YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY THE NIAGARA BOOK By mark twain, w. d. howells, e. s martin, N. S. SHALER, Etc., Etc. 'is This book is not only notable from a literary standpoint, but is the only "guide" to Niagara of any importance. In it the falls are treated by famous writers from ah points of view — humorously, seriously, scientifically, historically — no aspect of them is forgotten or omitted. Altogether, the book, fully illustrated by thirty-two full-page pictures from the best photographs obtainable from noted profes sionals and amateurs, is complete in every detail. Aa* ' ^itt»-t> ...^^e^tt^s. Photograph by Harlan H. Boyce. A NOVEL VIEW OF THE HORSESHOE. The Niagara Book BY W. D. HowELLs, Mark Twain, Prof. Nathaniel S. Shaler, and Others NEW AND revised EDITION With Remarkable Photographic Illustrations New York Doubleday, Page & Co. 1901 COPYRIGHT, 1893 BY UNDERHILL & NICHOLS COPYRIGHT, igoi BY IRVING S. UNDERHILL ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Many of the illustrations in this book are from photographs taken by amateurs. For the use of the others zve are indebted to the courtesy of Messrs. IVielson, Arnold, Curtis., Koonz and Zyback ^ Co. In every case the name of the photographer is given. CONTENTS. Part I. Page What to See. Frederic Almy, A. M 3 Dramatic Incidents. Orrin E. Dunlap 59 Historic Niagara. Hon. Peter A. Porter ... go The Geology of Niagara Falls. Prof. N. S. Shaler. 123 The Flora and Fauna of Niagara Falls. Hon. David F. Day 158 Utilization of Niagara's Power. Coleman Sellers, E.D., Sc.D., etc 178 Part II. The First Authentic Mention of Niagara Falls. Mark Twain . . . ...... 215 Niagara, First and Last. Willia?n D. Howells . . 236 As It Rushes By. Edward S. Martin . . . 270 Famous Visitors at Niagara Falls. Rev. Thomas R. Slicer 278 Part III. Buffalo and the Pan American Exposition. . . 315 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. A NOVEL view OF THE HORSESHOE . . . Frontispiece Facing Page ENTRANCE TO THE CAVE OF THE WINDS .... 10 . THE HORSESHOE FROM THE MAID OF THE MIST . . 22 . THE THREE SISTER ISLANDS 34. QUEENSTON AND LEWISTON. — END OF THE GORGE . 42' PROSPECT POINT . . . . 50- SEARCHLIGHT IN THE GORGE . . 5g . SPELTERINA . . . -70 BLONDIN . . 70 - searchlight in the gorge . . 84- the american fall from goat island .... 90 . devil's hole .... 104 , a panorama of niagara . iio . the maid of the mist ... ... . ii9 bird's-eye VIEW OF NIAGARA RIVER . . 122 - MAP OF LAKE IROQUOIS . . I29 • THE ICE PALACE . . 132 - HYPOTHETIC HYDROGRAPHY AT A DATE BEFORE THE MELTING OF THE GREAT GLACIER FROM THE ST. LAWRENCE VALLEY I3.^ ¦ HYPOTHETIC HYDROGRAPHY AT A DATE AFTER THE MELTING OF THE GREAT GLACIER FROM THE ST. LAWRENCE VALLEY 137 ¦ bird's-eye VIEW OF THE NIAGARA GORGE .... 144 . LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Facing Page THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT • ^5°' SECTION OF NIAGARA FALLS, SHOWING THE ARRANGE MENT OF HARD AND SOFT STRATA, AND ILLUS TRATING A THEORY OF THE PROCESS OF EROSION 152 . SPRINGTIME AT NIAGARA 158' AMERICAN RAPIDS ABOVE GOAT ISLAND BRIDGE . l68 • THE GORGE ROAD • 178 ' THE GORGE NEAR LEWISTON 178 ' POWER HOUSE — EXTERIOR . . .... l88 ' POWER HOUSE — INTERIOR ... . . ... l88 ' A bird's-eye VIEW FROM THE TOWER . ... I96- THE AMERICAN FALL FROM BELOW .... . . 206 ^ ROCK OF AGES AND CAVE OF THE WINDS .... 2l6v THE HORSESHOE FALL AT SUNSET 226^ THE WHIRLPOOL RAPIDS 236. LUNA ISLAND IN WINTER 244, THE "maid OF THE MIST " 254 THE BREAKING OF THE ICE BRIDGE 267. THE ICE BRIDGE 267- THE CAVE OF THE WINDS IN WINTER 274 ¦ MOONLIGHT 284 . THE WHIRLPOOL 294* THE ICE MOUNTAIN 304 . PLAN OF THE CITY OF BUFFALO 316 ' NIAGARA FALLS AND VICINITY . . .... 33 1 . PLAN OF THE PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION . . . 340, THE STADIUM ,-2 ¦ THE NIAGARA BOOK. PART I. What to See. Frederic Almy, A.M. Dramatic Incidents. Orrin E. Dunlap. Historic Niagara. Hon. Peter A. Porter. The Geology of Niagara Falls. Prof. N. S. Shaler. The Flora and Fauna of Niagara Falls. Hon. David F. Day. Utilization of Niagara's Power, Coleman Sellers, E.D., Sc.D., etc THE NIAGARA BOOK. PART 1. WHAT TO SEE. By Frederic Almy, A.M. A CONSECUTIVE DESCRIPTION FOR VISITORS. I. The Cave of the Winds. II. The Maid ofthe Mist. III. Queen Victoria Park ; the Horseshoe Fall ; the Dufferin Islands. IV. The American Rapids ; Prospect Park ; Goat Island ; Luna Island ; the Three Sisters. V. Lower Niagara : The Whirlpool Rapids ; the Whirlpool ; the Gorge Road to Lewiston and Queenston ; Brock's Monument ; Niagara on the Lake, and Youngstown. VI. Seasons and Moods ; The Ice Bridge ; Tramps, Strolls, and Resting Places ; the Bicycler. VII. Programmes for One Day at Niagara. VIII. Statistics. 3 THE NIAGARA BOOK. I. THE CAVE OF THE WINDS. The most greedy imagination need not remain long hungry at Niagara. One well- used day, with a sun bright enough to start the rainbows, can satisfy every expectation; and yet, many who see the Falls for the first time are disappointed. There are various rea sons for so general an experience, but no one of them implies any short-coming in the place. A rather stolid mind takes in such a sight slowly, and one look does not quicken it, while a more sensitive temperament is apt to come to Niagara with such composite antici pations that no single aspect of the place could satisfy them all. If you are easily^moved it may be that a tremor of excitement will take possession of your senses as you approach Niagara for the first time, and so subdue your judgment that you will have no power to criticise ; but, on the other hand, no matter how callous you may be, no matter how utter a Philistine, it is possible 4 WHAT TO SEE. for you to be so introduced that you will be made an instantaneous convert to the majesty of the place if not to its beauty. If you are willing to take the climax of Niagara at the outset and so forestall every possibility of dis appointment, you will do well, without the least preliminary glance of any kind, to enter the watery chaos of the Cave of the Winds. Cross the stone bridge that leads to Goat Island, with the rapids of the American Fall slipping furiously under you as they fall from the sky line at the left ; with the brink itself a few rods below you on the right, so that you see the plunge, but not the fall; with the roar of the torrent in your ears and the musty smell of the roily water in your nos trils; and finally, before you in the distance, rising over the tree tops of Goat Island, the pillar of cloud by day that guards the Horse shoe. If it is very early morning in midsum mer, and the wind is favorable, a rainbow, zenith high, will overarch the scene, but this is hardly needed to quicken the pulses of your heart as you advance to meet the wonder of your thoughts from early childhood. Take now the middle path across the idyllic beauty 5 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of the island. You find it a cool bower, sweet with every wood fragrance, carpeted in the spring with masses of blue violets and white trillium, and overspread by branches of huge trees whose leaves sift out the sunlight until it falls in patches only on the road below. It is a place in which to " loaf and invite the soul," as Whitman says, but now is not the time. Five minutes brings you to the dressing house that marks the entrance to the Cave of the Winds. Here it will take a strong will not to look down over the hand rail on the bank; but the epicure in sensations will refrain. In deed, to look now is to spoil everything, and to accept for your first view of Niagara one of the least imposing. Instead, step quickly into the house, pay your dollar for the necessary escort of a guide, strip to the skin with no thought of retaining even your underclothes, and put on the homely and uncomfortable but eminently practical suit that is ofifered you. A blouse and trousers of a light gray flannel, a hooded coat and overalls of yellow oilskin, and slippers made out of a sheet of thick white felt folded around the foot and firmly tied in place with strips of whip-cord — arrayed in these you 6 WHAT TO SEE. are in full court costume, ready to be presented to Majesty. To reach the cave you circle down the clif? by an uncomfortable, small, winding staircase, of a sort familiar to sight-seers abroad. From this you presently emerge, out of breath, upon a ledge of rock, with the dark green waters of the river below and a vertical wall of granite towering above. A mere score of steps brings you around a curve and puts before your sight the enor mous sheet of water, vast in itself, but at Ni agara insignificant and inconspicuous, which curtains the Cave of the Winds. About one hundred and fifty feet in height, and as much in breadth, it descends between Goat Island and Luna Island. It has no special name, and the ordinary visitor to Niagara will hardly realize its separate existence. Our English cousins who do not go behind it may respect it more if they are told that it leaves the sky at the height of the top of the western towers of Canterbury or of Durham Cathe dral, and that it has twice the width of the main faqade of either. If they have ever been behind they will need no details to ensure re- 7 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Spect. We see it first in profile, a long, curv^ ing edge of green and white, not so much fall ing from the brink above as leaping, with a forward plunge, so that between its inner wall and the retreating surface of the cliff is left a strange gray cavern, now to be explored. I have been through the cave more than a score of times, but no number of trips can ever dull or in any degree displace in my mind the impressions of the first visit. In quiet ig norance of what was to come, I approached the precipitous wooden staircase which de scends behind the fall. Looking across I saw a patch of blue sky at the farther outlet of the cave, but elsewhere the air was dark with criss-crossed blasts of sleet, hurtling in all di rections like frightened comets. A second later the battery of the fall was on. my head and all the Powers of the Air were at my throat. Around my feet a rainbow formed a ring through which I seemed to drop into blackness. The staircase stopped and I was on a narrow ledge of rock, with no more path or rail, hugging a sHppery wall of stone. The water clutched my feet furiously. Neither the burly guide nor the stranger who had accom- WHAT TO SEE. panied me was to be seen. I started to go forward, but as I turned a mass of water struck me breathless. I tried to find the stairs, but a worse dash of water from the other side outdid the first. Facing the wall again I waited, perhaps thirty seconds, wondering, when suddenly the guide appeared with the frightened Frenchman whom he had pursued and recaptured. It was a lonesome introduc tion to the place, but we moved on now to gether through the water, clinging desperately with our toes through the felt to whatever foothold we could discover, and glad to have the support of hands as well as feet. Dignity in such a place, and such a costume, is the last thing to be considered. Half blinded, quite deafened, gasping — the agitation of the nerves is too great at first for observation ; but soon the eye learns how to follow the curving inner surface of the falling water, half translucent and of shifting colors, far up to where it leaves the line of the cliff above. It learns to over come the twilight and gather outlines of black, terraced rocks, dripping with streams of sleet, that form the amphitheatre of the cave. You learn to step fearlessly into the churning 9 THE NIAGARA BOOK. water, towards the Fall, knowing that the re bound of the cataract is so violent that even if you lost your footing you would only be thrust roughly back against the terraces. It is soon over. A brief climb up the ledges brings you to dry rock and the bright sun again, but you have seen a cave of ^olus such as Virgil never dreamed of. Henceforth the lines in the opening pages of the ^neid : Hie vasto rex jEolus antro Luctantes ventos vinclis et carcere frenat, will have new meaning. A clever writer once said that the cave was like a small choky corridor with the deluge going on inside it, and he marvelled greatly that the end of his trip coincided with the point of departure instead of occurring in transitu. It is alarming but not dangerous, and accidents are almost unheard of. Women frequently go through the cave as well as men. There is no surer way to take the conceit out of a complacent cockney who affects to look down on Niagara than to make him run this gauntlet. I think always of Emerson's lines on Monadnoc : Photograph by Edmimd R. Hardy. ENTRANCE TO THE CAVE OF THE WINDS. WHAT TO SEE. Pants up hither the spruce clerk From South Cove and City Wharf, I take him up my rugged sides. Half repentant, scant of breath, — I scowl on him with my cloud, With my north wind chill his blood ; I lame him clattering down the rocks ; And to live he is in fear. Then, at last, I let him down Once more into his dapper town, To chatter, frightened, to his clan And forget me if he can. The passage through the cave is an experi ence too grim and colorless for pure pleasure, but the return across the rocks in front of the fall — in a bright sun — is a luxury of delight. The heart that " leaps up when it beholds a rainbow in the sky " will here be in a dancing- fever of excitement, for there are whole rain bows, half rainbows, and quarter rainbows, not in the sky, distant and inaccessible, but in your fingers, around your head, and between your feet, while the pot of gold at the rain bow's foot is a caldron of molten silver, foam ing and rushing about your knees, and tug ging at you with an invitation that is irresis- THE NIAGARA BOOK. tible. I have seen grave men frolic in the water, their trousers and sleeves swelled al most to bursting with the imprisoned air; now clinching their toes firmly in some crevice and leaning back with all their force against the cushion of water that rocked them like a cradle; now crouching low with arms akimbo while the interrupted stream sprang high above their heads in an arching curve, like a sea shell around a naiad; now thrusting thera selves into invisibility against some rock over which the torrent broke in a noisy cascade — their heads safe in the airhole near the crest, from which they dimly watched the passing figures in their oilskins, until they chose to startle them by reappearing. To play so with Niagara brings an exhilaration that is inde scribable. It " washes brain and heart clean " and gives a child's courage for the tasks of the world. The exaltation is heightened, by the heavy roar of the cataract close above you, and the brilliant beauty of color all around you. You climb through one circular rainbow to the top of a black boulder and descend through another on the other side ; you cross slippery wooden bridges, exposed to such fun is WHAT TO SEE. OUS castigation from the sleet that yOu bend involuntarily in homage to the fearful power of your recent playfellow. Most glorious of all, whenever for a moment the eye is not so buf feted by driving spray as to deprive you en tirely of your vision, look upwards, always up wards — where the flashing peaks of the Amer ican Fall tower above the deluge like the snowy summits of a mountain chain. In such access of mind, in such high hour Of visitation from the living God, Thought is not, in enjoyment it expires, — Rapt into still communion that transcends The imperfect offices of prayer and praise. IL THE MAID OF THE MIST. Everywhere at Niagara the genius of the place has many moods. Often at the Cave of the Winds there is not a rainbow; sometimes when the spray beats down the river you can even enter the cave without a wetting. It may take twenty trips to see all its splendor, but fully to see it is worth them all. I know of 13 THE NIAGARA BOOK. nothing in Nature to be compared with it. The valley of the Rhone Glacier at dusk, when the white frozen mass of ice falls silently at your feet from the sky, suggests it dimly, as the moon in dayHght suggests the sun. For many, though, the pleasures of the cave are too robust. All such should still attempt to see Niagara first from below, and the next best way is from one of the twin steamers called the Maid of the Mist. The approach is through Prospect Park, and by taking the central path to the inclined railway you can again reach the water's edge without so much as one glimpse of the Fall. As you come out of the house at the foot of the railway there is a territory at the left, full of attractions, but your way lies to the right. From the steamer landing you see a broad river of a dark green color, as placid and un ruffled as if it had never known a struggle or a fall. Men swim in it with safety. Before you is the disappointing profile of the up per half of the American Fall. The lower half is hid by rocks and spray. Slip on one of the rubber cloaks in the saloon, take a rubber blanket, and rush forward to the 14 WHAT TO SEE. choice seats at the front. As the steamer moves sturdily forward, still through smooth green water, the air begins to fill with a soft spray, as fine and penetrating as a Scotch mist, and the water is thickly overlaid with foam. You coast along the one thousand and sixty feet of the American Fall, close to the rocks below and so very close to the Fall itself that it is almost terrifying. Nothing is distinctly seen, for the eyes blink in the beating rain. You can see better if yoti wear glasses; the wet dims them, but you can at least keep your eyes open more steadily. Nothing is distinctly heard. The deep note of Niagara sounds in your ears with a heavy throb that is almost painful. You are confronted by a rip pling, flashing, shimmering wall of white, a precipice of falling foam, furrowed in deep creases by the uneven contour of the brink, and rebounding high in a leaping cloud of spray that always hides the base from every eye. Near the steamer are many boulders ; the largest the Rock of Ages that stands before the entrance to the Cave of the Winds. Then come the bare cliffs of Goat Island, another thousand feet or more ; and then — the Horse- 15 THE NIAGARA BOOK. shoe. Its lofty, curving walls confront each other, one hundred and sixty feet in height, and in their contour fully three thousand feet, or more than half a mile. The plucky Maid pushes straight into this pit of falHng waters; forward she goes, into its depths, until for an instant, for one short second, there is nothing to the right, to the left, or before, nothing any where in the whole world for you but the en closing cataracts falling on all sides from the sky. It is just one second of crowded, glori ous life, worth a year's pilgrimage. The little steamer has gone as far as the full force of her engines will carry her; she lurches heavily, tosses like a cork on the white surging foam, and wheels suddenly around. Then, gradu ally, you realize that the climax is to be re peated. Once more the Maid pushes stead ily through the churning froth, straight for the vortex of the Horseshoe; once more the white cataracts surround you, and then the Maid gives up the hopeless struggle, wheels heavily again, and shoots like an arrow down the stream and away. The views now are from the stern; first of the rapidly receding Horseshoe, then of Goat i6 WHAT TO SEE. Island, then of the American Fall as we coast again along its length, nearly as close as be fore, and finally, from the Canadian dock, a beautiful panorama of both Falls. From here the boat returns to the American landing, but the tourist's best plan is to go ashore, take the inclined railway up the Canadian bank, or climb the winding road, and then walk or ride along the .crest of the cliff to Inspiration Point and to the former site of Table Rock. III. CANADA THE HORSESHOE THE DUFFERINS. It is disappointing to the patriotic soul, but not to be disputed, that the finest views of Niagara are to be had on the Canadian side. Perhaps there is more variety of beauty in the American park than in the other; Goat Isl and, the Three Sisters, Prospect Park, the Rapids, and the River Road are all exceed ingly beautiful ; but when you have seen it all there is no place to which you come back so eagerly for inspiration as to Table Rock on the Canadian shore. 2 17 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Queen Victoria Park. The Queen Victoria Park was established in 1888, or three years after the State of New York had purchased Goat Island and the land on the American side, and dedicated it to its people. Here and there are trifling indica tions of the different temper of the govern ments on either bank. Take for instance the governmental signboards with their warning notices, which in Canada are less considerate of the tender feelings of the dear public than with us. Mark the autocratic barbarity of the British declaration that persons throwing stones over the bank will be prosecuted ac cording to law, as compared with the exquisite delicacy of the placards that meet you at every turn on Goat Island Dangerous Places " Trees and Shrubs " " Do Not Venture in "Do Not Harm the " Stones Thrown Over the Bank May Fall upon People Below." The Queen Victoria Park is much more trig than its neighbor. It has flower beds and close clipped lawns, rustic arbors, and wig wams, busts of notables, and even fountains ! In the State Reservation, on the contrary, the 18 WHAT TO SEE. more important portions are in a condition al most primeval. It is well to remind the visitor that in dis tributing his time the hours given to the Cana dian park should be in the afternoon. At Niagara, Canada is the land of the setting sun, and it is only in the afternoon that the superb bows can be seen which rise high in the sky, sometimes over-arching both Falls in a single curve. It is the other shore which is distinctly Rainbow Land. Give only the sun, and on the American shore the wise pilgrim can have his rainbow, be it morning or be it afternoon. In the morning at Prospect Park, if the day is bright, one rainbow is certain, two are usual, and to see three concentric bows, each revers ing the colors of its neighbor, is not uncom mon. At the brink of the Horseshoe it is the same, while in the afternoon I know of no more beautiful sight at Niagara than the view of Luna Island and the great American Fall, framed by an iridescent bow. It is a spectacle not to be missed. Suppose, then, that it is the afternoon. You make your way along the Canadian shore to wards Inspiration Point, and what we still call 19 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Table Rock, though the last vestige of the rock itself fell over forty years ago. You find at once that here the railroad has entered Paradise. The tracks of an electric road ac company you all the way. It was built in 1892, and runs along the whole Niagara gorge from Queenston, seven miles below, to the placid beauty of the Dufferin" Islands, where iron railroad bridges now run side by side with all the older ones of inoffensive wood. The world must move. Electric cars run from The Hague to the bathing houses of Schev- eningen. They run even from Florence up to Fiesole, and how can Niagara be spared ! They are necessary and laudable, but as unat tractive to the eye as the cheap books that have opened literature to the million. Below Inspiration Point the view may pos sibly be disappointing, but from this point on it is difficult for one who knows the place to see how even a newcomer can fail to be raost powerfully impressed, especially if the convic tion of the height of Niagara has been first well driven home by a journey through the Cave or on the stearaer. Still, a Bostonian looked first from here and promptly wished to WHAT TO ,SEE. improve on Nattire by removing the barren waU of Goat Island, so that there should be one continuous fall. A more legitimate source of disappointment is due to the heavy spray. Over and over travellers brought with care to Table Rock for their first view, open their eyes to see only an invisible Niagara, both Ameri can Fall and the Horseshoe being veiled com pletely by a loud, thundering cloud of mist. The Horseshoe Fall. As you advance towards the Horseshoe, and see farther ancl farther into its white re cesses, until, at Table Rock, you are admitted almost to the heart of its secrets, the sensation of awe in the presence of such majesty is ir resistible. You stand at one limit of the vast curve. Your eye traverses the whole extent of the silent sheets of plunging water, and fol lows them downward to the milky sea beneath. Frora below rise such enormous clouds of shifting spray that at times all outlines are confused. The vagueness magnifies each dis tance, and through the blur the opposite crest seems infinitely far away, and the chasm hot- THE NIAGARA BOOK. tomless. The effect is all of white and gray, and yet conspicuous before you is the great Green Water, the one place where the flood of Niagara does not break instantly into foam but clings together in a solid sheet that de scends for many feet unbroken, exhibiting the exquisite color of the green deep sea. The water nearer is sometimes turbid and yellow. Everywhere its surface has a waxen, sheeny glaze that is characteristic of Niagara. At the convergence of the two opposite faces of the cataract the confusion of waters is indescriba ble. Above all mounts the white column of spray that seems to " Rise like a cloud of incense from the earth." The raan or woraan here who does not de scend to the foot of the precipice commits a sin unpardonable. Fear may forbid the Cave of the Winds, or even the Maid of the Mist, but here you have firm Mother-earth to stand on. If the whim of the wind allows you dry rocks you can lie at your ease in the sun and drink in alraost the view which the prow of the steamer presents for a second and then snatches frora you. You are in the same white Photographs by Orrm E. Dunlap. THE HORSESHOE FROM THE MAID OF THE AIIST. WHAT TO SEE. pit of downward rushing walls. You have al most the same sense of having conquered the inaccessible, of having invaded sanctity. It is Hke the disembodied joys of spirits. Mr. Howells speaks in his book of the repose of Niagara. Another paradox is its silence. The sheets of falling water are so unchanging to the eye that the motion seeras no raore actual than when the breeze runs through a field of grain. It moves without moving. In some such way the unchanging volume of sound soon leaves on the ear a strange sense of si lence. Now and again, however, as sorae raore corapact raass of water raakes its fall, a new note strikes the ear, and under all is the heavy beating of the air as if of sound too low for the range of human hearing. It has always seemed to me as if much of the voice of Ni agara raight be to us inaudible.