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Summary of The Gold-Bug by Poe

William Legrand had lost his fortune and was living in South Carolina with his servant, Jupiter. One day, he found a rare scarab beetle with gold scales and drew a picture of it for the narrator, who noticed the drawing resembled a skull. Later, Legrand took the narrator and Jupiter on an expedition to a tulip tree, where Jupiter found a real skull. Following clues in the beetle's placement, they uncovered a chest of gold and jewels belonging to pirate Captain Kidd. Legrand revealed he had decoded symbols on the beetle drawing's parchment that led them to the buried treasure.

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Josefina Bianchi
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221 views1 page

Summary of The Gold-Bug by Poe

William Legrand had lost his fortune and was living in South Carolina with his servant, Jupiter. One day, he found a rare scarab beetle with gold scales and drew a picture of it for the narrator, who noticed the drawing resembled a skull. Later, Legrand took the narrator and Jupiter on an expedition to a tulip tree, where Jupiter found a real skull. Following clues in the beetle's placement, they uncovered a chest of gold and jewels belonging to pirate Captain Kidd. Legrand revealed he had decoded symbols on the beetle drawing's parchment that led them to the buried treasure.

Uploaded by

Josefina Bianchi
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

The summary of The Gold-Bug begins with the unnamed narrator's introduction of William Legrand,

who moved to South Carolina with Jupiter. Legrand had been very rich but he lost all his money. He had
no family. One day the narrator went to visit Legrand. When he got to his home no one was there.
Shortly after dark, Legrand and Jupiter arrived, excited about a new species of scarab, or beetle, that
they found with metallic, gold scales. The narrator asked to saw it, but Legrand said he lent it to a friend.
Offering to drew a picture of the bug, Legrand pulled a piece of parchment out of his pocket. After
completing his drawing, Legrand hands the parchment to the narrator sitting by the fire who looked at
the parchment and said the beetle looks like a skull.
A month later, Jupiter surprised the narrator at his home. Jupiter believed his master is ill, having been
bitten by the bug. Legrand now spent his days wandering the island. Jupiter produced a note from
Legrand requesting a visit. When they arrived, the narrator tried to persuaded Legrand to went to bed,
but Legrand informed him that they were going on an expedition and asked the narrator to join. After
two hours of walking, they arrived at an enormous tulip-tree. Legrand told Jupiter to climbed it, tooking
the bug which was now tied to a bit of string. He told Jupiter to climbed up to the seventh limb and
crawl out to the end. Jupiter did so and came across a human skull nailed to the branch. Legrand told
him to put the bug through the left eye socket and drop it to the ground.
Legrand drove a peg into the ground where the beetle fell and determined where to begin digging. After
they found nothing, Legrand told Jupiter to show him which eye is his left; Jupiter points to his right eye.
A new spot is determined several yards away. The men uncovered a large wooden chest filled with gold
and jewels.. The men then took the chest home then returned for the rest of the treasure. They slept for
three or four hours then spent the whole next day looking through the contents of the chest.
After the treasure had been looked over, Legrand revealed how he came to know of it. He explained
that the parchment he used to drew the image of the bug had, in fact, revealed a skull when the
narrator held it close to the fire. He realized that it likely had more heat-activated writing and after the
narrator had left and Jupiter had gone to bed, Legrand held it to the fire where he saw the image of a
goat appear in the corner opposite the skull. He believed the skull to symbolize pirates and the goat to
indicate Captain William Kidd, but he wondered about the lack of writing in the middle. When he
returned, he saw lines of symbols; a cipher.
Having solved ciphers before, Legrand put his best practices to work and decoded the message. He then
followed the instructions which led him to Bishop's Hostel. From there, he found the place that was
referred to as "the devil's seat" and he employed his looking glass in the direction indicated in the
message. From the devil's seat he was able to saw the large tulip-tree that he would later have Jupiter
climbed. He then followed the rest of the instructions which ultimately led them to Captain Kidd's
buried treasure. Although they would never know, they assumed the two dead bodies in the hole were
the captain's help who he had killed not wanted anyone to know the location of the treasure.

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