This was done soon after the sun had risen, and Spike now ordered all hands called, and began his operations in earnest.  By sounding carefully around the schooner when last here, he had ascertained her situation to his entire satisfaction.  She had settled on a shelf of the reef, in such a position that her bows lay in a sort of cradle, while her stern was several feet nearer to the surface than the opposite extremity.  This last fact was apparent, indeed, by the masts themselves, the lower mast aft being several feet out of water, while the fore-mast was entirely buried, leaving nothing but the fore-topmast exposed.  On these great premises Spike had laid the foundation of the practical problem he intended to solve.

No expectation existed of ever getting the schooner afloat again.  All that Spike and the Senor Montefalderon now aimed at, was to obtain the doubloons, which the former thought could be got at in the following manner.  He knew that it would be much easier handling the wreck, so far as its gravity was concerned, while the hull continued submerged.  He also knew that one end could be raised with a comparatively trifling effort, so long as the other rested on the rock.  Under these circumstances, therefore, he proposed merely to get slings around the after body of the schooner, as near her stern-post, indeed, as would be safe, and to raise that extremity of the vessel to the surface, leaving most of the weight of the craft to rest on the bows.  The difference between the power necessary to effect this much, and that which would be required to raise the whole wreck, would be like the difference in power necessary to turn over a log with one end resting on the ground, and turning the same log by lifting it bodily in the arms, and turning it in the air.  With the stern once above water, it would be easy to come at the bag of doubloons, which Jack Tier had placed in a locker above the transoms.

The first thing was to secure the brig properly, in order that she might bear the necessary strain.  This was done very much as has been described already, in the account of the manner in which she was secured and supported in order to raise the schooner at the Dry Tortugas.  An anchor was laid abreast and to windward, and purchases were brought to the masts, as before.  Then the bight of the chain brought from the Tortugas, was brought under the schooner’s keel, and counter-purchases, leading from both the fore-mast and main-mast of the brig, were brought to it, and set taut.  Spike now carefully examined all his fastenings, looking to his cables as well as his mechanical power aloft, heaving in upon this, and veering out upon that, in order to bring the Molly square to her work; after which he ordered the people to knock-off for their dinners.  By that time, it was high noon.