* It is strange that no great poera has yet been written for Niagara. Many have tried their hand, but there is nothing of established fame, nothing that is known for itself as well * In " Scribner's Magazine" for February, 1881, there is an article on " The Music of Niagara," by Eugene M. Thayer. He writes the chords of its different harmonies, but finds them four octaves lower than the keyboards of our pianos. 23 THE NIAGARA BOOK. as for its subject. There is line after line, how ever, of Coleridge's Hymn to Mont Blanc which if once thought of at Niagara will be always thought of there. Verse after verse is curiously apposite. Those who have never raade the translation from mountain to cata ract will find in it a wealth of new associations for both poem and place. The waters at thy base Rave ceaselessly ; but thou, most awful Form, [Fallest] from forth thy silent sea of green. How silently O dread and silent [Fall !] I gazed upon thee Till thou, still present to the bodily sense. Didst vanish from my thought. Entranced in prayer I worshipped the Invisible alone. Yet like some sweet beguiling melody. So sweet we know not we are listening to it. Thou, the meanwhile, was't blending with my thought, — Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy — Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused, Into the mighty vision passing — there. As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven. Who gave you your invulnerable life, Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, 24 WHAT TO SEE. Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ? Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven Beneath the keen full moon ? Who bade the sun Clothe you with rainbows ? Who, with living flowers Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet ? God !— let the torrents, like a shout of nations, Answer ! and let the ice-plains echo, God ! TAe Beautiful Dufferin Islands. The Titans of Niagara have been presented. They are grand, beautiful, but overpowering. The strain on the sensations is so exhausting that to stay long with them is oppressive, and after looking your fill you are glad to with draw to the more human pleasures of the isl ands. One of the dehghts of Niagara is the con stant alternation of tumult and peace, of majesty and winsoraeness. Willow Island and Goat Island are full of sweet wood charm. On Goat Island, especially, you can quite forget Niagara, although all the tirae its nearness in duces an exaltation of spirit which enhances the restful beauty of the forest. The Dufferin Islands, on the Canadian 25 THE NIAGARA BOOK. shore a mile above the Horseshoe, have a unique quality which cannot easily be stated. They are the perfection of rustic loveliness, and the approach is hardly less lovely. If you take the electric road, or even the carriageway, to the Dufferins, you will miss rauch beauty ; but the distance is raore than a mile, so that it may be necessary. The foot path is best, for it follows the water's edge, climbing the slope of the rapids, a green bow- ered path, with the big, breezy river at the left. At intervals are rustic seats from which you can watch the turmoil so near you, and the in- trieate tossing of the breakers. Here, as everywhere at Niagara, a bicycle is the ideal vehicle. It lifts you from the earth, spiritually and physically; you have not the sight of the horses nor the noise of their hoofs to distract you ; and you can have the intimate beauty of the footpaths without the weariness of the magnificent distances. A bicycle day at Niagara is an unforgettable pleasure, and no part of it raore so than the ride up the wind ing path to the Dufferins. Whether you approach by bicycle, by car riage, or by trolley, you see little of the islands 26 WHAT TO SEE. unless you leave your vehicle and explore the narrow paths. First coraes a swift river, about thirty feet wide, sweeping close against the hand-rail which guards the path. The river describes a seraicircle, and the path by its side is at the base of steep, dense woods, and is so overhung with vines that you proceed through a succes sion of pergolas. Here and there weeping willows whip the stream incessantly with their trailing branches. After this circuit, or before it, you raust by no means fail to wander through the mazes of the islands themselves. Wherever you turn you will find a tangled cluster of wooded islands, carpeted with thin gray sheets of rushing water, clear as a trout stream. Plank walks carry you dry shod through many places where all the dense vege tation springs not from earth, but from a film of swift, transparent water. This forest Ven ice, with its lovers' walks, and bowers, and platforras, is indescribably fascinating. The Burning Spring. Those who have araple time will find it worth while to visit also the burning spring 27 THE NIAGARA BOOK. on the hill above the Dufferins. You are shown into a darkened room, where an outlet of natural gas is lighted on payment of a fee, and the tossing of the great flames is pictur esque and beautiful. IV. THE RAPIDS AND PROSPECT PARK GOAT ISL AND, LUNA ISLAND, THE THREE SISTERS. It is late to speak of the famous rapids above the Goat Island bridge which, for raany visit ors, are the first thing seen at Niagara and the last forgotten. They do not equal the great rapids above the Whirlpool, seen frora the Gorge Road, but they are a chief source of pleasure. To see thera it is necessary, abso lutely, to descend to one of the platforms at the river's edge. Unless you do so they have not been seen. Sit for at least ten minutes, watching, and the fascination will seize you irresistibly. It is like a great turmoil of tossing ostrich feathers, except that there is feverish life in these white pluraes restlessly curling. There are tags of verse in the raind everywhere 28 WHAT TO SEE. at Niagara. The one that speaks to me here is from Matthew Arnold : Now the wild white horses play. Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. And again ; The wild white horses foam and fret, " Margaret ! Margaret ! " In sunshine these rapids blaze from a dis tance like white fire and are intolerable to the eye. Although not so terrific as the lower rapids, they are perhaps as exciting because they are hastening towards doom instead of escaping from it. As we watch, the imagina tion inevitably includes the shuddering leap into space. They race madly towards disaster, and as you follow you share their impatience. You walk close at the river's edge, unprotected from the contagion of its motion, until you reach the brink at Prospect Park, where only a low stone rampart separates you frora the Fall. Prospect Park. This is generally the first view seen by visitors, but, though fine, it is not the best. 29 THE NIAGARA BOOK. The Falls are seen in profile so that the line of their length is foreshortened, and the height seems rauch less than when seen frora below. It is well to insist on seeing Niagara first frora its base; what we look down on never seems so great as what we raust look up to. The sight frora Prospect Point is beautiful enough, however, and a favorite one to return to. If there is any sun there is always a rain bow in the morning, and at any time the great mass of shifting spray which cushions the falling waters will hold the eye prisoner. It seems as if some vast sea monster would emerge frora it, as in " Schiller's Diver." At night especially it is mysterious and awful, ^j^ As you follow the rampart along the preci pice the views change gradually. One of the best is labelled Father Hennepin's View. It is supposed to be the view seen in 1678 by Father Hennepin, a Jesuit missionary, and Chevalier de la Salle — the first white men who ever saw Niagara. The former writes of it as follows : " A vast and prodigious Cadence of Water which falls down after a surprising and aston ishing manner, in so much that the Universe does not afford its parallel. . . . This 30 WHAT TO SEE. Wonderful Downfall is corapounded of two cross streams of water, and two falls with an isle sloping along the middle of it. The waters which fall from this horrible precipice do foara and boyl after the most hideous manner imag inable; making an outrageous Noise, raore ter rible than that of thunder; for when the wind blows out of the South their dismal roaring raay be heard more than Fifteen Leagues off." Goat Island and Luna Island. Those who fear the trip on the Maid of the Mist can cross from here to the Canada shore by the bridge; or, if Goat Island is taken next, it is but a few rods back to the Goat Island bridge. As we cross we have a fine view of the hill of the rapids on the left, while on the right we see the brink of the Fall. The Ameri can islands are anchored in the very centre of Niagara. First coraes Bath Island, which is uninteresting, and then Goat Island itself, a fa raous treasure-house of delights. There are no more lovely forest roads or paths in the world than those on Goat Island, and Asa Gray, the botanist, tells us that there is hardly another 31 THE NIAGARA BOOK. place in the world where so great a variety of trees and flowers can be found in so small an area. Goat Island is still covered with original forest, except for the carriageways and foot paths that traverse it. That this is so is due no doubt to the fortunate fact that for genera tions all the Niagara islands, as well as part of the mainland, were owned by the wealthy fara ily of Gen. Peter B. Porter, well known in the War of 1812. A suraraer hotel on the bank of Goat Island, overlooking the Horseshoe, would have been a source of enorraous profit, but the sanctity of the place was always re spected. A pleasant story is told of one of the family who was asked in England if she had ever seen Niagara Falls. Drawing her self up proudly, she quite annihilated her ques tioner with the unexpected answer : " Niagara Falls ! I own them." You circle round Goat Island by a shady road with cool forest depths on one side and on the other a steep, wooded bank with glimpses of the river through the leaves. A flight of steps leads down to Luna Island, and from its landings affords the finest view that is to be had of the American Fall. If you study 32 WHAT TO SEE. it closely you will find that there are subtle harmonies in the color of Niagara as well as in its music. The Fall is by no raeans only gray and white. If the sun favors, you will find at tiraes faint tints of lavender, of rose, and green. A low bridge leads directly over the roof of the Cave of the Winds to Luna Island. This bridge in winter is so thickly crusted with ice that as you cross your feet are alraost level with the railing at the side. The island itself is so called from the lunar rainbow which is often seen from it in the spray — a mere dim ghost of a rainbow, hardly brighter than the third arch even of a solar bow. It is beautiful to see, but the beauty lies less in the bow itself than in its weird accompaniment of night shad ows and 'moonlight. The island is small, and so flat upon the water that a trifle would sub merge it. The shallow, transparent sheet of water that passes over the long, ragged edge of the American Fall is so near your feet that you can touch it as it leaves the brink. In fact, everywhere the great accessibility of Niagara is strongly felt. It never holds you at arm's length. As you look down at 3 33 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the huge clouds of smoky vapor you lean over a low parapet of stone along which the river brushes as it makes the plunge; and if you continue now along the Goat Island road to the Horseshoe you can paddle in the water at the very verge. There is never the tantaliz ing wish to get " a little nearer." Except for occasional dashes of spray, no raonarch of Na ture allows more absolute freedom of ap proach. From Goat Island, the ^Horseshoe shows but one of its curving faces, but it is that which is crowned by the wonderful Green Water al ready mentioned. It- is better seen from the bank above than from below. The rich green mass descends unbroken until it is lost to sight behind the nearer curve of the Fall. You see no chasm ; raerely two edges with a deep seam or scar between, broken at moments by a sud den, spurting leap of spray from the invisible depths, a silent messenger of the tumult below. The Three Sister Islands. The road leaves the Horseshoe. A broad, breezy view fills the eye, and presently appear the bridges of the Three Sister Islands. The 34 WHAT TO SEE. first bridge crosses a thin stream of water, so quiet that one would hardly be afraid to wade to the other side. There is no suggestion of the rush and roar of Niagara. The second stream is much more turbulent. The third, narrow but noisy, comes racing down the slope with breathless speed, and crashes immediately over a low parapet of rock with an uproar as of forty Niagaras. It is so little and so furious that it frightens you. It shakes the water into shreds and tatters and flings it down in a tangled heap of white motion, to pass on in stantly without reprieve to the new fate be yond. It is Hke torture before death. A soft green dimple in the lower stream is all that marks the vortex of the Horseshoe into which the water plunges. The small bridge quivers with the rush of water so close below it. This bridge and Pros pect Park are said to be the favorite resorts of men intent on suicide, but those who care for life can hardly find a dearer lingering spot for a long sumraer's day than at the foot of this small torrent. The Third Sister gives again the broad, free outlook on the river. Not far from the shore 35 THE NIAGARA BOOK. is the Spouting ^Rock, or Leaping Horse, where the water shoots up at intervals in a dash of spray. A Httle clambering over the gnarled rocks of the island brings you to the water's edge, where you can look up the cur rent to the horizon. By springing over a nar row gap you reach a boulder near the shore, on the farther side of which the water sweeps down a Httle glassy shoot shaped like a beaver's tail. Tiny white waves keep curling up it from below, trying to climb the slope. The pygmy army is unwearied in its attack, but, like Sisyphus, it toils upward in vain. The carriage road and footpath lead from the Sisters to the Parting of the Waters at the upper end of Goat Island, where the river divides its raass for either Fall very quietly, with only a light ripple on the shore ; and still farther is a glen known as " The Spring." Then come the bridges to the mainland, and the tour of Goat Island has been accomplished. If you wish to taste again the constant al ternation between peace and conflict which makes Niagara so bewildering, walk up the water's edge to a wihow grove which is idyllic in its beauty ; and if then you wish in full meas- 36 WHAT TO SEE. ure a benediction on your day, return to the hotel or train by the lovely River Road, which follows the bank in an easy curve that is a de light to the senses. It is but a raoment longer, and I know of nothing that will leave so sweet a flavor in the mind. V. LOWER NIAGARA. THE WHIRLPOOL RAPIDS THE WHIRLPOOL THE GORGE ROAD TO LEWISTON AND QUEENSTON BROCK'S MON UMENT, YOUNGSTOWN. All that has been described — Cave of the Winds, Maid of the Mist, Dufferin Islands, and all — may be seen in a day by the abject slave to time. He will corae away dazed, uncertain, alraost, whether the cataract flows up or down, and unfit, utterly, to say a word in criticisra, either of praise or blame. Still, if a day is all that life allows you, it is best to crowd it full. If not afraid of raental indigestion, the one-day tourist might make room in his day not only for all this, but for a glimpse, at least, of the wonderful Whirlpool Rapids. To see raore 37 THE NIAGARA BOOK. than this of lower Niagara, even in the most hasty fashion, a second day is indispensable, unless the Cave of the Winds, the Dufferins, or some other of the charms which surround the cataract, are sacrificed. On the American shore the Niagara gorge can be traversed in several ways. There are three railroad tracks, above, below, and mid way. The carriage road above is too far back from the brink to afford views, but the trains of the Rome, Watertown and Ogdensburg Railroad have some fine, distant outlooks. They are not specially arranged for sightseers, however, and are less desirable for scenic pur poses than the trains of the New York Central, which carry open observation cars in sumraer through the gorge, from Niagara Falls to Lewiston. The tracks are half-way up the side of the cliff, and the ride is beautiful. The dis tance is about seven miles. The Gorge Road. Most tourists will prefer the round trip on the electric road, which has the advantage of giving you both shores, one from above, the other from the water's edge. On the Cana- 38 WHAT TO SEE. dian side the only road is the trolley, on top of the bank. The round trip takes over two hours and is usually taken on the Canadian side first, because of the fine views as you de scend the mountain, looking towards Lake Ontario. It is a trip on no account to be missed if you can afford the time. It is best, if possible, to make many stops at the different stations on the line, especially at the Whirl pool Rapids. The Upper Whirlpool Rapids. These rapids, rather than the Whirlpool, are the feature of lower Niagara. They are wilder, finer, in every way more splendid than the rapids above the falls. On the Canadian side you descend by elevator to the rapids, but the American trolley road takes you directly by thera. If you sit on the rocks, alraost in the spray, you find a mass of roaring water, be tween high walls of rock, that leaps incredibly into the air. At times it spurts alraost like a geyser, and from the bank will even hide from sight a low house on the other shore. It is the most infernal riot of mad waves that the raind can picture. Like Hamlet's players, in the 39 THE NIAGARA BOOK. torrent, tempest, and whirlwind of their fury, they tear their passion to tatters, to very rags. They race past with a suicidal rage and vio lence which is terrifying. The place is one to linger at for hours and is one of the chief glor ies of the Falls. The Whirlpool. The Whirlpool also can be visited by those who have scant time, without taking the whole trip through the gorge. It is apt to disap point the expectation, but all wish to see it. From the rapids, if you are adventurous, you can reach the Whirlpool by following the shore and climbing up the bank. If you are prudent, however, you will take the trolley or the carriage road. From above, as you look down over the bank, the first sensation is sur prising, almost uncanny. Niagara is caught in a trap. It enters a circle without outlet. Your eye follows the whole contour and finds no interruption in the line of shore. From a few steps farther to the right you see below you the narrow gap through which the river turns, at a full right angle with its forraer course. It seems as if a girl could throw a 40 WHAT TO SEE. stone over, but raen have tried and seen the stone land on the nearer shore, short even of the water's edge. Those who expect to find a raaelstrora in the Pool will be ludicrously taken by surprise. A country millpond is hardly raore serene. The water circles lazily around its pen as if indiffer ent whether it escaped or not. Above the hole and below is the rattle of the rapids and the glitter of their white spray, but the Whirlpool itself is dark and still. When the first disap- pointraent is over at not seeing the boiling, riotous whirl of the railway posters, you realize a silent strength and majesty that grow awful. It is not so hard to beHeve that what is once drawn down into its centre wiH not emerge for days. To Queenston and Lewiston. If you see only the Whirlpool Rapids and the Whirlpool you will get a good idea of the Niagara gorge, but the whole trip to Queens ton and Lewiston should be taken if possible. The cars cross the bridge, a thread poised be tween two panoramas. Under the bridge on the American side you can see the outlet of the 41 THE NIAGARA BOOK. power tunnel which is said to have " harnessed Niagara." The inlet of the tunnel is some dis tance above the Falls, and the vast power sup plied is used both in Niagara Falls and in Buffalo. Frora the Canadian end of the bridge the tracks keep close to the edge of the cliff so that you can look down at the green streara below; at tiraes there are viaducts over deep gorges above the tree tops, and as you approach Brock's Monuraent and descend rapidly into the quaint little viUage of Queenston the view of Lake Ontario in the distance is superb. It is worth while to leave the car and enjoy the view until the next car arrives. After crossing frora Queenston to Lewiston the cars return, following the edge of the streara. It is a dramatic, magnificent ride, but it passes too quickly for the fullest pleasure. No one should fail to get off and linger at the Upper Whirlpool Rapids. Niagara-on-the-Lake and Youngstown. Toronto. The beauty of the river continues all the way to its mouth at Lake Ontario. Niagara-on- 42 Phdtograijh by urriii E. Dunlap. QUEENSTON AND LEWISTO.N. — END OF THE GORCE. (Lake Ontario in the distance.) WHAT TO SEE. the- Lake and Youngstown are six railes below Queenston and Lewiston. There is an espe cially good hotel at the former, but possibly Queenston is more picturesque and interest ing. At both there are forts and military sta tions, and the scarlet coats of the British sol diers are seen at the Canadian post. Near Lake Ontario the river is no longer shut in a gorge, but is ample and splendid, with finely wooded banks and a carriage road on either side from which the views are ravishing. The road is sandy on the Youngstown side, but for pedestrians or bicyclers there are side paths close to the edge, and the trip is of unforget table beauty. It is by no means inferior among Niagara's pleasures, and the visitor from in land especially will enjoy the broad expanse of the waters of Ontario. Looking frora the walls of Fort Niagara at Youngstown even the lover of fhe ocean will find nothing lacking. From either Youngstown or Niagara steamers can be taken for the trip across the lake to To ronto. 