u were flying through
the air.

[Illustration: THE SECOND JUMP.]

[Illustration: "TRYING IT AGAIN."]

Boom! Splash! The boat strikes the water, almost jolting you off your
seat, and whirling the spray high into the air. The people on the banks
of the little pond whiz by, for the speed is still terrific, and the
boat jumps forward in crazy leaps. After two or three of these spasmodic
efforts the boat glides to the landing, thanks to the assistance of the
man in the stern. Your breath comes back. You find you weren't hurt a
bit, or even wet. You feel as if you jumped from the top of the barn
into the lowest but softest hay-mow. You give an ecstatic gasp, this
time of extreme delight, and plead with papa or Uncle Tom to "try it
again."

You "try it again," and this time you are not scared a bit, just simply
delighted. As you are being paddled over to the shore after the last
violent plunge of the ride, you take a look at the boat, and notice that
it is very strongly built--of hickory and oak, the boatman says, and
costing over a hundred dollars. It has a long slope upward in the prow,
less sharp than a yacht's bow, and thus the danger of getting wet is
almost entirely done away with. Each boat has four seats, seating eight
people altogether, besides the man who steers.

Perhaps you go down the chute a few times more. If you do, you will have
acquired the "chute craze," and then it is only a question of how much
money you can have spent for you. Abroad, several of the royal families
acquired the "chute craze," and some of them have had amusing times on
it. When the present Emperor of Russia, then the Czarovitch, was
visiting England in July, 1893, he, the Prince of Wales, and the King of
Denmark, went to Captain Boyton's water-show to "shoot the chute." An
eye-witness, who wrote about it to a Chicago paper, said:

"They climbed to the top of the high incline, and the Czarovitch, with a
twinkle in his eye, invited the King of Denmark to take the front seat
in the boat in which they were to make the swift descent. His Majesty
took the place, and his nephew quietly stepped in behind and put his
silk hat under the seat. The Indian guide pushed off, and in a moment
the boat was flying like mad down the steep incline. The King, who
thought the boat would certainly plunge under the waters of the lake
when it struck, crouched down and held on like grim death. The
Czarovitch stood up and yelled with excited glee. The flat-bot