Elbow-Room | Page 8

he got a very strong galvanic battery and put it
in the cabin of the boat, attaching it to the other end of the line, forming
a circuit.
[Illustration: A PERPLEXED MULE]
The first time the mules stopped to reflect, the captain sent a strong
current through the wire. The leading mule gave a little start of
astonishment, and then it looked around at the boy upon the tow-path

with a mournful smile that seemed to say, "Sonny, I would like to know
how you worked that?" But the mules stood still. Then the captain
turned a stronger current on, and the mule shied a little and looked hard
at the boy, who was sitting by whittling a stick. The captain sent
another shock through the line, and then the mule, convinced that that
boy was somehow responsible for the mysterious occurrence, reached
over, seized the boy's jacket with his teeth, shook him up and passed
him to the hind mule, which kicked him carefully over the bank into the
river.
The mules were about to turn the matter over in their minds when
Captain Binns sent the full force of the current through the wire and
kept it going steadily. Thereupon the animals became panic-stricken.
They began to rear and plunge; they turned around and dashed down
the tow-path toward the boat. Then the line became taut; it jerked the
boat around suddenly with such force that the stern of it broke through
a weak place in the bank, and before the captain could turn off his
battery the mules had dashed around the other side of the
toll-collector's cabin, and then, making a lurch to the left, they fell over
the bank themselves, the line scraping the cabin, the collector, three
children and a colored man over with them. By the time the line was
cut and the sufferers rescued the mules were drowned and all the water
in the canal had gone out through the break. It cost Captain Binns three
hundred dollars for damages; and when he had settled the account, he
concluded to wait for the report of that committee before making any
new experiments.
The report of the committee upon improved locomotion was submitted
to the company during the following summer. It was a long and
exceedingly entertaining document, and the following extracts from it
may possess some interest:
THE REPORT.
"In reference to the plan offered by Henry Bushelson, which proposes
to run the boats by means of his patent propeller, we may remark that
the steam-engine with which the propeller is moved would sink the
boat; and even if it would not, the propeller-blades, being longer than

the depth of the canal, would dig about five hundred cubic feet of mud
out of the bottom at each revolution. As a mud-dredge Bushelson's
patent might be a success, but as a motive-power it is a failure; and his
suggestion that the tow-path might be cut into lengths and laid side by
side and sold for a farm, therefore, is not wholly practicable.
"The idea of William Bradley is that holes might be cut in the bottom
of the boat, and through these the legs of the mule could be inserted, so
that it could walk along the bottom, while its body is safe and dry
inside. This notion is the offspring of a fruitful and ingenious intellect;
and if the water could be kept from coming through the holes, it might
be considered valuable but for one thing--somebody would have to
invent a new kind of mule with legs about seven feet long. Mr.
Bradley's mind has not yet devised any method of procuring such a
mule, and unless he can induce the ordinary kind to walk upon stilts,
we fear that the obstacles to success in this direction may be regarded
as insurmountable.
"Mr. Peterman Bostwick urges that important results might be secured
by making the canal an inclined plane, so that when a boat is placed
upon it the boat will simply slide down hill by the power of the
attraction of gravitation. This seems to us a beautiful method of
adapting to the wants of man one of the most remarkable of the laws of
Nature, and we should be inclined to give Mr. Bostwick the first prize
but for the fact that we have discovered, upon investigation, that the
water in the canal also would slide down hill, and that it would require
about fifteen rivers the size of the Mississippi to keep up the supply. Mr.
Bostwick does not mention where we are to get those rivers. He does,
however, say that if it shall be deemed inadvisable to slope the canal,
the boats themselves might be made in the shape of inclined planes, so
that they would run down