43 THE NIAGARA BOOK. VI. SEASONS AND MOODS THE ICE BRIDGE TRAMPS, STROLLS, AND RESTING PLACES THE BICYCLER. The perfect time for the trip to Lewiston is in October. The Canadian bank is then a blaze of flame, and the green river below and blue sky above make a beautiful color picture. The most lovely time for upper Niagara is in early spring, when Goat Island is covered with flowers and the trees show every tender shade of green. The most wonderful season is un doubtedly raid-winter. Niagara in winter is like a fairy tale come true. The spray gathers and freezes so inces santly that twigs the size of knitting needles are cased with ice until they have the bigness of a squirrel's tail. The trees seem all of ice, and their wood seems only a stick to which these ice trees are tied for support. Whole bushes are covered with a heavy splendor which, like heavy splendor elsewhere, pins them to the earth or even breaks them down. A low sun flashing through this ice turns it to 44 WHAT TO SEE. jewels. It is as if the rainbows of Niagara were flung before you in a tangled heap. In a light wind the rattle of the trees is most un- Jikejhe soft murmur of sumraer. It is rheu- raatic and wheezy, like opulent old age, cov ered with diaraonds. There are huge icicles like stalactites on the cliffs which rise from the river. Many of them are discolored and show strong tints of yellow and blue. Below the American Fall the ice cone gath ers and grows to the height of seventy-five or even of a hundred feet. Men climb it with spiked shoes and coast fearlessly down. The freezing spray covers your hat with enamel and makes your overcoat a rigid board. The Ice Bridge. In most years a so-cahed ice bridge forms. A warm day melts the field of ice above the Falls. It crashes down and chokes together in the narrow gorge below, forming an ice floe like a bridge from shore to shore. This bridge becomes a second Ponte Vecchio. It is lined at once on either side by raushroora booths where peddlers sell their wares. They 45 THE NIAGARA BOOK. take your tintype with Niagara for a back ground, but those who lend themselves to such an insult to the place are usually satisfied to sit before a hideous pasteboard scene although Niagara itself is close at hand. The merchants deal in foreign liquor upon the doubtful inter national line. The ice bridge in itself is only this, and those who expect an arching span will be disap pointed. It is its association with the winter scenery, and the vantage ground it gives for novel points of view, that make it well worth seeing. In winter usually you miss the charm of lazy sumraer lingering, but on the ice bridge you change the fleeting views the Maid of the Mist affords for ones raore at your ease. You walk sturdily where you will, and look till you are satisfied. The pleasure, too, is greater at the water's edge than on the deck of a stearaer. For this reason in summer it is pleasantest to cross by a small rowboat that ferries passengers. Moods. It is not only the seasons that change the aspect of Niagara. In fact, it differs every day 46 WHAT TO SEE. in mood. You cannot go twice to the same place without seeing some new thing. One day you can climb higher than ever before upon the rocks at the base of Prospect Park until you sit dry in the shadow of the American Fall, fairly behind its sheet. Another day you cannot put your head outside of the house at the foot of the inclined railway without meet ing a blinding shower of spray from the same Fall that makes any visit to the rocks impos sible. These changes of the spray occur with disconcerting suddenness, especially below. The wind whips suddenly around the corapass, and before you think, lashes the spray at your face. I have seen a girl who was standing too near the Fall drenched instantly with a rush of spray. Even when above a little wetting often coraes. These are the natural aspects of Niagara. To see it in raore unfarailiar, curious beauty, as only one in hundreds cares to do, walk by summer moonlight through the Lewiston gorge or see the Horseshoe by the winter moon. 47 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Tramps, Resting Places — The Bicycler. To catalogue the pleasures of Niagara and not describe the many tramps it offers would be a mistake. The shortest and perhaps the best is down the gorge to Lewiston, about five miles, a pleasant journey for an afternoon. Begin not at Niagara, but at Suspension Bridge. Two miles of country road lead to the Devil's Hole, the scene in 1765 of a mas sacre of English by the French and Indians who are said to have forced them down the cliff. Upon a broad plateau of rocks you look down on the tops of trees that fiH the pit below. The rapids of the river spot its dark green sur face with white, and their clamor is always in the air. A few steps farther on you leave the road, from which there are no views, and take the railroad track, a ledge half-way up the side of the cliff, with a sheer raountain of rocks above and the wonderful river talking loudly below. Keep on the track to Lewiston and then come back by train. If you have a whole day's tirae and can stand a raore vigorous walk, begin on the Canadian side of the Suspension Bridge, walk 48 WHAT TO SEE. by the road to the Whirlpool, crawl around its circling beach over ground thick with petrified leaves, and when you reach the outlet climb somehow up the bluff and keep to the brink until you reach Brock's Monuraent and Queenston. It is about seven miles, and if you are rowed across at the Queenston ferry and come back up the railroad track from Lewis- ton you will have had a glorious day. The walk along the Canadian brink is tangled and rough, and often lengthened by retreating gorges which have to be skirted, but the views are beautiful. There are many jutting bluffs, and in the gorges are fantastic boulders. Upon the hill below the raonument to General Brock you look far off to Lake Ontario; it is another place for a day's resting. If you take this for an epilogue to Niagara you may like also a prologue. There is no pleasanter approach than to walk or drive frora Buffalo on the Canadian shore. The dis tance is not more than twenty miles and the road is almost always at the river's edge, al most upon the beach. It is rough riding for a bicycle, but beautiful enough to repay rauch jolting. The advantage of this approach is its 4 49 THE NIAGARA BOOK. suddenness. During the last miles of the journey you see the spray of Niagara before you, but you get no glimpse of the cataract until, at the Horseshoe, the finest single view of Niagara is suddenly disclosed. On the American side you can go as far as Tonawanda by the tow path, which is beauti ful but not smooth, and from there by cinder path to the FaUs. Goat Island is a wheelman's paradise, and so is the bowered path to the Dufferins. From Lewiston or Queenston to Lake Ontario is also a fascinating trip by bicycle. You can ferry over at the river's mouth. Grand Island also has pleasant walks and bicycle rides, and if the trip to Niagara includes Buffalo, the city will be found to be practically all paved with asphalt and thronged with bicycles, even in its busiest downtown streets. If you want a place to which you can take a book for a long afternoon or morning, there is none more accessible or pleasanter than Willow Island, which is just above the Goat Island bridge on the mainland. Other resting places are the forest depths of Goat Island, the Second and Third Sister Islands, or the Duf- 50 IVHAT TO SEE. ferins; and in lower Niagara the rocks by the Whirlpool Rapids, or the hiUside below Brock's Monument. VII. To read too rauch of a place before seeing it is to prepare the way for disappointment. Un consciously you expect to crowd into the first impression all the finest aspects of repeated visits made by others in their happiest moods. You are in danger, too, of displacing your own natural sensations by others ready made. A descriptive guide book stunts perception as often as it stimulates it. The purpose of this sketch lies in the hope that, just as a word may kindle memories and enrich itself in the mind of the hearer, these details may serve for a nu cleus around which the scattering recollections of the place raay gather more distinctly. One final word. If after all, with all the time you have, Niagara disappoints you, pray have the grace to remember that the fault may be your own. In a sense you can see in it only what you bring with you. As has been said, 51 THE NIAGARA BOOK. if no man is a hero to his valet it is not perhaps because the hero is no hero, but because the valet is only a valet. ONE DAY AT NIAGARA. Tourists may find these programmes for a single day serviceable : A. — Morning: Prospect Park; Maid of the Mist; Horseshoe; Dufferin Islands. Afternoon: Goat Island; Whirlpool Rapids or Cave of the Winds. In detail : From the train walk down Second Street to the river and follow the water's edge to the brink at Prospect Park {% mile) ; from there take the inclined railway to the foot of the Falls and cross to Canada by the Maid of the Mist (50 cents), or by the bridge (10 cents), if you are timid. Walk to the Horseshoe {% mile) ; walk or take the electric car to the Dufferin Islands, and walk among the islands ; return by car. In the afternoon walk or ride around Goat Island {2% miles around) ; turn to the right after crossing the bridge from the mainland, and after reaching the Three Sister Islands return by wood path across the island. The Cave of the Winds (|i) is reached from Goat Isl and ; the Whirlpool Rapids by electric car from Falls Street. 52 WHAT TO SEE. B. — Morning: Prospect Park; Maid of the Mist; Horseshoe; Goat Island. Afternoon: The Gorge Road, including Whirlpool Rapids and Whirlpool. In detail : The morning trip is described in A. For the Gorge Road, take the electric car over the bridge and down the Canadian bank to Queenston, returning on American side {2)4 hours). Stop over at Whirlpool and Whirlpool Rapids on American side. c. — Morning: Cave of the Winds; Goat Isl and; Prospect Park; Maid of the Mist, or bridge, to Canada; Horseshoe; Dufferin Islands. . Afternoon: The Gorge Road, including Whirlpool Rapids and Whirlpool. It would be much better to divide this into two days ; or to omit the Gorge Road and take the Maid of the Mist, Horseshoe and Dufferins in the afternoon. STATISTICS. Niagara. Said to be an Iroquois word, mean ing " Thunderer of Waters." Niagara River. Width, above the Falls, about 4,400 feet; 53 THE NIAGARA BOOK. below the Falls, about i,ooo feet; at the Whirlpool, about 400 feet. Length of river, from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, 36 miles. Descent, from lake to lake, 336 feet, as fol lows: from Lake Erie to the Falls (22 miles), 70 feet (55 feet of this in the Rapids, J4 mile); at the Falls, 160 feet; frora the Falls to Lake Ontario (14 miles), 106 feet. Current, estimated at from 4 miles per hour in the quietest places to 40 miles at the Whirlpool Rapids. Depth, estimated at 20 feet in the river above the Falls ; at the Whirlpool Rapids, 250 feet; in the Whirlpool, 400 feet. Volume. Estimated that 15,000,000 cubic feet of water per minute pass over the Falls, or about one cubic mile per week. Niagara Falls. Width of Falls at the brink, including Goat Island, 5,370 feet, as follows: American Falls, 1,060 feet; Goat Island, about 1,300 feet; the Horseshoe, in 1890, 3,010 feet. The Horseshoe Falls. Height, 158 feet. Contour, in 1890, 3,010 54 WHAT TO SEE. feet; in 1886, 2,600 feet; in 1842, 2,260 feet. Width across, at widest point, about 1,200 feet. Depth of water at brink, esti mated, 20 feet. Average annual recession, 2.18 feet; total recession from 1842 to 1890, 104J4 feet. Total area of recession for the same 48 years, 6}^ acres. The American Fall. Height, 167 feet. Contour, in 1890, 1,060 feet; in 1842, 1080 feet. Average annual recession, 7^^ inches; total recession frora 1842 to 1890, 30^ feet. Total area of re cession for sarae period, % acre. The New York State Reservation. Area, 107 acres. Purchased by the State of New York, under Acts of April 30, 1883, and April 30, 1885, for $1,433,429.50; formally opened to the pubHc July 15, 1885. The Queen Victoria Niagara FaUs Park. Area, 154 acres. Preliminary Act of Legis lature passed 1885. Park opened to the pubHc, May24, 1888. Goat Island. Area, about 63 acres; in early records said 55 THE NIAGARA BOOK. to have contained 250 acres. (Gull Isl and, south of Goat Island, is said to have contained two acres of land in 1840. There is hardly a trace of it now.) Cir cumference of island, about one raile. First bridge built, 1817; another bridge, 1856; present bridge, 1900-1901. Bridges to Three Sister Islands built 1868. The price paid by the State of New York for Goat Island and all the surrounding islands except a part of Bath Island, was $525,000.00. Suspension Bridge. Height of floor above river, 190 feet; height of towers, 100 feet; length of span, 1,268 feet. First built, 1868-69; blown, down and rebuilt, 1889. Steamers Maid of the Mist. First boat built and run, 1846. Larger boat built, 1854. Ran the Whirlpool and Rapids to Lewiston, to escape the sheriff, 1 86 1. First of present boats launched, 1885, 71 feet long; second launched, 1892, 85 feet long. 56 WHAT TO SEE. CHARGES. Within New York State Reservation. Inclined Railway, Prospect Park. Either way, 5 cents. Stairs free. Steamers Maid of the Mist, with rubber coat, 50 cents. Cave of the Winds, guide and dress, $1.00. Within Canadian Reservation. Behind Horseshoe Falls, with guide and dress, 50 cents. Dufferin Islands, 50 cents for carriage and all occupants, 10 cents for pedestrian. Steel Arch Bridges. Upper bridge, over and back, 15 cents; one way, 10 cents. Lower bridge, two railes below, over and back, 10 cents. Whirlpool. Araerican or Canadian side, 50 cents. Whirlpool Rapids. Araerican or Canadian side, with elevator, 50 cents. Brock's Monument, 185 feet high; built, 1853. A former monument, 126 feet high, built in 1826, was destroyed by explosion in 57 THE NIAGARA BOOK. 1840. General Brock fell in 1813. Ad mission to top of monument, 50 cents. CARRIAGE HIRE. New York Reservation Omnibuses. Round trip, including circuit of Goat Island, with stop-overs, 25 cents. Shorter trips, with stop-overs, 15 cents. Children under twelve years, half fare. Children under five years, free. Carriage Rates by Niagara Falls Ordinances. Two horses: first hour, $2.00; each addi tional hour, $1.50. One horse : first hour, $1.50; each additional hour, $1.00. BELT LINE TROLLEY. From Niagara Falls to Queenston along the Canadian bank, returning via Lewiston and the Gorge, $1.00. GORGE RAILROAD. Round trip, Niagara Falls to Lewiston and return, 75 cents ; one way, 50 cents. 58 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. By Orrin E. Dunlap. The numerous strange features of the Niagara region have resulted in the develop ment of many reraarkable incidents, all of which are a part of the history of the locality and thoroughly interesting as going to show how the human mind, impelled by unusual conditions, is led to attempt deeds of daring for dollars and notoriety. For nearly a cen tury Niagara has been rich in such incidents, and the records show that in sorae cases hu man life has been sacrificed in the general de sire for gain, while in other cases the public has had opportunity to applaud the living heroes. During the final twenty years of the last century the efforts to attain notoriety through some Niagara feat were perhaps more frequent than ever before, but as far back as 1827, Niagara was recognized as an ideal place 59 THE NIAGARA BOOK. where great crowds raight be assembled by thrilling incidents. About the first feature of this character was the sending of THE PIRATE MICHIGAN over the Falls on the afternoon of September 8, 1827. This vessel was at the time one of the largest of her class, but had been con demned by her owners as unfit to longer sail the lakes. Dressed as a pirate, she was loaded with wild and tame aniraals, and with a crew in effigy, was towed to the foot of Navy Island and set adrift. She was caught by the current and hurled through the upper rapids and over the Horseshoe FaH. It was never recorded that any of the aniraals were recaptured to be sent to the rauseuras in New York, Montreal, and London, as was the intention. Coaches left Buffalo on the afternoon of the 7th of September to accommodate the crowds, and ah of the Niagara hotels were fuH of guests. SAM PATCH. Among the crowd drawn to the Falls by this incident was Sam Patch, a man who had won 60 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. fame at Pawtucket Falls and other eastern points as a high jumper. He erected a plat form at the water's edge of the dibris slope just north of the Biddle Stairs, and from this platform leaped into the river, the height of the jump being about ninety feet. Patch was considered a wonder, but shortly after his Niagara experience he lost his life in a leap frora the Genesee Fall in Rochester. FRANCIS ABBOTT. While Francis Abbott never sought farae, or even recognition, at Niagara, he won for hiraself a place in the history of the FaUs that will stand forever. He was known as the " Hermit of Niagara." Of brilHant mind, mu sical, he sought the subHraity of the cataract to live alone and commune with Nature. He lived on Goat Island and also in the section now known as Prospect Park. It was his cus tom to bathe daily in the river, and on Friday, June IO, 1 83 1, he was drowned. His body was recovered June 21, 1831, and is buried in Oakwood Cemetery at the Falls. 61 THE NIAGARA BOOK. DISCOVERY OF THE CAVE OF THE WINDS. There is no doubt but what the discovery of the Cave of the Winds marked a new era in the enjoyment of visitors to Niagara. The day of the discovery of this wonderful cave was July 15, 1834. H. A. Parsons had made heroic efforts to reach the cave by passing through the stream from the Centre Fall, when B. H. White and G. W. Sims succeeded in crossing the water and rocks and entered the cave, and to them is due the credit for the discovery. When first entered, the cave was the horae of many eels. BURNING OF THE CAROLINE. At the close of 1837 Canada was aflame with the Patriot war. The headquarters of the Patriots was on Navy Island, a short distance above the Falls. On the Canadian shore, about Chippewa Creek, the British were gathered. The steamer Caroline was in service on the upper river, and had raade two trips from the New York shore to Navy Island. The British, feeling the boat was carrying supplies to the 62 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. Patriots, organized a volunteer expedition, and at midnight on December 29, 1837, crossed the river to Schlosser Dock, where the Caroline was moored for the night, and cut her ropes, setting her adrift on the current. She was also set on fire, and all ablaze, she was carried down the river towards the Falls. WHEN NIAGARA RAN DRY. The winter of 1847-48 was of extraordinary severity. Very heavy ice formed in Lake Erie. During the latter part of March this ice field was broken by a thaw and wind. The wind swept the ice into the entrance of the Niagara River at Buffalo, where it jammed in a solid mass, completely choking the outlet of Lake Erie, the result being that on March 29, 1848, the Falls of Niagara was practically dry. The spectacle was weird in the extreme, and lasted throughout the day, the scene being one of desolation. FALL OF TABLE ROCK. This incident is usually referred to as having occurred on June 26, 1850, when a piece 200 63 THE NIAGARA BOOK. by 260 feet fell with a terrible crash. This un doubtedly, was the passing of the Table Rock known to the raajority of Niagara visitors, but the fact is that, in July, 1818, a big piece of the rock fell, while in December, 1828, and in 1829 other pieces of the rock gave way. TRIP OF THE MAID OF THE MIST. One of the raost daring feats ever performed at Niagara was that of Joel Robinson and his two associates, Maclntyre and Jones, on June 6, 1 861, when they voyaged through the Whirl pool Rapids in the steamer Maid of the Mist. The boat was libelled and mortgaged to such an extent that the waters of the Niagara were too warm for her, and Robinson agreed to de liver her at a Canadian lake port. On the afternoon of the day raentioned, to the surprise of all who saw the boat, instead of heading over her usual course up the river, her bow was directed right into the rapids, with the waves of which she was soon battling. It was the first trip of the kind ever raade, but under a full head of steara she made the trip in safety, the Stack being swept away in the seething 64 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. waters. Robinson was born in Springfield, Mass. He died in 1863. CAPTAIN WEBb's FATAL SWIM. With the advent of Capt. Matthew Webb to Niagara, a new impetus was given to navi gation of the Whirlpool Rapids. Captain Webb had won fame and glory in European waters, and he sought to add to his laurels by swimming the Niagara rapids unprotected by any Hfe-saving device. The date of his fatal trip was July 24, 1883. Right on time, he left his hotel, the Clifton House, since destroyed by fire, at four o'clock. Entering a small boat, with Jack McCloy at the oars, he was carried to a point on the lower river several hundred feet above the lower bridges. It was 4.25 p.m. when he leaped from the boat into the water, and with nothing on but a pair of red trunks, swam boldly towards the rapids. On the banks and bridges thousands of people were gathered, for the event had been well heralded. At 4.32 p.m. he passed under the bridges. His stroke was beautiful. In three minutes more he had reached the fiercest part of the rapids. A great wave struck him. He disappeared from 5 65 THE NIAGARA BOOK. sight of all. Thousands of eyes watched the boiling waters, praying that his life might be spared. Four days went by, and sorae said Webb was in hiding so that advantageous bets might be raade by his friends in England, but at raidday July 28, 1883, his Hfeless body was picked up seven miles down the river. It now occupies a grave beside that of the " Hermit of Niagara " in Oakwood Cemetery. CARLISLE D. GRAHAm's WONDERFUL TRIPS. If any man deserves the title of " Hero of the Whirlpool Rapids " it is Carlisle D. Graham, a Philadelphia cooper, who, despite Webb's death, travelled to Niagara determined to show the world that he had confidence that he could go through the rapids and live, as well as being willing to -risk his lif6 in a barrel of his own construction. Graham made his first trip on the afternoon of Sunday, July 11, 1886, going way to Lewiston, the trip occupying about thirty-five minutes. Grahara rode in a barrel weighted at the bottom. The height of the barrel was so that he could nearly stand upright in it, and the top was of larger diam eter than the bottom. On Thursday, August 66 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. 