Part 16 (1/2)

CHAPTER XIII

IN THE JUNGLE

”What e do with the cameras, Blake? The filh waterproof cases!” cried Joe to his chuh some accident or failure, backed nearer and nearer to the closing steel gates

”Will we really have to jump overboard?” asked the Spaniard ”I am not a very excellent swimmer”

But Blake, at whom these questions seemed directed, did not have to answer them For, after a series of confused shouts on the top of the concrete wall above them the ates, ceased It was just in ti was not more than a few feet away froht now,” a , fro with the towing locolad to know that,” answered Captain Watson gruffly

”You ht just as well kill a man as scare him to death What was the matter, anyhow?”

”Well, all of ouras sineer explained ”Soh, and you went backward instead of forward Then it took a ht now, and you'll go on through”

Blake and Joe looked at each other and smiled in relief, and Mr

Alcando appeared to breathe easier A little later the tug was again urged forward toward the front lock gates Then the closing of those at her stern went on, until the vessel was in a square steel and concrete basin--or, rather, a rectangular one, for it was longer than it ide, to lend itself to the shape of the vessels As Blake had said, it was like a big swio up,” Captain Watson said ”You can't get any pictures in here, I suppose?” he added

”We can show the water bubbling up as it fills the lock,” said Blake ”Water alwayspictures, as it seeht rate of speed We'll take a short strip of fil did not occupy a whole section of the lock, for they are built to acco To econoreat tank as that would be the locks are subdivided by gates into sates for all the locks,” explained Captain Watson, while Blake and Joe were getting their ca certain water valves and opening others ”Each lock has two leaves, or gates, and their weight runs anywhere fro to its position Soh, and others nearly twice that, and each leaf is sixty-five feet wide, and seven feet thick”

”Think of being crushed between two steel gates, of six hundred tons each, eighty feet high, sixty-five feet wide and seven feet thick,” observed Joe

”I don't want to think of it!” laughed Blake ”We are well out of that,” and he glanced back toward the closed and water-tight lock gates which had so nearly nipped the tug

”Here courgling sound, and an to show on the surface of the limpid fluid in which floated the _Nas in the floor of each lock, being admitted by means of pipes and culverts from the upper level

As the water hissed, boiled and bubbled while it flowed in Blake took her she went until finally she was raised as high as that section of the lock would lift her She went up at the rate of two feet a h Captain Watson explained that when there was need of hurry the rate could be three feet a h?” asked Joe

”Yes, two more here at Gatun, and three at Miraflores; or, rather, there is one lock at Pedro Miguel, where we go down thirty and a third feet, and then we go a mile to reach the locks at Miraflores

”There we shall have to go through two locks, with a total drop of fifty-four and two-thirds feet,” Captain Watson explained ”The syste easily in the basin, but sohpictures of this phase of the Canal, since the next scenes would be but a repetition of the process in the following two locks that would lift the _Nama_ to the level of Gatun Lake

”But I tell you e could do,” Blake said to his chum

”What's that--swim the rest of the way,” asked Joe, ”and have Mr

Alcando h of water lately But we could get out on top of the lock walls, and take pictures of the tug going through the lock That would be different”

”So it would!” cried Joe ”We'll do it!”