ars were got out. Harry knew
that, in order to pass through the locks, it would be necessary to pay
toll, and to procure an order from the canal authorities directing the
lock-men to permit the _Whitewing_ to pass. The canal boatmen, of whom
he made inquiries, told him where to find the office, which was some
little distance up the canal. When the office was reached, an officer
came and inspected the boat, asked a great many questions about the
cruise up the Hudson, and seemed to be very much interested in the
expedition. He told the boys that the water was low in the Champlain
Canal, and that the lock-men might not be willing to open the locks for
so small a boat; but that they could avoid all dispute by entering the
locks at the same time with some one of the many canal-boats that were
on their way north. He charged the _Whitewing_ the enormous sum of
twenty-five cents for tolls, and gave Harry an important-looking order,
by which the lock-men were directed to allow the skiff _Whitewing_,
Captain Harry Wilson, to pass through all the locks on the canal.

Thanking the pleasant officer, the boys pushed off. After they had
passed the place where the Champlain Canal branches off from the Erie
Canal, they were no longer troubled by a crowd of canal-boats, and were
able to set the sail again. Unluckily, the mast was just a little too
high to pass under the bridges, and at the first bridge which they met
they narrowly escaped a capsize--Jim succeeding in getting the mast down
only just in time to save it from striking the bridge. They had hardly
set sail again when another bridge came in sight, and they could see
just beyond it a third bridge. It would never do to stop at every bridge
and unship the mast, so Harry went on shore, borrowed a saw from a
cooper's shop, and sawed six inches off from the top of the mast, after
which the bridges gave them no more trouble.

The boys were very much interested in passing the first lock. They
slipped into the lock behind a big canal-boat, which left just room
enough between its rudder and the gate for the _Whitewing_. When the
lock-men shut the gate behind the boat, and opened the sluices in the
upper gate, the water rose slowly and steadily. The sides of the lock
were so steep and black that the boys felt very much as if they were at
the bottom of a well; but it was not many minutes before the water had
risen so high that the upper gates were opened, and the big canal-boat
and its li