19, 1886, Graham raade a second trip, going as far as the Whirlpool. In this trip his head protruded through the top of the barrel throughout the entire trip. He raade a third trip June 15, 1887, and on August 25, 1889, he made a fourth trip, using a barrel of much smaller size and going way through to Lewis- ton. Graham will be remembered as never having disappointed a gathering. His nerve never failed him. HAZLETT AND POTTS. Copying somewhat the idea that Graham had developed so successfully, George Hazlett and William Potts, of Buffalo, made a trip through the rapids in a barrel, said to be of their own construction, on Sunday, August 8, 1886. The barrel they used more closely re sembled the familiar type of barrel, having no unusual features of form. W. J. KENDALL. Two weeks after Hazlett and Potts had raade the trip there appeared at Niagara a Boston policeman named W. J. Kendall. The date was August 22, 1886. Unannounced, 67 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Kendall went through the rapids to the Whirl pool, protected by only a cork life-preserver. All previous trips had been publicly an nounced, but Kendall slipped through with only a few spectators, accidentaUy on the cliffs or bridges, to bear witness. For this reason sorae have felt that the trip was never made, but men of integrity are known who witnessed the performance. GEORGE HAZLETT AND SADIE ALLEN. In the sarae barrel that was used by Hazlett and Potts, Miss Sadie Allen and George Haz lett raade a trip through the rapids on Novem ber 28, 1886. Miss Allen is the only woman who has ever made this journey through the Niagara gorge, and this trip, it may be re raarked, ended the barrel voyages. CHARLES ALEXANDER PERCY. Next to appear on the scene to win fame through the rapids voyage was Charles Alex ander Percy, of Niagara Falls. Percy had watched the others journey through the wild waters, and, being a wagonraaker, he con ceived the idea of building a boat which possi- 68 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. bly might have value as a life-boat. The craft he built was seventeen feet long, four feet ten inches beam, with air chambers at either end. In this boat Percy made a fine trip through the rapids to the Whirlpool on Sunday, August 28, 1887. During the passage of the rapids he occupied one of the air chambers. The boat remained at anchor on the Canadian side of the Whirlpool for a month following Percy's trip through the rapids, and on Sunday, Sep tember 25, 1887, Percy and a friend, WiUiam Dittrick, made the trip through the lower half of the gorge from the Whirlpool to Lewiston, having a thrilling experience. In this trip Dittrick occupied one of the air compart- raents, while Percy sat in the cockpit. On Septeraber 16^ 1888, Percy raade a second trip through the waters of the gorge to Lewiston. In this trip he narrowly escaped death, his boat being lost. ROBERT WILLIAM FLACK. The success Percy had in navigating the waters of the gorge in his boat led Robert Williara Flack, of Syracuse, to travel to Niag ara to demonstrate the merits of a boat he had 69 THE NIAGARA BOOK. built. Percy and Flack signed articles of agreernent for a race through the rapids, but Flack was first to show that his craft was sea worthy. On the afternoon of July 4, 1888, Flack raade this trip, and he went down to death. Flack's boat was of clinker pattern. In the trip through the rapids it capsized three times, but Flack remained in the boat because he was held there by a harness rigging about his body. It was a frightful spectacle, this trip of Flack's, and was witnessed by thousands of people. The last time the boat capsized was on the final big wave at the entrance to the Whirlpool. High in the air the boat tossed. It stood on end for an instant, and then it top pled over on poor Flack. From the point where the boat capsized it floated about the pool upside down for an hour or more until captured on the Canadian side. Flack was found hanging dead by the straps he had placed there to aid him to save his life. WALTER G. CAMPBELL. This would-be hero selected Sunday, Sep tember 15, 1889, for making the trip through the rapids. With a life-preserver about his 70 SPELTERINA. DRA.MATIG INCIDENTS. body he rode in an open boat until it capsized, when he was thrown out and forced to battle with the waves. He landed in the Whirlpool twenty minutes after he started. A dog he carried with him in the boat was lost. JOHN LINCOLN SOULES. On July 4, 1890, John Lincoln Soules raade an attempt to swim through the rapids, but in starting he kept too close to the Canadian bank and was thrown ashore at the elevator just below the bridges on the Canadian side, badly cutting one of his knees on a rock in landing. PETER NISSEn's FEAT. For ten years there was a rest from the rapids agitation, and nothing notable occurred in those waters until July 9, 1900, when Peter Nissen, also known as " Bowser," appeared at the Falls and announced his intention of going through the rapids. Nissen is a bookkeeper, and the boat in which he made the trip was built after his own ideas. In length the boat was twenty feet. It had a beam of six feet and a depth of four feet. It was decked over, with 71 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the exception of a small cockpit in the centre. There were two air compartments in the front and rear, and one on each side of the cockpit. To the keel of the boat proper hung an iron keel weighing 1,250 pounds. It was after four o'clock when Nissen and his boat carae out of an eddy in tow of a rowboat. After being set adrift, he got caught in an eddy just above the rapids and had to be started again. It was approaching five o'clock before he was in the rapids. His craft rode the waves raagnifi- cently. It was a glorious sight, quite in con trast with the spectacle presented by Flack and his light craft. Never once did Nissen's boat capsize, for all it was wave-washed frequently. After reaching the Whirlpool, Nissen and his boat floated about until captured, when Nissen landed. The following day his boat was sent out of the pool to float to Lewiston, where it was taken frora the water. Nissen's feat was indeed a grand sight. His home is in Chicago. M. BLONDIN. Of all the men who have won fame at Niag ara none was more lasting than that of Blon- din, who, on Thursday, May 30, 1859, first 72 DRAM.ITIC INCIDENTS. crossed the Niagara gorge on a tight rope. His cable was stretched over the river at a point now midway between the upper and lower bridges. He made frequent trips there after, and on August 14, 1859, he carried Harry M. Colcord across the cable on his back. Blondin also crossed the gorge in i860, in which year his cable was stretched over the Whirlpool Rapids below the old railway sus pension bridge, since replaced by a steel arch. He walked with baskets on his feet, performed on stilts, cooked his meals on the rope. On September 8, i860, Blondin walked for the Prince of Wales, now King of England, and on this occasion he also carried Colcord on his back. SIGNOR FARINI. While Blondin was commanding rauch at tention by his perforraances in i860, Signor Farini appeared at the Falls and stretched a cable across the gorge near the hydraulic canal basin. He was very expert on the rope and coramanded much attention, but Blondin's farae has lived, while Farini has been forgotten. 73 THE NIAGARA BOOK. SIGNOR BALLENI. In 1873 Signor Balleni stretched a cable from a point opposite the old Clifton House to Prospect Park. One of his feats was to leap into the river, aided in his descent by a rubber cord. MARIA SPELTERINA. It was in July, 1876, that Maria Spelterina crossed the gorge on a tight rope. She is the only woman who has ventured this feat, and in all her perforraances she was watched by great crowds. Her rope was stretched over the rapids where Blondin last walked. She won great favor. JENKINS AND HIS VELOCIPEDE. Still another who performed on a tight rope at the Falls was a man naraed Jenkins, who stretched his cable across the gorge over the rapids. One of his principal feats was to cross from cliff to cliff on a machine that resembled a velocipede, his balance pole being held by an arrangement under his feet. 74 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. STEVE PEERE. On June 22, 1887, Steve Peere, a painter, walked across the gorge on a wire cable six- eighths of an inch in diameter, stretched be tween the old suspension bridge and the canti lever bridge. His was indeed a wonderful performance, considering all the others had used a rope two inches in diameter. On June 25, 1887, Peere was found dead on the bank beneath his rope, the supposition being that he had attempted to walk it at night. SAMUEL JOHN DIXON. While Samuel John Dixon, a Toronto, Ont., photographer, was on his way to the photog raphers' annual convention, he observed Peere's cable still stretched across the Niagara gorge. He remarked that he could cross on it, and true to his word he returned to the Falls and made a trip over the slender cable on Saturday, September 6, 1890. He performed several gymnastic feats in the centre, and won much applause. 75 THE NIAGARA BOOK. CLIFFORD M. CALVERLEY. Clifford M. Calverley, of Toronto, erected a wire cable at the same point between the bridges where Peere and Dixon had crossed, and on Wednesday, October 12, 1892, he gave his first pubHc exhibition at Niagara. He was indeed clever, and won for himself the title of the " Araerican Blondin." On Saturday, July I, 1893, Calverley opened another series of ex hibitions at the Falls, performing nuraerous feats, such as high kicking, walking with baskets on his feet, cooking meals on the rope, and chair balancing. He also gave night ex hibitions. AVERY ON THE LOG. Of all the incidents connected with Niagara none is more thrilling than the efforts made to rescue Avery from a log in the rapids, a short distance above the American- Fall, on July 19, 1853. The night before, Avery and a compan ion had been swept down the river in a boat. Avery landed on a log, but his companion was carried over the Fall. All day long mighty efforts were made to save Avery. Boats, rafts, and barrels were let down to him from the 76 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. Goat Island bridge, and towards evening, just when a rescue appeared certain, the very boat that was designed to carry him to safety struck him full in the breast and knocked him into the river, and he was hurled over the Fall. to the horror of the assembled thousands. A SAD INCIDENT. To pretty Luna Island must be accredited what is perhaps the most sorrowful incident in the history of Niagara. On June 21, 1849, while the family of Mr. Deforest, of Buffalo, in corapany with a friend, Charles Addington, were viewing the American Fall frora this island, Mr. Addington playfully picked up An nette Deforest and held her over the rapid rushing water. The child, in the excitement, sprang out of Mr. Addington's arras into the water. In a second she was dashed over the precipice. As she struck the water Mr. Ad dington leaped after her, and he also was swept to death over the precipice. UNCONQUERED NIAGARA. Despite all that has been claimed by certain fakirs, let it be known that up to the opening 77 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of the twentieth century no human being has ever gone over the FaUs of Niagara and lived to tell the story of the experience. DUMMY MAID OF THE MIST. In September, 1883, several enterprising citizens of Niagara Falls purchased a sraall boat, which they fitted up to represent the Maid of the Mist, and sent it through the rapids. Men were stationed about the boat in effigy, but no human beings were allowed aboard during the trip, for all there were ap plications for passage. The boat passed through the gorge in good shape. NEW YORK STATE RESERVATION. On the 15th day of July, 1885, the lands in the immediate vicinity of the FaHs were thrown open free to all mankind forever, New York State having acquired the property from the individual owners on payment of $1,433,- 429.50. VICTORIA PARK. On the 24th of May, 1888, the sixty-ninth anniversary of Her Most Gracious Majesty, the late Queen Victoria, the lands on the Cana- 78 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. dian side were opened free to the public. On June 21, 1888, the event was celebrated. DEATH ON THE ICE MOUNTAIN. . On February 28, 1886, while L. G. De Witt, of New York, was viewing the winter scenery, he slipped from the ice mound towards the American Fall. On March 11, following, his body was seen on the ice at the foot of the Fall. On March 12th dynamite was used to blast the ice in order that the body might be recovered. March 13th a tunnel through the great ice raountain was begun, and after three days of hard work the body was secured. RESCUED FROM A ROCK. While engaged in painting the bridge that leads to the Second Sister Island, in 1874, Wil- Hara McCuUough fell into the river. In his passage down stream he caught on a rock, from which he was rescued by Thomas Con- roy, then a well-known guide. RESCUE OF CHAPIN. In 1838, while one of the bridges leading frora the mainland to Goat Island was being 79 THE NIAGARA BOOK. repaired, a Mr. Chapin fell from the work into the water. He was fortunate enough to land on one of the small islands, from which point he was rescued by Joel Robinson by means of a small boat. The island is known as Chapin Island. TAYLOR ISLAND DOGS. Before the construction of the Gorge Road, a fall of rock on the New York side of the Whirlpool Rapids was known as Taylor's Isl and. Two dogs that had been thrown off the lower bridge landed here. They attracted much attention. Food was thrown to them daily. On August ii, 1881, James F. Brown descended the cliff and rescued them. TRIP OF THE DETROIT. In 1841 the Detroit, a vessel of about 500 tons burden, was started down the river, the intention being to send her over the Falls. She lodged on a reef, and afterwards went to pieces. The Detroit is said to have been one of Commodore Perry's fleet. 80 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. BIDDLE STAIRS. The Biddle Stairs are on Goat Island and lead to the Cave of the Winds. They are naraed after Nicholas Biddle, of Philadelphia, who gave a sura of raoney towards their con struction in 1829. There is a desire to replace them with an elevator. OLD TERRAPIN TOWER. This structure was erected at Terrapin Point, on the edge of the Horseshoe Fall, in 1833, the stone being gathered in the vicin ity. It was 45 feet high, 12 feet in diameter at the base, and 8 feet at the top. It was believed to be unsafe, and was torn down in 1873. There is talk of rebuilding it. SUSPENSION BRIDGE DESTROYED. On the night of January 9-10, 1889, a ter rific gale swept down the Niagara gorge frora the southwest. It caught the upper suspen sion bridge full on the side. Stays gave way, and soon the great structure was swinging at the mercy of the gale. About 3 a.m. it fell into the gorge, a complete wreck. Dr. John THE NIAGARA BOOK. Hodge was the last man to cross it before it fell. WRECK OF LEWISTON BRIDGE. There was a vast amount of ice passing down the Niagara River in the winter of 1863- 1864, and the men in charge of the old Lewis- ton suspension bridge unfastened the guys, thinking the ice might carry thera away. After the ice-floe had passed they forgot to refasten them, and a high wind wrecked the bridge on February i, 1864. It was not rebuilt until 1899. THRILLING RESCUES. John McCloy is the owner of a medal for several daring rescues at Niagara. On Octo ber 6, 1886, he rescued Charles Robinson from the remnant of a pier in the rapids above Bath (now Green) Island. This feat was per formed at night by the light of bonfires. On November 15, 1887, he rescued WiUiam Glass- brook from the rocks at the foot of the Horse shoe FaU. Glassbrook was out duck hunting and had lost his boat. " Thank God ! I'm saved at last," were the first words Louis Hoehn ut tered after McCloy had rescued him from a 82 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. ledge of rock in the river, a third of the dis tance between Goat and Bird Islands, on Mon day, May 9, 1898. GOAT ISLAND. This beautiful spot is so named because John Stedman placed thereon a nuraber of ani mals, among them a raale goat. This was about 130 years ago. It was the intention to have the aniraals winter there, but when spring came none but the goat was found alive, and to this incident is attributed the naming of the island. SEARCHLIGHT ILLUMINATION. One of the new features at Niagara during the summer months is the nightly illuraination of the Whirlpool Rapids by searchlight oper ated on the Niagara Gorge Railroad. The spectacle is unusual and brilliant. At times the illumination is effected by means of power ful arc laraps at the old Buttery elevator, and at other periods of the display both the shore Hghts and the searchlight are in operation. A divergent door placed before the searchlight serves to cast the beam frora bank to bank, while color discs give various hues to the light 83 THE NIAGARA BOOK. and the water. At times red fire is burned in quantities, and the cHffs and the wild waters are aflame. Under this light the Whirlpool Rapids becorae a raging torrent of crimson. EARLY CROSSING OF THE GORGE. When the railway suspension bridge, re cently supplanted by an arch, was projected, connection was made between the cliffs by a kite string. This served to draw a heavier cord, and later wire cables, over the river, and on the cables so placed an iron basket was operated from cliff to cHff. Although it was designed to aid in the construction of the bridge, thousands of passengers were tarried. This basket is now in possession of the Buffalo Historical Society. OLD FERRYBOAT SERVICE. From the foot of what is now the inclined railway in Prospect Park, a ferryboat service was for many years operated between the banks. The boats were small but staunch, and manned by strong oarsmen. Until 1868 there was no bridge crossing the river close to the 84 Copyng-ht, 1900, by Orrin E. Dunlap. SEARCHLIGHT IN THE GORGE. DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. FaUs, and the ferryboats were largely patron ized. The trip was full of interest, for from the ferryboats views of the Falls were obtain able frora raidstream. The stearaer Maid of the Mist has now taken the place of the smaller craft. A THRILLING EXPERIENCE. On Sunday afternoon, January 22, 1899, while about fifty people were crossing on the ice bridge, the ice comraenced to move down streara on the current. Imraediately there was a wild rush for the shores. One young man saved himself by leaping frora the ice onto the steel arch near the Araerican shore, but a man and woman, who gave the naraes of C. E. Misner and Miss Bessie Hall, were carried several hundred feet down stream before they reached the bank of the river. ICE PALACE. In 1898 several residents of Niagara Falls erected an ice palace on the Riverway opposite Prospect Park. The weather was very un favorable for the venture, and it proved a financial failure. 85 THE NIAGARA BOOK. CROSSING THE ICE BRIDGE ON HORSEBACK. On Thursday and Friday, January 23 and 24, 1879, Andrew Wallace, a resident of Can ada, rode a horse across the ice bridge and up the ice mountain. Robert Owen, of Niagara Falls, has also performed this feat. WATER BICYCLE TRIP. On Sunday, August 14, 1887, Prof. Al- phonse King crossed the river below the Falls and bridge on a water bicycle. The wheel with paddles was erected between two water tight cyHnders, 8 inches in diameter and 10 feet long. ROMANTIC MARRIAGES. Tuesday, July 28, 1891, in the evening, just as the sun was sinking in the west. Judge Edward E. Russell married Henry Bird and Miss Carrie Scudder, of Newark, N. J., on the upper suspension bridge. On another occa sion Judge RusseU married a romantic couple at the entrance to the Cave of the Winds, right in the spray cloud. 86 DRAMATIC INCIDENTS. RESCUE OF MRS. GRIMASON. While crossing the old upper suspension bridge on Saturday, Septeraber 24, 1892, Mrs. Grimason, of Toronto, Ont., fell through a hole. She caught on the bottom chord, frora which perilous position she was rescued by Harry WilHaras, Harry Huntley, and Rev. Dr. Rarasay. Williams received a raedal frora the Royal Canadian Humane Society. AUTOMOBILE ACROSS ICE BRIDGE. Wednesday, February 27, 1901, an auto mobile was taken down the bank on the Cana dian side and dragged across the ice bridge. It was pulled up the slope leading to the ice raountain, where photographs were taken for advertising purposes. SLID DOWN A ROPE. Monday, August 15, 1887, Prof. J. E. De- Leon, who aspired to be Peere's successor, started out to cross his cable. After going a short distance he slid down a rope and dis appeared in the bushes, ascending the bank by a ladder. 87 THE NIAGARA BOOK. THE CRANDALL CASE. Niagara records do not contain a more re markable incident than that concerning Bry ant B. Crandall, a Buffalo man who left his horae on the last day of May, 1886, and on the following day wrote letters intimating an in tention to corarait suicide. April 3d a hat bearing his name was found on the river bank. July 28th a body found near Queenston was identified as that of Crandall and interred in the family plot, Buffalo. His insurance poli cies were paid. In 1887 suspicion was excited by William B. Sirrett, of Buffalo, claiming to have seen Crandall in Los Angeles, Cal. Clew after clew was followed. A reward of $1,000 was offered. In 1892 Crandall was captured in California. THE " AMERICAN BLONDIN." Harry Leslie was first to be given the title of " American Blondin." He crossed the gorge and rapids on a rope cable in July and August, 1865. 88 dramatic incidents. doring's band in cave of the winds. On the afternoon of Saturday, August 26, 1865, Doring's Band, of Troy, N. Y., then fill ing a summer engagement at one of the hotels, passed through the Cave of the Winds, carry ing their instruments. The band had ten members. They played " Yankee Doodle " on Prospect Rock in front of the cave. farini in the rapids. Monday, August 8, 1864, Farini walked about the rapids above the American Fall on stilts. Between Robinson's Island and the precipice he was delayed. He claimed his stilts caught in a crevice. His brother suc ceeded in reaching a log between the old paper mill and Robinson's Island, frora whence he threw a line, with a weight attached, to the ad venturer, and by this line a pail of provisions was sent to Farini. A larger line was thrown and both reached shore by way of Goat Island. 89 HISTORIC NIAGARA. By Peter A. Porter. Faraous all over the world as Niagara is to day in its scenic, botanic, geologic, and hy draulic aspects, it is equally faraous, equally interesting, and equally instructive in its vari ous and nuraerous historic features. And in using the words of our title we use them in their broadest and noblest sense, employing the word " historic " to cover all those multi tudinous phases of this region's existence and condition at which a true student of history instinctively looks; and the word Niagara, not in that circumscribed raeaning which takes in only the Falls and their immediate sur roundings, but making it cover both banks of this famous river frora its source to its mouth. To treat of such a broad subject within the narrow limits of a few pages will permit of only the briefest reference to any point. 90 Photograph by Nielson. THE AMERICAN FALL FROM GOAT ISLAND. HISTORIC Nl.lGARA. early mentions of NIAGARA. Just when white men first saw the Falls we cannot accurately say. This great Cataract vvas known in a general way to the Indians of North America, who dwelt far frora it and who had never seen it, probably before Columbus sailed on his first voyage of discovery. It has been known to white men, only since 1603, al though the Falls may possibly, though not probably, have been visited during the i6th century by any one of the adventurous seamen and traders sent out by France to explore the New World, though they left no record of any such visitations. Samuel De Champlain in his " Des Sauvages," published in 1603 and describing his first voyage to the St. Lawrence, in that year, refers to the Falls in unmistak able language though not by name, this being the first reference to them in literature. The Indians told hira in reply to his inquiries regarding the source of the St. Lawrence, that " after ascending raany leagues among rapids and waterfalls he would reach a lake (Ontario), 140 or 150 leagues broad, at the western end of which the waters were whole- 91 THE NIAGARA BOOK. some and the winters mild; that a river emp tied into it from the south which had its source in the country of the Iroquois; that beyond the lake he would find a cataract and a port age; then another lake (Erie) about equal to the former, which they had never explored." Champlain never saw Niagara. In his 1613 volume, describing his voyages Up to that date, he locates them very accurately on his maps as a " waterfaU," but not by name; and in his 1632 edition, he both locates them cor rectly, though not by their name, on his map and further refers to them in his description of the map itself. In 1641, the Jesuit Father L'AUement in his letters to his superior, speak ing of the Indian tribes, refers to the " Neuter nation (Onguiaarha), having the same name as the river; " and in 1648 the Jesuit Father Ragueneau in a similar letter says, " North of the Fries is a great lake fully 200 leagues in circuraference called Erie, forraed by the dis charge of the Mer Douce (Lake Huron), which falls into a third lake caUed Ontario, though we call it Lake St. Louis, over a cataract of fearful height." In 1656 Sanson located the Falls accurately on his map and called them 92 HISTORIC NIAGARA. " Ongiara," and in 1660 De Creuxius in his " Historiae Canadensis " noted them as " On giara Catarractes." In 1678, Father Louis Hennepin, who accompanied La Salle, tells us that " he personally " visited the Falls, and in FAC-SIMILE OF A VIEW OF NIAGARA FALLS BY FATHER HENNEPIN. (From the Original Utrecht Edition, 1697.) his first book, " Louisiana," published in 1683, describing La Salle's explorations and adven tures in this section of the country, applies the , name Niagara both to the river and to the Falls, and gives the earliest, though a very 93 THE NIAGARA BOOK. brief description of the FaHs themselves. In 1688, Coronellis's map of this region locates the Falls and first uses the name " Niagara " in cartography, a name used from that date without change. In 1691, Father Le Clercq in his " Establishment of the Faith " (from which work Father Hennepin is accused of plagiarizing certain parts of his faraous " New Discovery "), also speaks of " Niagara FaUs," but it is in Father Hennepin's " New Discov ery " just referred to, published in 1697, that we find the first real description of them pre served to us in type, and in that volume is also given the first illustration of the FaUs, which is reproduced in this work. A part of Henne pin's description is also quoted in another arti cle in this book. During the next fifty years Hennepin's three works appeared in some forty-five editions and reproductions, and were translated into all the languages of Europe; and by these means and from descriptions of other travellers (not ably that of Campanius Holm, in his " New Sweden," pubhshed in 1702, and Baron La Hontan's "Voyages," published in 1703) Ni agara became generally known to Europeans. 