Suddenly Bruce flung down the pickaxe, and seized his spade. At once all the others rushed forward to join in the task. Bruce was first; his spade was plunged deep into the loosened earth. Bight and left it was flung. The spades of the others were plunged in also. All of them were digging wildly and furiously, and panting heavily with their exertion and their excitement. Each one had felt his spade strike and grate against that hard metallic substance which the pickaxe had struck, and which they now fully believed to be the pot of gold. Each one was in the full swing of eager expectation, when suddenly there came an awful interruption. They might have been digging five minutes, or an hour; they could never tell exactly. Afterwards, when they talked it over, and compared one another’s impressions, they could not come to any decision, for all idea of time had been lost. Engaged in their work, they took no note of minutes or hours. But while they were working Captain Corbet had stood aloof; he held a spade in his listless hands, but he did not use it. He was looking on nervously, and with a pale face, and his thoughts were such as cannot be described. Solomon also stood, with trembling frame and chattering teeth, a prey to superstitious terror. To Solomon had been committed the care of the lights; yet he did not dare to venture near them. For that matter, he did not dare even look at them. His gaze was fixed on the boys, while at times his eyes would roll fearfully over the dark outline of those dim and sombre woods whose shadows lowered gloomily before him. Such, then, was the situation,--the boys busy and excited; Captain Corbet nervous, and idle, and fearful; Solomon trembling from head to foot, and overcome with a thousand wild and superstitious fancies,--when suddenly, close beside them, outside of the row of lights, just as their spades struck the metallic substance before mentioned,--suddenly, instantaneously, and without the slightest warning, there arose a sharp, a fearful, a terrible uproar; something midway between a shriek and a peal of thunder; a roar, in fact, so hideous, so wild, so unparalleled in its horrid accompaniments, that it shook the boldest heart in that small but bold company. It rose on high; it seemed to fill all the air; and its awful echoes prolonged themselves afar through the darkness of the midnight scene. The boys started back from the hole; their spades dropped from their hands. They saw about half of the lights extinguished, and amid the gloom they could perceive two figures rushing in mad haste away from the spot. A panic seized upon them. Before a panic the stoutest heart is as weak as water. Even the “B. O. W. C.” yielded to its influence. They shrank back, they retreated, they passed the line of flickering lights. They fled! Away, away! back from this terrible place, back towards the Academy. So fled the “B. O. W. C.” First of all the fugitives was Solomon.