there could be no doubt.  The dead brands in the centre were the remains of a fire that could not have been kindled by wild beasts, and the bones scattered about had been scientifically dissected and handled.  There were also remnants of furniture and pieces of garments scattered about.  At the farther end, in a fissure of the rock, were stones regularly built up, the rem Yins of a larger fire,—­and what the hunter did not doubt was the smelting furnace of the Spaniards.  He poked about in the ashes, but found no silver.  That had all been carried away.

But what most provoked his wonder in this rude cave was a chair I This was not such a seat as a woodman might knock up with an axe, with rough body and a seat of woven splits, but a manufactured chair of commerce, and a chair, too, of an unusual pattern and some elegance.  This chair itself was a mute witness of luxury and mystery.  The chair itself might have been accounted for, though I don’t know how; but upon the back of the chair hung, as if the owner had carelessly flung it there before going out an hour before, a man’s waistcoat.  This waistcoat seemed to him of foreign make and peculiar style, but what endeared it to him was its row of metal buttons.  These buttons were of silver!  I forget now whether he did not say they were of silver coin, and that the coin was Spanish.  But I am not certain about this latter fact, and I wish to cast no air of improbability over my narrative.  This rich vestment the hunter carried away with him.  This was all the plunder his expedition afforded.  Yes:  there was one other article, and, to my mind, more significant than the vest of the hidalgo.  This was a short and stout crowbar of iron; not one of the long crowbars that farmers use to pry up stones, but a short handy one, such as you would use in digging silver-ore out of the cracks of rocks.

This was the guide’s simple story.  I asked him what became of the vest and the buttons, and the bar of iron.  The old man wore the vest until he wore it out; and then he handed it over to the boys, and they wore it in turn till they wore it out.  The buttons were cut off, and kept as curiosities.  They were about the cabin, and the children had them to play with.  The guide distinctly remembers playing with them; one of them he kept for a long time, and he didn’t know but he could find it now, but he guessed it had disappeared.  I regretted that he had not treasured this slender verification of an interesting romance, but he said in those days he never paid much attention to such things.  Lately he has turned the subject over, and is sorry that his father wore out the vest and did not bring away the chair.  It is his steady purpose to find the cave some time when he has leisure, and capture the chair, if it has not tumbled to pieces.  But about the crowbar?  Oh I that is all right.  The guide has the bar at his house in Keene Valley, and has always used it. 
   I am happy to be able to confirm this story by saying that next
day I saw the crowbar, and had it in my hand.  It is short and thick, and the most interesting kind of crowbar.  This evidence is enough for me.  I intend in the course of this vacation to search for the cave; and, if I find it, my readers shall know the truth about it, if it destroys the only bit of romance connected with these mountains.