"Jack Thompson is so common a name, a body never knows. Besides, if he was
killed by that whale, he may have told the secret to a dozen before the
accident."

"There's his oath ag'in it. Jack was sworn, as well as all on us, and he
was a man likely to stand by what he swore to. This was none of your
custom-house oaths, of which a chap might take a dozen of a morning, and
all should be false; but it was an oath that put a seaman on his honour,
since it was a good-fellowship affair, all round."

Deacon Pratt did not _tell_ Daggett that Thompson might have as good
reasons for disregarding the oath as he had himself; but he _thought_ it.
These are things that no wise man utters on such occasions; and this
opinion touching the equality of the obligation of that oath was one of
them.

"There is another hold upon Jack," continued Daggrett, after reflecting a
moment. "He never could make any fist of latitude and longitude at all,
and he kept no journal. Now, should he get it wrong, he and his friends
might hunt a year without finding either of the places."

"You think there was no mistake in the pirate's account of that key, and
of the buried treasure?" asked the deacon, anxiously.

"I would swear to the truth of what _he_ said, as freely as if I had seen
the box myself. They was necessitated, as you may suppose, or they never
would have left so much gold, in sich an uninhabited place; but leave it
they did, on the word of a dying man."

"Dying?--You mean the pirate, I suppose?"