94 HISTORIC NIAGARA. It was reserved for Charlevoix, in 1721, accu rately to reckon the height of the Falls and to correct other erroneous reports and descrip tions of them published theretofore. We have thus briefly traced the history of the earliest knowledge and of the earhest Hterature of Ni agara down to a comparatively recent date. From that time the bibliography of Niagara, including its cartography and illustrations of every kind, is so voluminous as to form in itself a distinct branch of our title on which for lack of space we cannot even touch. THE NAME NIAGARA. The Indian custom of giving their tribal name to, or taking it from, the chief natural feature of the country they inhabited (as proved by the nomenclature of the Central and Eastern States, as weU as in the extensive Hterature on Indian subjects) tells us that a nation of this narae inhabited the territory along the Niagara River on both sides ; but as there are forty different known ways of spell ing the name, its orthography differs materi ally with various early authors.* This much, * A list of these is given in the Index volume of the ' ' Docu- 95 THE NIAGARA BOOK. however, we know — that when Hennepin first saw the FaUs, Niagara was the local Indian speUing of the name; " Niagara," the world accepted it; and " Niagara " it has been ever since. According to the most general accept ance the name is derived from what is com monly known as the Iroquois language, and signifies " the thunder of the waters," though this appropriate and poetic significance has been questioned, and it is claimed by some that it signifies " neck," symbolizing the fact of the Niagara River being the connecting link be tween the two great lakes. The Neuter or Niagara nation of Indians (subsequently merged into the Iroquois) by whom the name was first adopted, would seem to have pronounced it Nydh-ga-rdh, their lan guage having no labial sounds, and all their words being spoken without closing the lips. The pronunciation Nee-ah-gara, sometimes heard nowadays, was probably also in common use later on ; while in more raodern Indian dia lect, the sounding of every vowel being still mentary History of the State of New York." The most com monly met with of these variations are Onguaiarha, Ongiara, Onyakara, lagara, Nicariaga, Ungiara, and Jagara. 96 HISTORIC NIAGARA. continued, Ni-ah-g^h-rah (accent on the third syllable) was the accepted, as it is the cor rect, pronunciation, the present pronunciation, without any pronounced accent on any sylla ble, being an adaptation of more recent years. MODERN HISTORY. The coramencement of what may be termed the modern history of this region dates back to that day in December, 1678, when, starting from the mouth of the Niagara River, " A chieftain ofthe Iroquois, clad in a bison skin, Had let two travelers through the woods — La Salle and Hennepin " — to view the great cataract of which they had heard so much from their Indian allies on the St. Lawrence. As these three raen stood there, they typified the nations — -the French and the Indian — that for almost a hundred years were to control the destinies of this re gion; and in their personalities, " the chief, the soldier of the sword and the soldier of the cross," they exemplified the professions by raeans of which its conquest and civUization were to be effected. In the two hundred years that have elapsed 7 97 THE NIAGARA BOOK. since that day, the Indian and the Frenchman have disappeared from this region; another and a stronger race has acquired possession of this territory, to be in turn dispossessed of half of it by her own descendants. And during those two hundred years, on the pages of their history and in the literature of France, Eng land, Canada, and the United States, the name Niagara is indelibly stamped as a prominent and integral part. OWNERSHIP. So far as the contention for, and the posses sion of, this famous region by the nations of the earth are concerned, we may divide its his tory into these main periods : French claims on a broad basis by reason of early explorations and discoveries in the East, up to the real occupation by La SaUe in 1678. French occupation and sovereignty from that date, gradually, but regularly, and at last successfully disputed by the English in 1759. English occupation and undisputed control from then tiU 1776. Enghsh occupation till 1783, and from that 98 HISTORIC NIAGARA. date undisputed ownership of the land lying west of the Niagara River. United States ownership and control of that part lying east of the Niagara River frora that date, although so far as Fort Niagara is con cerned, England did not relinquish it till 1796. FRENCH OCCUPATION. The French, having early claimed all the northeastern part of this continent from Lab rador southwards as above noted, began at an early date to push their explorations and con quests westwards at first mainly along the line of the St. Lawrence River. Champlain, be tween 1603 and 1630, had done rauch to raake France a paramount force in this section and to attach many of the Indians to her allegiance by siding with thera in their tribal wars against their neighbors — an alliance which in after years arrayed raany Indian tribes, espe cially the powerful Iroquois, against her and hastened her defeat. On December 6, 1678, Father Hennepin, in a brig of ten tons and with a crew of sixteen persons, entered the mouth of the Niagara River. He was on his westward journey, sent 99 THE NIAGARA BOOK. . on in advance by La Salle, who followed him before the close of the year, and who, through love of his country and expectations of per sonal wealth, had labored long to extend the sovereignty of France. La Salle's object was to make good by conquest the powers con ferred upon hira by the French king, to obtain for himself a monopoly of the fur trade, and to reach and control the mines of St. Barbe, in Louisiana; and as he went he intended to es tablish a chain of fortifications which both in war and the fur trade should be points of van tage for future generations. A true soldier, La Salle at once saw the immense strategic advantage of the point where Fort Niagara now stands, and to this day the correctness of his judgment has not been questioned. Here he built a trading post, and pursuing his way up the Niagara River to where Lewiston now stands, he buUt a fort of palisades ; and carrying the anchors, cordage, etc., which he had brought for that purpose, up the so-called " Three Mountains " at Lewiston, he found a spot at the mouth of Cayuga Creek, about five miles above the FaUs (where is to-day a hamlet bearing his name). HISTORIC NIAGARA. where he built and launched the Griffon, the first vessel that ever sailed the upper lakes. For almost a hundred years after this the his tory of the Niagara Frontier belongs to the French, though their sovereignty was attacked and at last overthrown by the English. In 1687, Marquis De Nonville, during his expedition against the hostile Senecas, rebuilt La Salle's destroyed trading post at Fort Ni agara into a strong fort. The following year it was abandoned and destroyed, but it was too valuable a point of vantage to be lost, and in 1725 it was rebuilt in stone by consent of the Iroquois. The site of the present village of Lewiston, the head of navigation on the lower Niagara, was the commencement of a portage by which goods, araraunition, etc., were conveyed to a point about a raile and a half above the Falls, over a line which is still called the Portage Road. For the purposes of this portage, frora the edge of the river at the lower end of the rapids, up the " Three Mountains," was built a rude tramway on which, by means of ropes and windlasses, a car was raised and low ered. Built in 1764, it is clairaed to have been THE NIAGARA BOOK. the first raUroad constructed in this country. Though noted on many maps no trace even of its foundations now remains. The Indians, naturaUy averse to manual labor, operated the tramway, taking their pay in rum and tobacco, otherwise unobtainable by them. The upper end of this portage was originally only a land ing place for boats, but was gradually fortified until in 1750 it became a strong fort — called Fort Du Portage, or by some. Fort Little Niagara — to defend the French barracks and storehouses which had been erected there. The Fort was burned in 1759 by Joncaire, who was in coramand when the British commenced their memorable carapaign of that year, and Joncaire retreated to a station on Chippewa Creek. In that carapaign General Prideaux, coramanding the British forces in this section, and carrying out that portion of the general plan assigned to him, massed his forces on the shore of Lake Ontario, east of Fort Niagara, and demanded its surrender; this being re fused, he laid siege to it. During the siege Prideaux was killed, and Sir WiUiam Johnson succeeded him and captured Fort Niagara, the main stronghold then held by the French in HISTORIC NIAGARA. that long chain of forts connecting Canada with Louisiana. During the siege the French had sent reinforcements from Venango in Pennsylvania to the garrison of Niagara. They left their vessels on Navy Island (named Isle de Marine by the French), passed over the Portage, and just before reaching Fort Niag ara were ambushed and routed by the British. On Navy Island the French had recently built some small vessels, and to prevent these, as well as the two ships which brought down the reinforceraents frora Venango, frora falling into the hands of the victorious British, they took them over to Grand Island, at the northern end of which is a bay, where they set them on fire, destroying thera and sinking the useless huUs, from which circumstance the place is caUed Burnt Ship Bay to this day. The British successes of 1759 made them raasters of all this frontier, and by 1761 Capt. Joseph Schlosser of the British Array built a fort a little to the east of Fort Du Portage and named it after himself. Just below the site of that fort still stands a solitary stone chimney, the only relic left of all these fortifications. It 103 THE NIAGARA BOOK. i was part of the old French barracks, previously aUuded to at Fort Du Portage. devil's HOLE MASSACRE. The Indian nature is heartless and unforgiv ing. When Champlain in his trip to the lake which bears his name asked the assistance of the Hurons, he took their part in their tribal war against the Iroquois. Thus was laid the commencement of that partisanship of the various Indian tribes, some to the French and some to the Enghsh, which lasted throughout the better part of the eighteenth century, and one of the results of which was that fatal trag edy on this frontier known as " The Devil's Hole Massacre." After the British success of 1759 and their subsequent control of this territory, the Sene cas, actuated by their inherited hatred of the Enghsh and incited probably by the French, commenced a bloody supplemental campaign^ in 1763. Knowing that the English were daily sending poorly guarded trains from Fort Niagara through Lewiston, where they had an auxiliary encampment, to Fort Schlosser, they planned an ambuscade and executed it 104 HISTORIC NIAGARA. with precision and fatal results. At the nar row pass at the Devil's Hole they ambushed the supply train, destroying it and kiUing all but three of the escort and drivers. They then ambushed the relieving force, which on hear ing the firing had hastened from Lewiston, killing all but eight. It was a masterly exam ple of Indian warfare executed with Indian cunning and Indian bloodthirstiness. CESSIONS AND TREATIES. By the treaty of 1763 France ceded to Eng land all this region and all her Canadian pos sessions for which her arraies and her mis sionaries had spent, during one hundred years, so much energy, so vast an araount of money, and so many lives. In the spring of 1764 Sir Williara Johnson, supplementing the treaty of the preceding year, assembled representatives of all the In dians of Northern America from both East and West, over 2,000 in number, including the hostile Senecas, at Fort Niagara, and acquired from them, for the British Crown, the title to a large tract of land, including a strip four miles in width, two miles wide on each side of the 105 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Niagara River for its entire length. At the same time the Senecas ceded to Sir William Johnson all the islands in the Niagara River. He in turn ceded them to the British Sover eign. So that at this time Niagara Falls, the grandest and most noted cataract on the globe, was the Koh-i-noor of the English Crown in the New World. Twelve years afterwards the Declaration of Independence was signed and the long revolutionary struggle for inde pendence comraenced. Had General SuUi- van's campaign of 1779, as planned, been suc cessful, he would have attacked Fort Niagara; but disaster overtook him, and the War of the Revolution never reached the Niagara River in actual hostilities. In 1783 the Treaty of Paris was signed, by which England adraitted the in dependence of the United States and recog nized the Great Lakes as our northern bound ary, though it was not until 1796, after the ratification of Jay's treaty, that she abandoned some of the strongholds on our soil, including Fort Niagara. WAR OF 1812. It is foreign to the purpose of this article to discuss the causes, some of which had a bear- 106 HISTORIC NIAGARA. ing on this region, which led up to President Madison's proclamation of war between Great Britain and the United States, known as the War of 1812, of which this iraraediate region, popularly called the Niagara frontier, felt the full force. In the fall of that year, four months after the declaration of war, General Van Rensselaer established his camp near Lewiston (so called in honor of Governor Lewis of New York), and collected an army to invade Can ada. After one unsuccessful attempt he reached the Canadian shore, and by the time General Brock had arrived from the mouth of the river to oppose him, was in possession of Queenston Heights. In endeavoring to re capture these and to retrieve the point of van tage that never should have been lost, General Brock was killed. British reinforcements ar riving from Niagara, the Americans were dis lodged from the heights, defeated, and many taken prisoners. Meanwhile, on the American side, in full view of the battle, were some hun dreds of American volunteers who basely re fused to cross the river and aid their compan ions. At the foot of Queenston Heights an inscribed stone (set in place by the Prince of 107 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Wales in i860) marks the exact spot where Brock fell; and on the heights, just above it, a lofty and beautiful column (the second one erected at this point, the first one having been blown up by a miscreant in 1840) stands as a monument of his country's gratitude. In the sarae year Gen. Alexander Smyth, of Virginia, issued his famous bombastic circular inviting everybody to join him at Black Rock, near Buffalo, and invade Canada from that point. Sorae five thousand raen responded to his invi tation, but Smyth having made himself a laughing-stock araong his own people, the in vasion was abandoned and the army dis persed. In the following year, 181 3, the Americans captured Fort George on the Canadian shore, near the raouth of the Niagara River, and the village of Newark, or Niagara. This is the oldest settlement in this section. It was for a tirae the residence of the Lieutenant-Governor of Canada, and here in 1792 the first Parha raent of Upper Canada held its session. New ark was burned by the Araericans on their re treat, without reason, as the British claimed, and they immediately retaliated; for ten days 108 HISTORIC NIAGARA. later they surprised and captured Fort Niagara and burned every American viUage on the Niagara River, including Youngstown, Lewis- ton, Manchester (now Niagara Falls), Fort Schlosser, Black Rock, and Buffalo, spreading devastation along the American frontier. The year 1814 witnessed two battles in the vicinity of the Falls theraselves, both on the Canadian side. Chippewa, a victory for the Araericans, and Bridgewater or Lundy's Lane, clairaed as a victory by both parties. The latter was one of the most remarkable conflicts recorded in history. Within sight of the FaUs, in the glory of the light of a full moon, the opposing armies engaged in hand-to-hand conflict, from sun down to midnight, when both sides, exhausted by their efforts, withdrew frora the field. The British before dawn, and unopposed, reoccu- pied the battle ground, and on this alone rests their claim to victory. Later on the Ameri can army occupied Fort Erie, which they had shortly before wrested from the British and where they were besieged by them. From this fort on the seventeenth of Septeraber, 1814, the Americans made that faraous and successful sortie, planned and led by Gen. 109 TBE NIAGARA BOOK. Peter B. Porter, which disbanded the British besiegers, this being the only case in history, according to Lord Napier, where a besieging army was entirely defeated and disbanded by such a movement. We necessarily omit all reference to raany points along the river raade famous by the ex ploits, the daring, and often by the loss of Hfe of the combatants in this war — points locally important in themselves but which have not risen to the dignity of that much-abused word, " history." The Treaty of Ghent restored peace to both countries and to the inhabitants on their ex hausted frontiers. Under this treaty, com missioners were appointed to locate the bound ary line between Canada and the United States, already somewhat laxly provided for in the treaty of 1783. These commissioners agreed to run the boundary line along this frontier, through the middle of the Horseshoe Falls and through the deepest channel of the river, both above and below them. Thus Navy Island fell to the share of the Cana dians and Grand Island became American soil. BISTORIO NIAGARA. LAND TITLES. We have already noted the cession of this region by the French to the English in 1763, and also the cession by the British of the east ern side of the river to the United States at the close of the Revolutionary War, which joint occupation has never since been perraanently disturbed. We also noted the cession by the Senecas to the British of the land on each side of the river, and of the islands to Sir WiUiam Johnson and by him to the English Crown. A strip of land one raile wide along the Araerican shore from Lake Ontario to Lake Erie had been exempted when New York ceded the ownership of what is now the west ern portion of this State to Massachusetts, which ownership New York subsequently re acquired. Finally the Indians, who, in spite of their former cessions to England, still claimed an ownership, ceded to New York, for $1,000 and an annuity of $1,500, their title to all the islands in the Niagara River. The State of New York patented the mile strip to individuals comraencing in the first decade of this century. THE NIAGARA BOOK. FAMOUS INCIDENTS. In the year 1824 Grand Island, which con tains about eighteen thousand acres, was se lected by Major M. M. Noah as the future home of the Jews of the New World. He pro posed to buy the island, make of it a second Jerusalem, and within the sound of Niagara to build up an ideal coraraunity of wealth and in dustry. In 1825, acting as the Great High Priest of the Project, clad in sacerdotal robes, attended in procession by the civic and mili tary authorities, local societies, and a great concourse of people, with appropriate ce.re- monies he laid the corner-stone of his future City of Ararat on the altar of a Christian church in Buffalo. This corner-stone was subsequently built into a monument at White haven on Grand Island, opposite the village of Tonawanda. It is now in the possession of the Buffalo Historical Society. Major Noah's plan fell through, as the Patriarch of Jerusalem refused his sanction to the project. THE ERIE CANAL. On October 26, 1825, a cannon boomed forth its greeting at Buffalo; a few seconds HISTORIC NIAGARA. afterward another cannon a short distance down the river caught up the sound, and so on, cannon after cannon, cannon after cannon, down the Niagara River to Tonawanda, thence easterly to Albany, thence down the bank of the Hudson to New York City, transmitting the message that at the source of the historic Niagara River the waters of Lake Erie had been let into that just corapleted water-way — the Erie Canal. Fort Niagara becarae a spot of national celebrity in 1826. WiUiara Morgan, a resi dent of Batavia in this State, and a member of the Masonic fraternity, threatened to disclose the secrets of that body in print. He was quietly seized and taken away from his home. He was traced in the hands of his abductors to Fort Niagara, where he is said to have been incarcerated in one of the buildings in the fort, and to this day " Morgan's Dungeon " is one of the sights shown to visitors. He was never heard of after he entered the fort, and popular fancy says that he was taken from this dun geon by night and drowned in Lake Ontario. Several persons were subsequently tried for his murder, but no proof of their complicity in 8 113 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the matter, nor even of Morgan's death, was produced. The principal episode in the fa raous anti-Masonic agitation of that period thus became a part of Niagara's local history. THE PATRIOT WAR. In 1837 occurred what is known as the Canadian Patriot War. While the agitation of the Patriots centred in Toronto, it kept the entire Niagara frontier on the Canadian side in a ferment for several months, and Navy Isl and becarae one of their rendezvous, a portion of the British troops being stationed at Chip pewa. Without reference to the intrigues carried on along the frontier by the Canadian agitators with their American sympathizers, we deal only with the one iraportant event known as the Caroline episode. It was openly charged that the Patriots were receiving sub stantial aid from the American side, not only from private individuals, but also by reason of the non-intervention of National and State authorities, when they knew that arms were being shipped and raaterial assistance rendered from American soil. So bitter was the feeling on the part of the Britishers, that when the 114 HISTORIC NIAGARA. Opportunity offered, it is not surprising that they made the most of it. A sraall stearaer, the Caroline, had been chartered by Buffalo parties to run between that city. Navy Island, where the insurgents were encaraped, and Schlosser Landing on the American shore. According to their statement it was a private enterprise, started to make money by carrying excursionists to the insurgents' camp; but ac cording to the Canadian view, her real busi ness was to convey arras and provisions to the insurgents. On the night of December 29th, the CaroHne lay at Schlosser's dock. The ex citement had drawn large numbers of people there ; all the hotels were filled, and some peo ple had sought a night's lodging on the steamer itself. At midnight six boatloads of British soldiers, sent frora Chippewa by Sir Allan McNab, sUently approached the Caroline, boarded and captured her, turned off all on board, cut her moorings, set her on fire, and towed her into the river. In the melee and exchange of shots, one man, Araos Durfee, was killed. The boat was burned to the water's edge and sank not far from where she had been cut adrift. 