Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 437

This issue of Beadle's Dime Novels (Volume XVII, No. 437, December 1885) features "The Hawks of the Hook" by Colonel Prentiss Ingraham, an adventure serial in two chapters. The story concerns a corsair named Captain Carl who commands an armed schooner seeking buried pirate treasure worth half a million dollars—supposedly hidden by the pirate Rafael the Rover fifteen years prior on Long Island's coast. Carl assembles a crew to raid the old house of a deceased miser named Barney Bolls, believing the treasure lies hidden there. However, Duncan Dare, a midshipman in the U.S. Navy, anticipates the raid and ambushes Carl's men inside the house alongside local constables. Simultaneously, Dare captures Carl's schooner from the water. The raid is defeated; Carl apparently dies in combat. Dare is celebrated by villagers despite earlier being falsely charged with murder, and reunites with his family.