attended Father Thomas and his friends, now we knew that the waters did really contain much valuable buried treasure, as to see where England came in and how her claims would stand the light of a dispassionate examination. As we proceeded we found the writer recorded that the Indians did not leave the four Jesuits very long in those caves, bound hand to foot, so that not one of them could move either to free himself or to help his companions. They were simply confined there until daybreak, and then the Indians returned with a lumbering bullock waggon, and, after giving their prisoners a meal of fish mixed with beans and a little rice, lifted the white men into this crazy vehicle, and, blindfolding them with great care, drove them all that day and the next night over a rough track, which nearly broke every bone they had.