115 THE NIAGARA BOOK. The affair caused intense excitement and was the source of long diplomatic correspon dence, the British Government assuming fuU responsibility for the claimed breaches of inter national law, but finally apologizing for it. One raan, Alexander McLeod, was arrested and tried in this State for raanslaughter, and finally acquitted. THE FENIAN WAR. Frora the time of the Patriot War, with the exception of the Fenian Outbreak in 1866, the history of this region has nothing to do with international war. The Fenian Outbreak, similar in its inception so far as its hostility to the existing governraent of Canada and a desire to aid the Irish cause of horae rule by inciting hostilities among Britain's colonies, was quickly suppressed. Of actual hostilities during that agitation there was but one occur rence, known as the battle of Ridgeway, on the Canadian side in the vicinity of Buffalo, where the Fenians were defeated. COMMERCIAL HISTORY. In its commerciaUy historic aspects, there stands out one important project in connec- 116 HISTORIC NIAGARA. tion with Niagara Falls which has been broached by its advocates in public and in pri vate, and especially in the haUs of Congress for the past three-quarters of a century. Al though by international treaty, no war vessels are perraitted on the upper lakes, in the line of Washington's famous aphorism, that " the best way to maintain peace is to be prepared for war," the advocates of a ship canal of a capacity large enough to float our largest ves sels, connecting the Niagara River some two or three miles above the Falls with its quiet waters at Lewiston or below, have continued their agitations, and preliminary appropria tions, and elaborate surveys — showing three or four routes — have been made by Congress at three different times. The project so far has made but little headway towards a success ful consideration. Of its earliest commercial history, during the first years of the century, when private individuals bought the land frora the State on account of its adjacent water power, and established here a village which they naraed Manchester; of the first utiliza tion of a portion of its enorraous power in re cent years and of the present stupendous 117 THE NIAGARA BOOK. power development now nearing completion, we cannot treat for lack of space. The enor mous development of power and its electrical transmission, with all that this has already added and will add to Niagara's history, are treated of elsewhere in this volume. STATE RESERVATION AT NIAGARA. In 1885, after sorae years of public agitation, the State of New York acquired Goat Island and the territory on the river bank adjacent to the Falls and for a half-raile above them, dedicating it by its ownership as free forever to the world. The Province of Ontario in 1888 took a similar course on the Canadian side, so that now the Falls themselves and the adjacent lands, under the ownership of two friendly nations, are forever preserved from any real defacement of their scenery by com raercial enterprises. The honor of first sug gesting this preservation of the scenery has been clairaed by raany persons. But the first real suggestion, though raade without details, carae from two Scotchmen, Andrew Reed and Jaraes Matheson, who in 1835, ^^ ^ volume de scribing their visit to the Congregational 118 THE MAID OF THE MIST. (Illustrating the Indian legend. — From a painting^ HISTORIC NIAGARA. churches of this country, first broached the idea that Niagara should "be deeraed the property of civUized raankind." INDIAN LORE. This region is rich in Indian lore and tra dition (which is Indian history) never yet thor oughly collected. Comraencing far back when the Neuter nation, or raore probably an earlier race, dwelt hereabouts, they wor shipped the Great Spirit of the FaUs, their wor ship culrainating annually in the sacrifice of the fairest maiden of the tribe to the Great Spirit of Niagara, sending her over the Falls in a white canoe laden with fruits and flowers; next, their inter-tribal wars ; later on, the tem porarily successful but ultimately inevitable futile atterapt of the Neuter nation to raain- tain a neutral existence; the use of Goat Isl and as the burying ground of great chiefs and warriors, and their adoration of the island be cause of such use, and the subsequent annihila tion of the Neuters as a distinct tribe by the Senecas, form an unwritten page of historic Niagara which will probably never be com- 119 THE NIAGARA BOOK. pleted with the accuracy that its importance demands. LOCAL HISTORY. To later local history in different aspects, we can only refer: To the engineering triumphs in the various bridges that span this river and the attendant benefits to this region; to the faraous achievements of Blondin and others who have crossed the gorge on a rope ; to the trip made by the Maid of the Mist in 1861, under the guidance of Joel R. Robinson from Niagara to Lewiston — the only boat that has ever successfully done so — proving, so far as that portion of the river is concerned, what the courts have held, that the Niagara River throughout its entire length is a navigable Stream ; to men who, like Francis Abbot, have associated their names with the Falls in one way, or like Captain Webb, with the Rapids in another way ; to the faU of Table Rock in 1850, showing to this generation the undermining process by which Niagara has cut the gorge; or to the numberless fatalities which have an nuaUy occurred, some by accident, some in tentionally. 120 HISTORIC NIAGARA. Each of these in one way or another has tended to make history, and to point out lines of thought whose deductions must benefit fu ture generations, and to all these which are necessarily blended with Niagara's history, we can but refer in this way. Such, in outline, and with almost brutal brevity, is the foundation for that great work to which sorae raaster mind will some day devote its energies, and produce, to its own farae and to the benefit of international litera ture, a work whose pages shall contain events as yet imperfectly recorded and whose subject raay be the words of our title. Historic Niagara. 121 l-wm.rtl'wMfi'-"^^^'"*'^^ -' ""SS^S?'^'?? BIRD S-EYE VIEW OF NIAGARA RIVER. THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. By Prof. N. S. Shaler, Dean of the Lawrence Scientific School, Harvard University. The effect of the raore raajestic spectacles of Nature is to turn the raind of the observer away frora the philosophy of the events which he is observing. This is a natural and wholesome action of all splendid things; he is indeed un happy who flies at once to speculation as to the cause of that which he for the first time freely beholds. There is, however, a second stage in the service which the great spectacles of the earth can do for us. This is where we seek to understand the ways in which the offer ing is raade to our souls. The well-trained naturalist, indeed any one who is attentive to the aesthetic as well as the rational opportuni ties of the world, learns in a manner to com bine these impressions which may come to him 123 THE NIAGARA BOOK. by instinctive appreciation and by knowledge. To him the beautiful and the magnificent are none the less moving because he sees them in the perspective of history, or in the great as serablage of causations. It is the fairest prov ince of science to afford these accessories of understanding so that the beauty of Nature raay raake a deeper irapression upon the raind of raan. Its work should in no wise diminish our perception or esteem of the beautiful; it should in fact unite these motives with our ordinary thought. Therefore it seems fit that we should consider the lessons which raay be derived from a study of this great waterfall. The first step towards the comprehension of any such feature as Niagara Falls should lead the student to an understanding of a general kind as to the range of the phenoraena with which it is allied. We will, therefore, begin our inquiry by a brief consideration as to the various kinds of waterfalls, and the conditions which produce them. It is easy to recognize the truth that aU streams tend to form con tinuous and uninterrupted slopes down which their waters course from the highlands to the sea. It is to this principle, indeed, that we 124 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. owe the fact that nearly all great rivers are freely navigable, and the most of the lesser are, for the greater part of their length, fit for sraall boats. Wherever we find a river in the tumult of a waterfall or of a cascade we readily note that it is steadfastly engaged in destroying the obstruction, and that, given geologic time enough, it will wear a channel down which its waters raay glide quietly to the deep whence they carae, and to which they inevitably re turn. If a new continent should be elevated, and rivers forraed upon it, they would quickly develop a host of waterfalls. If the continent were high it would be a land of cascades. Gradually, as the land became older, these barriers in the way of the descending water would be worn away. With the forraation of each mountain systera, however, or with the occurrence of other accidents, such as those which are brought about by a glacial period, the paths of the streams would be disturbed, and the rivers would once again have to con tend with obstructions which they seek to re move. Philosophical geographers now recog nize the fact that the presence of waterfalls in a country means that the topography is, in a 125 THE NIAGARA BOOK. geological sense, new; that the region has either recently been uplifted from the sea, or has, not long ago, undergone considerable revolutions, which have changed the shape of its surface. Among the many different conditions which produce cataracts, we may note the following groups, which include the greater part of these accidents : In mountain districts sraall streams gathering in the tablelands or upland valleys often encounter a precipice down which they find their way in successive leaps. The cliffs over which they tumble are not, as is the case at Niagara, the product of the stream's action, but have generally been formed by a fault or a break in the rocks, the strata on one side of the disruption having been lifted so that a wall like escarpment is created. In other cases the valley has been deeply carved by a stream of fluid or of frozen water, a river or a glacier. Waterfalls of this nature, though rarely of great volume, afford the most beautiful and highest cascades in the world. Those of the Yosemite Valley, or of Lauterbrunnen, in Switzerland, are excellent examples of this kind. 126 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. Wherever a stream, be it small or great, en counters in its course conditions in which it passes from a hard to a soft rock, or rather we should say frora strata which it does not easily attack to other deposits which are read ily worn away, the change is coraraonly marked by a rapid or waterfall. This altera tion may be due to any one of many causes. Commonly it is brought about by a dike, or fissure filled with volcanic rock, which lies across the channel of the river. In our lime stone rocks an ancient coral reef, buried in the strata, may produce a considerable cascade. The Falls of the Ohio at Louisville are due to the fact that such an ancient reef lies athwart the path of that river. Along the seashore wherever the waves have carved, as they often do, an overhanging steep, the streams, which may originally have flowed down gently decHning beds, tumble over precipices, sometimes faUing, as on the north shore of the Island of Anticosti, directly into the ocean. In all such cases we may as sume that the cliffs have been driven backward into the land by the effect of the surges. By far the commonest origin of waterfalls is 127 THE NIAGARA BOOK. to be found where horizontal stratified rocks arranged in alternating beds of hard and soft character are flowed over by a considerable streara. In these conditions the bed of the river is apt to lie on one of the hard layers upon which it courses until it cuts the layer through; then encountering the underlying soft mate rials it quickly wears them away down to the level of the next resisting stratum, where the process is repeated, forming, it may be, a dozen steps of descent in the course of a few miles. Each of the " treads " of such a stair way is apt to be many times as wide as the fall is high; but where the river has a great volume the down rush of water is apt to break up the lower-lying harder layers so that one great fall is produced. The reader will do well to see the beautiful system of step cascades known as Trenton Falls, where West Canada Creek de scends from the highland about its source through a beautiful gorge of its own carving in many successive leaps. The foregoing brief story concerning the natural history of waterfalls has led us to the point where we may begin our inquiries con cerning the genesis of Niagara. This fall be- 128 MAP OF LAKE IROQUOIS. (Explanation. — Modern hydrography in dotted lines. Ancient lake area shaded. Ice sheet cross-shaded.) THE NIAGARA BOOK. longs to the last-mentioned group of cascades, that in which the course of the river is deter mined in a great measure by the diverse resist ance which horizontally-irabedded rocks op posed to the wearing action of the water. In order, however, to face the raany interesting questions which this river and faU present to the naturalist, we raust ask the reader at the outset to obtain a clear idea as to the. condi tions of the valley of the streara frora the point where it leaves Lake Erie to that where it enters Lake Ontario. The ideal way to obtain this impression would be to view the country from the surarait of a tower having a height of five hundred feet or more, standing at a point near the present Hne of the falls. It is indeed most desirable from the point of view of the teacher, as well as others who love wide views, that such a " coign of vantage " should be constructed. In passing, we raay remark that such an outlook would enable the ob server to command the whole field of nearly level country from lake to lake. The student would thus be able to perceive directly what he can only otherwise infer from the maps and bird's-eye views. Using, however, these last- 130 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. named means of iUustration, we readily ob serve the following facts concerning the course of Niagara River. We follow the prevailing- fashion in terming this streara a river. It is, in fact, a mere strait connecting two fresh water seas, the one lying about three hundred feet above the other. Near its point of exit from Lake Erie the streara passes over a low uplift of the strata which somewhat interrupts its flow. A little way on in its path the tide is divided, enclosing a large island and some smaller isles. Its movement is slow, and in general the condition of the stream and its banks reminds one of the lower parts of a great river where it is about to enter the sea. The striking feature is that, from Lake Erie to Goat Island, the stream has no distinct valley. It has evidently done none of that downward carving which is so con spicuous a feature in the work of all ordinary rivers where they flow at a considerable height above the ocean's level. In part this absence of a valley is to be accounted for by the abso lute purity of the water. Ordinary rivers bear much sediment, the coarser parts of which are driven along the bottom, continuously though 131 THE NIAGARA BOOK. slightly wearing the bed-rock away as they rub over it; but in the Niagara all these sediments which the strearas bring from the uplands are deposited in the chain of the Great Lakes. At Goat Island the conditions are suddenly changed. In the rapids and in the raain falls the river descends about two hundred feet into a deep gorge, through which it flows as far as Lewiston in a more or less tumultuous man ner. At this point the channel passes through the escarpment which borders the southern margin of Lake Ontario. Here it ceases to flow as rapidly as before, the tide of waters finding ample room in the deep channel for a leisurely journey to the lower lake. The gorge of the Niagara, though deep, is very narrow; to the eye of the trained observer it appears almost as unlike an ordinary river valley as is the path of the stream above the cataract. Everywhere the walls are steep; there is no trace of the alluvial plain which normally borders great rivers ; nor do we find the slope of country toward the edge of the cliff which is so characteristic of ordinary val leys. This depression, indeed, is a true cafion, a trough carved by a raain stream without any 132 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. coincident work of erosion effected by the rain, frost, and water-courses operating on either side of its path. These features have led geologists, as they well raay lead any intelli gent observer, to the conclusion that the Niag ara River is from beginning to end a new-made stream; a watercourse which originated not as raost of our Araerican rivers have in remote ages, but in the geological yesterday. The reason for this sudden coming into existence of the Niagara, the steps which led to its invention, are now undergoing a very careful discussion through the labors of several able geologists.* Although there is rauch which is still doubtful concerning the history of this singular stream, a great deal of interest has been well ascertained. The outlines of this matter we will now endeavor to set before the reader. In endeavoring to comprehend the history *The literature concerning the problems of the Niagara River is abundant, but widely scattered. The ablest single contribution to the subject is by Mr. G. K. Gilbert, Geologist U. S. Geological survey. It is contained in the sixth annual report of the Commissioners of the State Reservation at Ni agara, for the year 1889.— Albany, James B. Lyon, Printer, i8go. References to various other treatises on the subject may be found in the foot-note of that paper. 133 HYPOTHETIC HYDROGRAPHY AT A DATE BEFORE THE MELTING OF THE GREAT GLACIER FROM THE ST. LAWRENCE VALLEY, (Explanation. — Water-parting in heavy broken line. Modern hydrography in light broken lines. Ancient rivers in full lines. Ancient lakes shaded. Ice sheet cross-shaded.) THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. of Niagara, it is necessary to take account of the singular conditions presented by the great valley in which it lies. The St. Lawrence is on some accounts the most curious of aU the great vales which geographers have had an opportunity to study. The raost of the river- basins in the world have their boundaries de fined by a considerable elevation. If, here and there, they have a low side over which we raay pass to a neighboring valley without travers ing a decided water-shed, the partial breach of the boundaries is very limited in its length. In the St. Lawrence valley, however, from the lower end of Lake Ontario to the mouth of Lake Superior, the basin on its southern side is but ill-defined. The low, broad ridge which separates the drainage from that of the streams which flow into the Hudson, or into the Mississippi, is frequently breached by depressions through which the waters belonging to the Great Lakes systera may readily be discharged whenever their elevation is considerably altered, or when by chance a barrier is interposed to their exit through the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Accidents of this description have been probably of fre- 135 THE NIAGARA BOOK. quent occurrence, so that from time to time the geographical relations of these waters have been greatly changed. The Great Lakes of the St. Lawrence valley were probably in existence before the last glacial period, though they were doubtless ex tended and somewhat modified in form by the wearing of the rocks which occurred in that wonderful age. With the beginning of the glacial period the ice-sheet of eastern North America, which is now limited to Greenland, rapidly extended its bounds over the land to the northward of the Great Lakes. It soon fiUed their basins, and extended southward until its margin attained the Ohio River where Cincinnati now stands, and lay over the head waters of all the valleys of the streams which pour from the South.into the Great Lakes. It is easy to see that such an ice-sheet having the depth of a mile or more would profoundly dis turb the drainage of these rivers. In its ad vance it would first create a dam across the waters of the St. Lawrence River, compelling the lakes to rise until they discharged through some of the low places on their southern boundary; next it must have filled their basins 136 HYPOTHETIC HYDROGRAPHY AT A DATE AFTER THE MELTING OF THE GREAT GLACIER FROM THE ST. LAWRENCE VALLEY. (Explanation.— Water-parting in heavy broken line. Modern hydrography in light broken lines. Ancient rivers in full Unes. Ancient lakes shaded.) THE NIAGARA BOOK. with ice, and deepened the sheet until its sur face lay thousands of feet above their floor. We cannot trace the history of these altera tions which the advance of the glacial envelope brought upon this field of land and water. But the steps in the alterations may be inferred from what happened when the envelope re treated stage by stage until it vanished from the continent, or at least from the part of the field with which we are concerned. For a time the barrier lay in such a position that the waters of the lakes below Superior were barred out from the passage of Niagara, flow ing over into the valley of the Ohio through a channel passing by the site of the City of Fort Wayne, and thence into the Wabash River. This old waterway has been preserved with unmistakable clearness. With the further retreat of the ice-front to the northeastward, the Hne of the barrier was withdrawn to near the present raouth of Lake Ontario, where it flows into the St. Lawrence River. At this time the level of the Great Lakes was lowered by successive stages, though on the whole rather suddenly, to the amount of five hun dred and fifty feet. 138 . THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. With the last mentioned condition of the ice- barrier the exit of the Great Lakes changed to a path which led through Central New York, down the valley of the Mohawk River. The channel still shows the marks of the great tide of water, probably as great in its volume as that which now passes Niagara FaUs. Those who journey by the New York Central Rail way to and frora Albany raay note at Little Falls the broad gorge of the soraetirae great river which is now occupied by a relatively small stream. It raight be supposed that at this stage the observer would have found the Niagara River flowing in somewhere near its present position. But here coraes in one of the extraordinary accidents of that period of geographic wonders, the great Ice Age. When the ice lay over the country to the north of the Great Lakes, the part of the continent which it occupied appears to have been borne down by the weight of the raass in such a man ner that it sloped to the northward at the rate of two or three feet to the mile. The resuh was that the basin of Lake Erie was to a great extent dry, and that of Lake Huron did not connect across to the southward through Lake 139 THE NIAGARA BOOK. St. Clair, but through Georgian Bay, and thence by a channel occupying the site of the Trent River to the northern part of Lake On tario. At a yet later stage, when the ice-bar rier was still further withdrawn, so that the channel of the St. Lawrence was open, another channel was found by way of the Ottawa River, so that the upper lakes no longer emp tied by way of Lake Ontario. After the ice passed completely away from this part of the country, the land recovered from its southward down-tilting. Lake Erie regained its waters, and the tide from Lakes Michigan and Huron began to flow, as at pres ent, by way of the Detroit River and Lake St. Clair. This was probably the age when the present Niagara River came into existence. We have already noted the fact that as a whole the valley of the Niagara, both above and be low the Falls, appears to be a piece of stream- carving done in very modern times. Although it doubtless antedates the earliest chapters of human history of which we have any written records, it almost certainly is newer than the records of man which we find written in cer tain ancient art-remains, such as those which 140 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. were found with the Calaveras skull in Cali fornia. The stream may have begun its work not more than ten thousand years ago. It appears, however, that there was a pre-glacial Niagara. If the reader will go to the cliff which bor ders the lowland along the lake, a precipice carved at some period when Lake Ontario was higher than at present, and walk westward from the river, he will observe that at the town of St. David's, a few miles west of Queenston, the cliffs turn inland in a way which indicates that here of old was a valley through which a great river found its way to the lake. Going • southward to the site of the Whirlpool we find there a point where, and where alone, the steep rocky walls of the Niagara canon fail, and their place is taken by heaps of drift material, evidently brought to its present site by the ice of the glacial time which here, as in many other regions, fiUed the pre-glacial valleys with de tritus. In the opinion of those who have most attentively studied the problem, there was an old Niagara River extending a part of its chan nel from St. David's to the Whirlpool, and probably from that point along much the same 141 THE NIAGARA BOOK. line as the present stream toward the existing FaUs. It is possible, however, that this old channel may have bent away to the west from the Whirlpool, and attained Lake Erie at some unknown point. If the old channel entered the present Niagara gorge at the pool we have to assume that when the stream, long dispos sessed by the glacier, was permitted again to flow, it found the channel to St. David's so completely filled that it was easier to plunge over the Queenston bluff at a new point, and thence in the retreat of the Falls to carve the canon back to its present site. It may be that a part of the channel above the enlargement at the Whirlpool was also carved in the old pre- glacial days, filled in with glacial waste, and afterwards swept clear of the obstruction by the mighty stream. To the reader who has paid no attention to the geographic changes which were produced in the last ice time, such alterations in the path of a river may seem raost improbable. The geologist, however, knows that these have been among the commoner incidents in this chapter of the earth's history. Hardly any of the considerable streams which existed within 142 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. the glaciated field before the advent of the ice escaped such perturbation. We could in an a priori way predict that a stream lying in the position of the Niagara River, where the araount of glacial waste deposited on the sur face was very great, would be so far effaced by detritus that when the tide again began to flow, a portion at least of its channel would de part frora its priraitive position. In fact, among the many detailed inquiries which the geologist has a chance to make in the old glacial fields, there are few which are more interesting and, indeed, raore perplexing than these which concern the relation of the ancient and existing river valleys. From this general and rather wide consider ation of the Niagara problem, which has brought us in face of sorae of the majestic ac tions of the past, we may now profitably turn to the detailed phenomena exhibited in the Falls and in the gorge between thera and Queenston. The student will do well to begin these inquiries by a journey to the Cave of the Winds, where, penetrating behind a thin strip of the falling water, he can see soraething of the condition of the steep over which the cata- 143 ('. 