"Shall we have an opening ceremony?" Hannah Wolston asked that evening.
"I rather think so!" Jack replied. "Just as if it were a matter of opening a canal in our own old Switzerland! What do you say, Mamma?"
"Just as you like, dears," Betsy answered.
"Then that is settled," said M. Zermatt. "The ceremony shall begin to-morrow with the starting of our machinery."
"How shall it end?" Ernest asked.
"With an excellent dinner in honour of Mr. Wolston."
"And of your son Ernest," said Mr. Wolston, "for he deserves great praise for his keenness and intelligence."
"I am delighted with your praise, sir," the young fellow replied, "but I had a good teacher."
The next day, about ten o'clock, the canal was formally opened in the presence of the two families who had assembled near the waterfall. The wheel, set in motion by the fall, revolved regularly, the two pumps worked and the water was let into the reservoir, which was filled in an hour and a half. Then the sluices were opened and the water travelled through the conduit, a distance of four hundred yards.
Everybody hastened to this spot, and there was much clapping of hands when the first trickles of water entered the portion of the canal which was open to the sky. After Ernest had thrown in a little buoy, the members of both families got into the waggon, which was waiting, and drove off towards Swan Lake, Jack speeding in front mounted on his ostrich.