Accordingly, the treasure seekers got out the pick
and shovel, and trudged along to the scene of the late fire. As they
neared the Encampment, their road became a difficult and painful one,
over fallen trees blackened with fire, and through beds of sodden ashes.
At the Encampment, the ground, save where the buildings had stood, was
comparatively bare. The lofty and enormously strong brick chimney was
still standing in spite of the many explosions, and, here and there, a
horse appeared, looking wistfully at the ruins of its former home.
There, the intending diggers stood, gazing mutely for a while on the
scene of desolation.
"'Sandy soil, draining both ways, and undercover,' is what we want,
Coristine," said the Squire. The two walked back and forward along the
ridge, rejecting rock and depression and timbered land. They searched
the foundations of houses and sheds, found the trap under Rawdon's own
house that led to the now utterly caved-in tunnel, and tried likely
spots where once the stables stood, only to find accumulations of
rubbish. A steel square such as carpenters use, was found among the
chips in the stone-yard, and of this Coristine made a primitive
surveyor's implement by which he sought to take the level of the ground.
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