'i': J ,i!i| 1 1!.; , i!li„i,C!i;3KMl! ifllliiiiiSiig ttliliii^lfi'' Iii ¦lit •msmm^ THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. raet plunges. He should also observe the rocks in the faces of the cliffs below the Falls. He will readily note the fact that the top of the precipice is occupied by a somewhat massive limestone. This rock is, it is true, divided by joints into large blocks, but these are hard, and are not much worn by the clean water which at the margin of the escarpment shoots clear of their face. Below this limestone, which is extensively developed in New York and in the adjacent parts of the continent, and which raost prop erly bears the narae of " Niagara Liraestone," there is a less considerable thickness of thin- layered shaley beds known as the " Niagara Shale." Yet below He beds of the Clinton Age, coraposed of somewhat coherent limestone and shaley sandstone. At the base of the sec tion of the Falls and steep, occupying more than half of its height, are the beds of the Me dina formation, mostly made up of rather fraU sandstones and thin reddish shaley layers. From what the reader can see in the Cave of the Winds, and what he can readily infer by observing the rocks bared in the cliffs near the Falls, he wdl readily understand that the Niag- 10 145 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ara Limestone is the rock which takes the brunt of the work required in maintaining the precipice down which its river plunges. He will see also that this hard edge of the cliff pro jects beyond its base, thus giving free room for the fall to descend unbroken to the level of the streara below, and thence downward in the tu mult of waters to the river bed to a greater depth than the visible face of the Falls. From tirae to time as abundant general ob servations and accurate surveys show, the Niagara cornice of the wall is so far left un supported by the more rapid wearing of the lower-lying softer beds that it breaks down by its own weight and falls in ruins to the base of the submerged cliff at the foot of the cascade. In this position we cannot see what becomes of the debris, but from what we may readily observe at other points we can make some in teresting and trustworthy inferences. Along many rivers the student of such phenomena can find places where ancient cataracts have left their bases bare by the shrinkage or di version of the streams which produced them; thus, at Little FaUs on the Mohawk, which, as before noted, was once the path of exit of the 146 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. Great Lake waters, there was in the olden day a great cataract, the raost of which is now above the level of the shrunken river. Here we find the rocks once trodden by the fall ex cavated in great well-Hke " pot-holes," some of which are ten feet or more in diameter, and with more than that depth. Each of these cavities has evidently been carved out by the bits of hard rock which the stream brought into them, the fragments having been raade to journey round and round in a circle, forraing what is often a dome-shaped chamber, widen ing toward its base. Such whirling move ments of water may be observed in a miniature way where a stream from a hydrant falls into a basin. The base of the Niagara cliff is doubt less under-cut in the raanner above described, the graving tools being the hard fragments which fall from its upper parts. As we may behold in the Cave of the Winds, the whirlings of the water-laden air and jets of spray tend somewhat to soften and dissolve the layers of the shale, and thus to bring about that recession of the face which causes the limestone to jut beyond the base of the preci pice. Beneath the level of the stream the vio- 147 THE NIAGARA BOOK. lent swayings of the tormented water, beaten by the strokes of the FaUs, doubtless serve yet raore effectively to erode the soft rocks of the Medina formations. These actions coopera ting with the pot-holing work keep the cHff ever retreating at its base at a little greater rate than at its summit, the limestone capstone falling only when the excavation beneath de nies it effective support. In the above de scribed features Niagara Falls are in no sense peculiar. There are probably within two hun dred miles of their site over fifty cascades which have been engendered and maintained by the same simple conditions of an upper hard layer and lower-lying raore easily worn strata. It should be reraarked, however, that the greater the height down which the plunge of water takes place, and the larger its volume, the more vigorous is the assault upon the base of the cliff through the development of pot hole excavations and the lashing which the troubled waters apply to the rocks. But for the fact that the tide of Niagara, though of vast volume, is perfectly clean, the retreat of the Falls precipice towards Lake Erie would have been far more rapid than under the exist- 148 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. ing conditions. If, in place of the marvellously pure lake water, the turbid stream of the Mis sissippi poured down this steep, the scouring action of the tumult beneath the faU would produce a vast increase of erosion. In these assumed conditions it might weU be that the observer would find some sorry remnant of this great cascade far to the southward of its present position, perhaps within the limits of what is now Lake Erie. The difference in the effect of pure and turbid water, when forced against hard rocks, may be judged by the fact that while a glass window may be washed with a hydrant streara for an indefinite period with out mark of abrasion, a similar stream of very turbid water will in a short time bring about a noticeable scratching of the glass. We are now in a position to understand how it is that the Falls have cut their way back through the great distance which separates them from the Queenston bluff over which the river flowed when it was first raade free to fol low its present course. It is a fine tour of the imagination to conceive how in some day after the ice age, when the country had as sumed the elevation and attitude which re- 149 THE NIAGARA BOOK. quired the development of the second Niagara River, the waters broke over the barrier near Buffalo, sweeping across the gently sloping country to the Queenston cHffs, there plung ing down in what was at first a broken cataract rather than a fall, into the lowlands about On tario, or it raay have been directly into the waters of the lake, then raore elevated than now. Very quickly the undercutting process above described raust have converted the cata ract into a vertical fall. In a few score years the process of retreat of the steep over which the water fell raust have begun the excavation of the great gorge. It may help the reader to conceive the advance of the process to im agine a great auger boring away upon some soft material, the tool while turning being drawn slowly across the surface. In the simili tude, the whirling waters at the base of the cas cade, with their armament of stones, represent the auger, and the wide field of strata which have been carved the material which is bored by the moving tool. For many years geologists, who are ever trying to measure the duration of the past, have endeavored to compute the time which 150 THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT. THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. has elapsed since the excavation of the gorge below Niagara Falls began. It seemed at first Hkely that the time occupied in this great work might be reckoned in a somewhat definite way. Long ago it becarae evident that the Falls were slowly advancing up the river through the undermining of their base and the conse quent crumbling of the overhanging limestone at the foot of the precipice. In 1842 Dr. James Hall made a careful map showing the position of the different parts of the Falls which were referred to raonuraents frora which subsequent surveys could do work that would afford a basis for comparisons. A third of a century later another survey was raade by officers of the U. S. Engineers. In 1886 Mr. R. S. Woodward made yet another careful map of the region. It now appears, however, according to Mr. G. K. Gilbert, that one or more of these delineations is soraewhat in error, for at certain places the outline of the front projects beyond the position indicated by Hall's survey. After a careful consideration of these discrepancies, Mr. Gilbert says: " Nevertheless a critical study, not merely of the bare lines on the chart, but also of the fuller 151 SECTION OF NIAGARA FALLS, SHOWING THE ARRANGEMENT OF HARD AND SOFT STRATA, AND ILLUSTRATING A THEORY OF THE PROCESS OF EROSION. THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. data in the surveyor's notes, leads to the behef that the rate of recession in the central part of the Horse Shoe Fall is approximately deter mined, and that it is somewhere between four feet and six feet per annum. The amount of falling away at the sides of the Horse Shoe is not well determined, but this is of less import ance, for such falHng away affects the width of the gorge rather than its length, and it is the length with which we are concerned." If we could assume that all the cutting of the gorge from the Falls to Queenston had been done since the stage in the retreat of the ice sheet when the river, as we now know it, began to flow, it would seem to be an easy matter to make an approximate computation as to the length of time which had been required to ef fect the task. As yet, however, we must hesi tate to make an assertion, and, foUowing the example of Mr. Gilbert, regard the problem as one which demands a far raore careful study than it has as yet received before a judgment can properly be given. It is in a high degree improbable that the rate of retreat in the last forty years is anywhere near an average of the movement since the excavation of the canon 153 THE NIAGARA BOOK. began. Between the Falls and Queenston the rocks which have been cut through, though of a tolerably uniform nature, have here and there local peculiarities which may have greatly accelerated the rate at which the Falls have worked upstream. The height of the Falls has altered in this moveraent, and it is very probable that the volume of water may have been subjected to considerable changes through the alterations of climate which have attended the passing away of the glacial sheet. In addition to these evident sources of error there are others connected with the irregular tilting movements of this part of the continent which, as before noticed, have perturbed the drainage since the close of the time when the ice-sheet lay over the basin of the St. Law rence. At present it is tolerably safe to reckon the rate of retreat of Niagara Falls at about five hundred feet in a century. The reader may, if he pleases, assume that this is a fair raeasure of the speed with which the cascade has worked back from the Queenston escarpment; but if he makes the computation he should re gard it as amusing rather than instructive 154 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. work. It is evident, however, that in the course of a thousand years the Fall is Hkely to be about a mile nearer Lake Erie than it is at present. It is most probable that long before this planet has dispensed with the presence of man, and before any geological or geographical changes have effaced this land, the question will have to be met whether our successors shall permit the recession of the Falls to bring about the draining of Lake Erie and the ad jacent waters. In the illumination of that time, indeed we may say in the light of our own, it wiU not appear difficult to arrest this natural development by which the recession of the cascade tends to drain away the lake from which its waters flow. New channels can be excavated which will divert the stream to sorae point on the line of the cafion where a fresh field of excavation can be provided for the cataract ; or if it seeras worth whhe, an excava tion can be made beneath the stream at a point above the Falls, and a hard masonry support provided for the Niagara limestone, which, as we have noted, forms the cornice over which the water plunges. 155 THE NIAGARA BOOK. If we may judge the motives of the future by those of the present, the decision as to the eventual fate of Niagara will rest upon eco nomic considerations. Such considerations, indeed, are likely in course of tirae, and that not long, to lead to the utilization of the vast araount of power which now goes to waste at this point. So long as the factory had to be placed near its water-wheel the deraand for the energy of the FaUs was not very insistent. If, however, as seems most likely, electricians de vise means whereby the tide of force made available by this leap of waters can be carried, without too much loss, to points five hundred railes or raore away, we may find New York and Chicago, and a hundred other places, ask ing for a share of the energy which here goes to waste. It is indeed most likely that the ar rest in the southward march of Niagara will be brought about by the diversion of its waters to the turbines which drive dynamos. The foregoing considerations may make it evident to the reader that Niagara Falls should not be viewed as a mere spectacle. They should be taken as majesticnatural phenoraena which throw light on many important chapters 156 THE GEOLOGY OF NIAGARA FALLS. in the history of our continent. It is indeed doubtful if at any other place in the world the mind stimulated by a majestic scene is so naturally led to inquiries full of learned as well as of human interest. 157 THE FLORA AND FAUNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. By David F. Day. The traveller, who seeks for exhibitions of the grander forces of nature, will find his wishes abundantly gratified at Niagara. The fall of the waters of one of the greatest rivers of the world over a precipice of more than one hundred and fifty feet in height, and the con stantly growing record of their power to chan nel through the enduring rock, will prove to him an absorbing, yet perplexing, subject for study. But the tourist, who takes enjoyment in the shadows of a forest, almost unchanged from its natural condition, in the stateliness and symmetry of individual trees planted by the hand of Nature herself, in the beauty and fragrance of raany species of flowers growing without cultivation and in countless numbers, in the ever-varying forms and hues of foliage, and in the continually shifting panorama of 158 Photograph by H. Wilson Saunders. SPRINGTIME AT MAG.VRA. THE FLORA AND FAUNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. the animated creation so near the scenes of human activity and occupation and yet so free from their usual effects, will find upon the bor ders of the river, within its chasm and on the islands which hang upon the brink of the great cataract, an abundant gratification of his taste and an exhaustless field for study. To such a person — to all, in fact, who realize how ennobling it is to the heart of man to be brought at times face to face with Nature, whether in her beauty or her sublimity — it must always be the source of profound satis faction to know that by the wise and liberal policy of the State of New York and the Do minion of Canada so large an area of country contiguous to the river and the Falls has been made a public property, and, placed forever beyond the reach of vandal hands, is now dedi cated, for all timCj to the highest and raost exalted purposes. Although in this volurae a chapter has been devoted to the geology of Niagara, by one abundantly quaHfied for the task, nevertheless, for a proper presentation of the Natural His tory of the Falls and of the region of which it is the centre, a passing glance should here be 159 THE NIAGARA BOOK. bestowed upon the geological record of Goat Island and the river within whose embrace it lies, to bring out raore clearly the relation to it of its Fauna and Flora. For this purpose it is not necessary to explore the measureless periods of time in which the imagination of the geologist is accustomed to range at wiU. It is demonstrable that in a scientific sense the Island itself is of a trifling antiquity. In fact it would be difficult to point out in the western world any considerable tract of land raore re cent in its origin. There is every evidence to believe that the Niagara River has excavated its enorraous chasm since the close of the period known to geologists as the Glacial Age. Whether before the coming on of the Glacial Age the upper lakes were connected or not with Lake On tario (a proposition which seems to be well received in the geological world), it seems very certain that thereafter Lake Erie, Lake Huron and Lake Superior sent their waters to the sea through an outlet which Lake Michigan then had into the Mississippi. A barrier not greater than fifty feet in height would suffice, even to day, to reverse the current of Lake Erie and i6o THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. Lake Huron and compel the discharge of their contents into the Mississippi, either by re opening the old, abandoned channel at the head of Lake Michigan or by forming a new one. The barrier, which was broken down at the time, when in fact the physical history of the Niagara River began, may be pointed out with reasonable certainty to-day. A ridge near the foot of Lake Erie, which at one tirae extended in an eastward and westward course, crossing the present channel of the Niagara River, was that barrier. On either side of the river it attains a height of sixty or seventy feet above the present level of Lake Erie. It is almost unnecessary to say that this barrier was of glacial origin — an immense moraine. From its base, on the northerly side, to the verge of the cliff at Lewiston and Queenston, where the cataract began its work of erosion, the surface of the underlying rock rises steadily. At the summit of the cliff at Lewiston and Queenston, it has an elevation of thirty-two feet above the present level of Lake Erie. It is fair to assume that although the lake (or river), after its irruption through this bar rier, spread widely, yet that the beginning of II l6i THE NIAGARA BOOK. the excavation of the chasm at Lewiston was not long delayed. Along the entire length of the river from Lake Erie to Lewiston and Queenston, the terraces left by the river, as frora tirae to tirae it deepened and narrowed its channel, may be easily recognized. Often they show evidence that they were formed at the bottom of the river before the chasm had been excavated, being very largely composed of water-worn stones and materials, brought and deposited by the river itself from more southerly localities. Goat Island is of this origin. It is in fact a portion of such a terrace. In a single place upon the island there is to be seen a small quantity of clay, possibly deposited by the glacier where it is found, but more likely to have been brought by the current of the river along with the other materials which make up the soil. Mixed with the soil of Goat Island and with that of the river terraces in other places, there may be seen an abundance of the half-decomposed remains of fluviatile and la custrine MoUusca — shell-fish, univale, and bi valve, identical in species with those still liv ing in the lake and river. 162 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. The period which has been employed by the river in the excavation of the chasm below the Falls, has, for more than half a century, been a most interesting study for the geologist. As early as 1841, Sir Charles Lyell, preeminent in his day as a geologist, from such data as he was then able to command, computed the time necessary for the work at no less than 35,000 years. Later geologists have sought, but un successfully, to reduce the period. When, however, the island appeared above the river, substantially as it now is, presents a more diffi cult problem; but that the deposit of the ma terials of which its soil is coraposed, began as soon as the irruption of the river through the moraine, at the foot of Lake Erie, was accom pUshed, can scarcely be doubted. That 35,- 000 years have passed since the shells found on the island and in the terraces on either side of the river were deposited, and that no spe cific difference is to be discovered between thera and their existing representatives and progeny, are facts full of interest to the evolu tionist. A calcareous soil, enriched with an abund ance of organic raatter, like that of Goat Isl- 163 THE NIAGARA BOOK. and, would necessarily be one of great fertihty. For the growth and sustentation of a forest, and of such plants as prefer the woods to the openings, it would far excel the deep and ex haustless alluviums oi the Prairie States. For the presenation of so large a part of the native vegetation of the island we must be thankful to the pohcy of its former owners, who, through so many years, kept it mainly in the condition in which Nature left it. To the naturalist, the hand of cultivation is often the hand of devastation. It has happily been spared, to a large extent, the ravage of the axe and plough, and from the still more com plete spohation which comes from the pas turage of horses and cattle. It would be very difficult to find within another territor}-. so re stricted in its Hmits, so great a diversity oi trees and shrubs — stdl more difficult to find, in so small an area, such examples of aboreal sj-mmetr}- and perfection as the island has to exhibit. From the geological histon.