He [Joseph Smith] had a large roll of paper rolled up in a valise which he carried with him, which he claimed to [Joseph] Knight was a translation from these plates and constituted the revelation. He farther showed this manuscript to Knight, which he claimed was translated by himself by looking through the Urim and Thummim while he sat behind a blanket hung across a room in order that the sacred records might be kept from profane eyes, and read off the "Book of Mormon," or Golden Bible as he sometimes called it, to Oliver Cowdery who wrote it down. He showed the certificate to Knight, which was attached, and read it to him as follows. ... After reading this off to Knight[,] Smith saw he had made a convert to his new religion. He took up the silver bows and looked in them steadily for a few minutes when he says: "Lo! I see feathers! I see feathers, a stump, a fence, a field. Yes, indeed, between this and Jericho is a stump covered with feathers, at the south east side of which is a pot of gold. Perhaps the treasure was buried there by Captain Kidd." ... Well, Smith and Knight arranged to get a neighbor or two and go up there and get the treasure on the following morning. Little sleep was found in that house the remainder of that night and in the morning Knight had his men with shovels, picks and bars ready for the crusade. Before leaving Smith gave his charge to all the men, that not a word must be spoken while they were digging nor within 10 rods of the place where the treasure was, else it would vanish. They went toward Jericho, and when about three fourths of the way along Smith stopped his horse and said to the men, "This looks like the place." Knight climbed up on the fence and looking off toward the woods said, "I see a stump with feathers on it." Smith then told him "This is the place." They dug around the stump all that day but found no treasure to satisfy their craving natures, but went home tired and jaded. The following morning they returned to the toil when about noon one of the men struck his pick on something hard that gave a sound like the lid of a pot. Without consideration he said "I have struck it," when Smith exclaimed: "Fool! thou art, the pot of gold was there but thy voice hath caused it to vanish." And so as Smith said no gold or pot was found and the men returned home to reflect, not on the impossibility of gold not being there, but upon the foolishness of the neighbor.
[Source: "Impressions of the Work and Teachings of Joseph Smith, the Morman [sic], at Nineveh," Bainbridge (NY) Enterprise, 16 August 1888., as cited in Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents: Bainbridge (Ny) Enterprise]
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