“Astern here, having a swim.”
Kenneth rushed aft and caught sight of the mate’s legs thrashing around under the overhang.
With rare presence of mind he had done the one thing that could save him. Finding himself overboard, he swam with swift strokes aft and clung, in spite of the twisting and rocking of the yacht, to the rudder. The overhang protected him from all harm, and beyond a chill produced by the cold water he was unhurt.
The lock-keeper, thoroughly scared by the consequences of his ill-temper, tried to make amends by letting in the water so gently that the “Gazelle” reached the upper level with scarcely a tremor.
“These very narrow escapes are trying, to say the least,” Frank remarked, as “Step Lively” once more got going.
“Yes, if we really had any skin on our teeth it would have been worn off long ago,” said Arthur, as he appeared on deck in dry clothes, smiling cheerfully.
While the “one-horse motor” could not be classed as a high-speed engine, the old mare plugged along with a steady gait that covered the miles at a speed sufficient for the purpose. It was a great trip, and the boys agreed that it would be hard to find a better way to see the country. Many of the important cities of the Empire State were cut in two parts by the canal, and as the boys passed through at the two-miles-an-hour pace, they had plenty of time to go ashore and see things—the great electric works of The General Electric Co. at Schenectady, the optical and camera works at Rochester. Troy, Schenectady, Utica, Rome, Syracuse, Rochester, and a score of other towns whose names are familiar all over the United States were visited.
They passed many sorts of vessels carrying cargoes of freight over the great water highway of the State. Canal boats, laden with lumber and grain, in fleets, single file, drawn by teams of from two to six mules, eastward bound, the water within eighteen inches of the decks. Forward on many of the boats was a box-like compartment for the steeds when off duty, and it was a common thing to see the head of a mule sticking out above the deck, “viewing the landscape o’er.” Whole families lived aboard these queer vessels; clothes were washed and spread to dry on the little backyard-like piece of deck over the cabin-house. Sometimes boxes of brilliant geraniums were placed to protect the family from the public gaze, and occasionally, under an awning spread over the cabin roof, a woman sat and sewed, rocking a cradle with her foot.
There was a constant procession of boats of many kinds, floating high as a rule when going westward, but laden down within a foot or two of the scupper holes when eastward bound.
One morning the “Gazelle” passed three immense iron grain boats tied up to the stone-lined bank. They were empty, and loomed up beside the yacht like small mountains.