"There were a captain and two sailors, then?" said Lady Helena.
"I will confess, your lordship," said the captain, "that the next word, _graus_, puzzles me. I do not know how to translate it. Perhaps the third document will enable us to understand it. As to the two last words, they are easily explained. _Bringt ihnen_ means _bring to them_, and if we compare these with the English word, which is likewise on the sixth line of the first document (I mean the word _assistance_), we shall have the phrase _bring them assistance_."
"Yes, bring them assistance," said Glenarvan. "But where are the unfortunates? We have not yet a single indication of the place, and the scene of the catastrophe is absolutely unknown."
"Let us hope that the French document will be more explicit," said Lady Helena.
"Let us look at it, then," replied Glenarvan; "and, as we all know this language, our examination will be more easy."
Here is an exact fac-simile of the third document:
"There are figures!" cried Lady Helena. "Look, gentlemen, look!"
"Let us proceed in order," said Lord Glenarvan, "and start at the beginning. Permit me to point out one by one these scattered and incomplete words. I see from the first letters _troi_ _ats_ (_trois-mats_), that it is a brig, the name of which, thanks to the English and French documents, is entirely preserved: _The Britannia_. Of the two following words, _gonie_ and _austral_, only the last has an intelligible meaning."
"That is an important point," replied Captain Mangles; "the shipwreck took place in the southern hemisphere."
"I will continue," resumed Glenarvan. "The word _abor_ is the trace of the verb _aborder_ (to land). These unfortunates have landed somewhere. But where? _Contin!_ Is it on a continent? _Cruel!_"
"'Cruel!'" cried Mangles; "that explains the German word _graus, grausam, cruel_!"
"Go on, go on!" cried Glenarvan, whose interest was greatly excited as the meaning of these incomplete words was elucidated. "_Indi_! Is it India, then, where these sailors have been cast? What is the meaning of the word _ongit_? Ha, longitude! And here is the latitude, 37° 11'. In short, we have a definite indication."
"But the longitude is wanting," said MacNabb.
"We cannot have everything, my dear major," replied Glenarvan; "and an exact degree of latitude is something. This French document is decidedly the most complete of the three. Each of them was evidently a literal translation of the others, for they all convey the same information. We must, therefore, unite and translate them into one language, and seek their most probable meaning, the one that is most logical and explicit."