- of the island, as has thus been told, it would be inferred that it had received its Flora from the mainland. This, no doubt, is true. In fact the botanist is 164 THE FLORA A\D FAIN A OF NIAGARA FALLS. unable to point out a single instance of tree, or shrub, or herb, now growing upon the isl and, not also to be found upon the mainland. But, as has been remarked, the distinguishing characteristic of its Flora is not the posses sion of any plant elsewhere unknown, but the abundance of individuals and species which the island displays. There are to be found in Western New York about one hundred and seventy species of trees and shrubs. Goat Island and the immediate vicinity of the river near the Falls can show of these no less than one hundred and forty. Of our trees producing conspicuous flowers, such as the Cucumber-tree (Magnolia acumi nata) and the Tulip-tree (Liriodendron tulipi- fera), there are but few specimens in the vicin ity of the Falls. Abbe Provancher found the forraer growing at or near Clifton, and one magnificent specimen of the latter may be pointed out on Goat Island. In the reforesta tion of the denuded portions of the island, due observance to the planting of these beautiful Araerican trees should be had. Four Maples are represented upon the isl and: Acer saccharinum, A. rubrum, A. dasy- 165 THE NIAGARA BOOK. carpum and A. spicatum. The first of these, the Sugar-maple, is perhaps the most abund ant tree upon the island. Five species of Sumach (Rhus) grow upon the island or along the margin of the river. Our native Plum (Prunus Americana) and two Cherries (Pru- nus Virginiana and P. serotina) belong either to the island or the mainland, the latter, the Black-cherry of the lumberman, attaining upon the island a wonderful development. Near the gorge of the river, on either side, but not upon the island, the Crab-apple (Pyrus coronaria) abounds, diffusing in the early days of June its unequalled fragrance upon the air. Three species of Thorn (Crataegus coccinea, C. tomentosa and C. Crus-galli) are to be met with upon Goat Island, adding in May and June no small part to the floral magnificence of the season. Six species of Cornel, includ ing the flowering Dog-wood (Cornus Aorida); two Elders (Sambucus Canadensis and S. pu- bens) and six Viburnums (V. Opulus, V. aceri- folium, V. pubescens, V. dentatum, V. nudum, and V. Lentogo), either on the island or the mainland, contribute greatly, in the spring and i66 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. summer months, to enlarge and diversify the display. To find the Sassafras one must go down along the river as far as the Whirlpool. He will there meet with it, but not in profusion, on either side of the river. Our other native laurel, the Spice-wood (Lindera Pension), is to be found handsomely represented on Goat Island. Two species of Ash, the white and black (Fraximus Americana and F. sambucifolia), are among the trees of the island, and are to be met elsewhere in abundance. The only species of Linden or Bass-wood, which belongs to the vicinity, is the familiar one, Tilia Americana. It is plentiful upon the island, and of extraordinary size and beauty. Of nut-producing trees the following occur : The Butternut (Juglans cinerea), the Black walnut (/. nigra), the white Hickory (Cary a alba), the hairy Hickory (C. tomentosa), the pig-nut Hickory (C. porcina) and the bitter Hickory (C. amara), the Beech (Fagus ferru- ginea), the Chestnut (Castanea vidgaris), the white Oak (Quercus alba), the post Oak (Q. obtusiloba), the Chestnut-oak (Q. Muhlenbergii), 167 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the Bur-oak (Q. macrocarpa), the dwarf Chest nut-oak (Q. prinoides), the red Oak (Q. rubra), the scarlet Oak (Q. coccinea), the Quercitron- oak (Q. tinctoria), and the Pin-oak (Q. palus- tris). Two species of Elm (Ulmus Americana and U. fulva), three Birches (Betula lenta, B. lutea and B. papyracea), one Alder (Alnus incana), six native Willows (Salix nigra, S. lucida, S. discolor, S. rostrata, S.petiolaris and 5". cor data), and four Poplars (Populus tremuloides, P. grandidentata, P. monolifera and P. balsamifera V. candicans), are embraced within the Sylva of Niagara. Of the cone-bearing family the number of species is not as great as might be expected. They are only six, distributed in five genera, as follows : The White-cedar (Thuja occidentalis), the most abundant of the evergreens at Niagara; the Red-cedar (Juniperus Virginiana), unfortu nately disappearing; the Juniper (J. communis), the American Yew or Ground-hemlock (Taxus baccata v. Canadensis), the White-pine (Pinus Strobus), and the common Hemlock-spruce (Tsuga Canadensis). The two last named spe- 168 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. cies are not as plentiful upon the island as their beauty demands. They should be at once, and largely, replanted. Of the herbs, producing showy flowers, which are to be found upon the island, the fol lowing may be raentioned, which by their profusion as well as beauty, raake it in spring- tirae and early summer a natural flower- garden, wild indeed, but wonderfully beauti ful: Our two Liverworts or Squirrel-cups (He- patica acutiloba and H. triloba), scarcely distin guishable from one another, except by the leaf, but of an infinite variety of color. The dioecious Meadow Rue (Thalictrum dioicum), raore noticeable because of the pecu liar beauty of its foliage than its conspicuous- ness of flower — it is as graceful as a fern. The wild Colurabine (Aquilegia Canadensis), to be found on the island, yet raore abundantly along the chasra, where it displays its elegant blossoms of scarlet and gold, far beyond the reach of the most venturesome. The May Apple (Podophyllum peltatum), a plant singular both in flower and leaf, but beautiful and always arresting attention. l6g THE NIAGARA BOOK. The Blood-root (Sanguinaria Canadensis), a plant lifting up its large, clear white flower and its solitary leaf in the early days of spring. Squirrel-corn and Dutchman's breeches (DiclytraCanadensis and D.cucullaria). Strange plants, but of great gracefulness and beauty. Abundant on the island early in May; the forraer species, rich with the odor of hyacinths. Of the spring-flowering Cruciferce to be found upon the island, the following deserve to be mentioned as notable for their abundance and beauty: The Crinkle-root (Dentaria di- phylla), the Spring-cress (Cardamine. rhom- boidea, v. purpurea), and the Rock-cress (/irato lyrata). As many as four violets abound upon the island and its vicinity, adding their charms to the beauty of the month of May — Viola cucul- lata, V. rostrata, V. pubescens, and V. Canaden sis, the last, remarkable among the Araerican species, for its fragrance as well as graceful ness. The Spring-beauty (Claytonia Caroliniana), the large, native Cranesbill (Geranium macula- tum), the Virginian Saxifrage (Saxifraga Vir- giniensis), the two Mitre-worts (Tiarella cordi- 170 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. folia and Mitella diphylla), the spreading Phlox (P. divaricata), the creeping Greek Valerian (Polemonium reptans), now rather rare; the American Dog-tooth, Violet, or Adder's- tongue (Erythronium Americanum), the large- flowered Bell-wort (Uvularia grandiflora), the Indian Turnip (Ariswma triphylla), and the two Trilliums (T. grandiUorum and T. erectum), add largely to the spring contingent of attractive and conspicuous plants. Later in the season, one may find the shrubby St. John's Wort (Hypericum Kalmia- num), and one of the most graceful species of Lobelia (L. Kalmii), each rejoicing in a damp situation, and each, quite probably, discovered at the Falls, by Bishop Kalm, nearly a century and a half ago, and introduced by him from that locality to the notice of the botanical world. The name of the discoverer of these interesting plants is worthily commeraorated in those which the great Linnaeus bestowed upon them. The summer time brings forward many at tractive forras — the Grass of Parnassus (Par- nassia Caroliniana), the Painted-Cup (Castilleia coccinea), an occasional Hly, an orchid or two, 171 THE NIAGARA BOOK. but of no great beauty, the Hare-bell (Cam panula rotundifolia), and a large array of an nuals. Nor is the autumnal Flora of Goat Island uninteresting. Golden-rods (Solidago sp.). Sun-flowers (Helianthus sp.). Star-flowers (Aster sp.), the Downy Thistle (Cnicus dis color), and, at last, the triumph of October and of the dying year, the shorn Gentian (Gentiana detonsa), its graceful blossoms as blue as the suramer skies. In the region of the FaUs, but not upon Goat Island itself, sorae plants of great beauty have been detected. Below the Whirlpool, two species of Bluets or Innocence (Houstonia cccrulea and H. purpurea) are to be observed, the rare Liatris cylindracea, Apocynum andro- sccmifolium, the orange-colored Milkweed (Asclepias tuaerosa), the Fire-lily (Lilium Phila- delphicum), the large, yellow Lady's Slipper (Cypripedium pubescens), the beautiful, low- growing Morning Glory (Convolvulus spitha- mcBUs), and wild Roses, as fragrant as beautiful. The ferns of Goat Island and the region of the Falls are nuraerous. Among them may be mentioned: The Ostrich-fern (Onoclea 172 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. Stnithiopteris), the Sensitive-fern (0. sensiblis), the Royal-fern (Osmunda regalis), the Inter rupted-fern (0. intcrrupta), the Cinnamon-fern (0. cinnamoinca), the Bladder-fern (Cystopteris bidbifcra), Shield-ferns of various species (As- pidium Noveboracense, A. Thelyptcris, A. spinu- losmn, A. cristatiim, A.Goldianum,A.marginale, A. Lonchitis), and the Christmas-fern (A.achro- .j^icAoicfe.?); the Beech-fern (Phegopteris Dryop- teris), only found at the Devil's Hole; the Walking-fern (Camptosorus rhyzophyllus), four Spleen-worts (Asplenium Trichomanes, A. ebe- w^Mw, abundant at Lewiston, A. achrostichoides, and A. Filix- fcemina), scarcely to be excelled in grace by any species; two Cliff-brakes (Pel- Icca gracilis and P. atropurpurea), the Common- brake, world-wide in its distribution (Pteris aquilina); the American Maiden-hair (Adian- titm pedatum), and the common Polypody (Poly podium vulgare), peering, in many places, over the edge of the chasm into the depths below. Of the Fauna of Niagara very much cannot be said. All the larger Mammalia, which abounded in the region whilst it was still the possession of the red man, have long since dis- 173 THE NIAGARA BOOK. appeared. It seems almost as though they could never have resorted, habitually, to Goat Island. The access to it of the elk, the red deer, the bear, the panther, the lynx, the fox, and the wolf, common enough in the neigh borhood, must always have been difficult, and their return to the mainland almost impossible. At the present time the quadrupeds inhabit ing the island are probably only three, the Black-squirrel, the Red-squirrel, and the Striper-squirrel or Chipmunk. These may be seen, almost any spring or summer day, dis porting themselves, without regard to the presence of man, in their leafy coverts. The birds affecting the island and the gorge are not to be distinguished, in species, from those of the mainland. But, as would be ex pected, environment makes some species rare and others plentiful. The Robin (Turdus migratorious), the Oriole (Icterus Baltimore), the Blue-bird (Sialia Wilsonii), and the Gold finch (Carduelis tristis), find so much of their food supply in door yards and cultivated land, that they are to be seen less frequently upon the island, or within the gorge, than elsewhere in the neighborhood. On the other hand, 174 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. birds of the deep and silent woods, Hke the Vireos, Wilson's Thrush (Turdus fuscescens), the Wood-thrush (Turdus mustelinus), and the Cat-bird (Mimus Carolinensis), are alraost al ways to be seen and heard in the vicinity of the Falls or river. Birds of the crow family, such as the com mon Crow, the Purple Crackle, and the Blue- jay were probably, at one tirae, plentiful; but they are now rarely seen, except as they are passing over from one side of the river to the other. Our common hawks may be included in the same remark. Summer or winter, nuraerous gulls raay be seen hovering over the river, between its high banks, below the Falls. Late in the autumn, after other birds have taken their flight in the thick spray of the Red-cedars, great flocks of Cedar-birds (Am- phelis cedrorum) are to be noticed, feeding so cially upon the plentiful sweet berries of the tree. Probably they reraain until the supply of food is exhausted. The Bald-headed Eagle (Halicetus leucoce- phalus) was once a frequenter of the region of the cataract, but is now seldom seen. Prob- 175 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ably he has learned to be wary and not un necessarily to expose himself to the aim of the collecting naturalist. But, however that may be, without doubt the waters below the Falls were once a favorite resort to him. He was a devourer of fish, and, although powerful of claw and pinion, he did not disdain to save his strength by feeding upon such as had been killed or stunned in their passage over the Falls. Of the birds of our region, which seem to fear the presence of man, and therefore retire to the unfrequented woods, it may be said that they are really plentiful in the shady nooks and recesses with which the gorge of the river abounds. The naturalist who would wish to make them a study, can do so satisfactorily, if he will but enter the woods at the Whirlpool or at Foster's Flat and patiently and quietly await their appearance. It is hardly possible that such a retiring species as the Indigo-bird (Cyanospiza cyanea) will fail to reward his watchfulness, or that a Scarlet Tanager (Py- ranga rubra) will not soon flash like a meteor before his eyes. Likely enough the King fisher (^Ceryle Alcyon) will leave his silent perch 176 THE FLORA AND FAVNA OF NIAGARA FALLS. and with a harsh cry dart down upon his scaly prey. Here, where the thick leaves make a twUight, even at midday, the attentive, ear of the student of our birds will listen, with de light, to the bell-like notes of the Wood-thrush or the sweet cadences of the Cat-bird's real song. 177 THE UTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. By Coleman Sellers, E.D., Sc.D., etc If, when contemplating the grandeur of the Cataract of Niagara, we consider for a moment the energy represented by the enormous body of water as it faUs into the gorge below, the question naturally suggests itself what this force must be, measured by the standards with which we are familiar, or, in other words, what would be the actual power of the Falls if all of the water pas.sing from it could be utilized. One computation places this total power at an amount so great that the world's entire daily output of coal would be barely sufficient as fuel to generate steam for operating puraps capable of returning to the level of the upper rapids the water which is discharged over the Falls into the lower river. The difference in level between the still waters above the upper rapids in the river and the gorge below is 178 THE GORGE ROAD. Photogftaphs by Arnold. THE GORGE NEAR LEWISTON. THE UTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. about 21 6 feet, and knowing this we could esti mate the power of the Falls could we but de termine accurately the amount of water which passes over it in any given time. To be sure, such measurements have been made, but as they were based on the mean velocity of the stream under ordinary conditions they are not altogether reliable, as the velocity is known to vary considerably, and is even materially af fected by the direction and force of the wind. To arrive at any approximately correct esti mate, therefore, the measurement should ex tend over a very considerable period of time, in order to erabrace all of the variations in the velocity and volume of the water passing down the river at any given point, but from the data now available the total energy that the Falls may be assumed to represent has been esti mated as about five million horse-power. We have long been in the habit of associat ing Niagara Falls with its attractions as a pleasure resort, and as one of the world's won ders, but from early times its power has been utilized, to a Umited extent to be sure, and in dustries have existed along the rapids above the FaUs certainly as early as 1725, when a 179 THE NIAGARA BOOK. sawmill was in use cutting tiraber for Fort Ni agara. These early raills were located on the river bank at points where the greatest fall or head of water could be obtained, the water being led to the wheels by a race from a con venient point up stream, and then carried off when used by the most direct course again to the river. This is a raethod coraraonly em ployed in utilizing the flow of strearas wher ever artificial or natural conditions perrait the development of power by means of falling water. Therefore, in 1847, when Mr. Augustus Porter, who owned most of the land now oc cupied by the city of Niagara Falls, outlined a plan upon which the so-called hydraulic power canal was projected, he adopted this recog nized method as conforming to the best prac tice at the tirae, and planned to carry the water frora above the upper rapids to the edge of the gorge below the Falls, to be utilized by raiUs located at that point. A corapany now known as the Niagara Falls Hydraulic Power and Manufacturing Company was organized, and, while the canal was virtually finished in 1861, it remained unused until 1870, when Mr. Charles B. Gaskell built a small flouring mill 180 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. on the site of the well-known group of larger buildings which have since formed a conspicu ous feature of the gorge below the State Res ervation. The canal when first opened was but 36 feet in width and 10 feet in depth from the surface of the water. In addition to the grant giving a right of way 100 feet wide through what is now a populous portion of the city, property was obtained amounting to about 75 acres, with a frontage of nearly a raile on the high bluff overlooking the river below the Falls. Here the forebay or distributing basin was located at a level of about 214 feet above the surface of the lower river, and frora this point the canal extends 4,400 feet in length across the town to its intake at the upper river just above the rapids leading to the American Falls. Of late years the canal has been enlarged at its upper end to the full limit of the right of way, and this improvement is being extended over as much of its length as can be widened under existing conditions. In addition to the mills on the high bank of the gorge, a power house has been erected at 181 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the lower river's edge to take advantage of the fall from the surface of the canal above, and. the present and prospective power avaUable is estimated as follows, according to a recent publication : By electrical transmission . . . 19,037 H.-P. By mechanical transmission . . . 360 " By hydraulic power used by five tenants . 7,000 " Total 26,397 " Many years ago when the late Thomas Evershed was a division engineer of the State of New York, he advocated a plan for the de velopment of power at Niagara Falls in which ' it was proposed to utilize a tunnel as a tail race to carry off both water and sewage, a plant to be constructed by a corporation organized to furnish power to manufacturing industries lo cated on the level land east of the city, a mile above the Falls. Interest having been re!Vived in this method of utilizing the power of the FaUs, about the year 1889 prominent capitalists became iden tified with a plan of development which con templated placing the water wheels and tur bines in pits to be supplied by short canals and 182 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. connected with a tunnel tail race and looking to the estabhshment of an industrial centre such as at Lowell, Fall River, Holyoke, and other placeswhere power development is under the control of power companies. Prior to this time the state of the arts and industries had not created a sufficient demand' for water power to warrant undertaking the develop ment at Niagara Falls on a scale beyond what had been already attempted, nor was it until ^the last decades of the 19th century that ira proveraents in the generation and transrais- sion of electricity gave any marked encourage- riient to its use in this connection. To under stand the value of the Evershed raethod of utilizing water power, it raust be remembered that in the case of a long surface canal or head race, a hydraulic slope must be secured in order to establish a current of the required velocity. If such a canal, discharging into a forebay or reservoir at its lower end, is not provided with means for regulating the amount of water passing through it, the con stant flow due to the hydraulic slope, if not fully utUized by the wheels, must overflow at the sluice way or weirs. This involves a waste 183 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of water and power beyond what is utihzed at the wheels, equal to that which is overflowing at the weir. When, however, there is but a short surface canal requiring no overflow and used in connection with a tunnel tail race, the only flow of water into the tunnel is that actu ally required by the wheel for the development of the power being used. Proceeding on the Hnes of the plan above indicated, it was proposed, in reviving the Evershed scheme, to establish a central station to generate electric power for transmission to a distance, around which would cluster indus tries, each of which would be provided with its own hydrauHc power plant supphed from short canals, and discharging the water from the wheels into a comraon tail race tunnel. To carry out the purposes of this enterprise the Cataract Construction Company was organ ized to undertake the work of construction for the Niagara Falls Power Company, which then had a charter, franchises, and options on two hundred acres of real estate. Cooperat ing with these companies, the Niagara Devel opment Company, the Niagara Junction RaU- way, and the Niagara Falls Water Works 184 THE UTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. Company were organized, and these aUied in terests secured land controlUng a river front of over two and a half miles, and with railroad coraraunication with the several Trunk Lines passing through the city. The first work of importance was the con struction of the tunnel, which has a total length of a little over one and a quarter miles, and ex tends in a direct Hne from the north end of the power house, located between Buffalo Avenue and the river above the upper rapids, and passes under the Hydraulic Canal and the business portion of the city of Niagara FaUs without affecting any portion of the ground or the thickly built-up section of the city over it. The upper end of the tunnel is 150 feet . or more below the inlet canal at the power house, and from this it slopes gradually in its course toward the long river, where its portal may be seen at the water's edge a short dis tance below the new steel arch bridge and ad jacent to the Government Reservation. The cross-section of this tunnel is of horseshoe form and the tunnel is lined with brick, the sides and roof being of hard brick, while the floor or invert is paved with vitrified brick of such 185 THE NIAGARA BOOK. hardness that the sand blast test to which the material was subjected gave no evidence of abrasion. While the direction of the tunnel is in a straight line throughout its entire length, its slope is not wholly uniform, being at the rate of 4 feet per 1,000 at the upper end, the lower half sloping approximately at the rate of 7 feet to the 1,000 toward the portal, where for some few hundred feet the floor slopes stiU more rapidly, and is plated on the bottom and side with steel, forming a wave like curve that brings the extreme end a num ber of feet below the main water level of the river. The back water standing in the tunnel thus presents a water cushion to the outgoing streara as it leaves the tunnel and passes the open cut beyond the portal. This hydraulic gradient necessarily reduces the head other wise due to the difference of level 216 feet be tween the surface of the river above the upper rapids and the water in the gorge below the Falls. The sacrifice thus raade is, however, unavoidable, as the slope is needed to obtain sufficient velocity to carry away frora the tur bines the water required to develop 100,000 horse-power through a tunnel of Hmited cross- 186 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. section. The nature of the rock through which the tunnel was driven made it necessary during the process of construction to support the roof and sides of the walls by strong timbers, which are replaced by the final lining of brick, forra ing an arch of such thickness as to insure ample stability. During the progress of the work careful supervision of the hydraulic ce ment used resulted in a structure in which the joints are as strong or stronger than the bricks of superior quality used in the lining. This was proven whenever it became necessary to cut through the walls to make lateral connec tions, the hard brick yielding more readily than the cement. The tunnel has been in con stant use since 1895, and upon examination no sign of deterioration has been discovered. Nature, it seems, has assisted in the task of preservation, as the brick waUs are found to be covered with a thin coating of vegetable growth which even the high velocity of the water seems unable to disturb, and which, therefore, acts as an additional protection to the brick work. On its land at the upper end of the tunnel the Niagara Falls Power Company has located 187 THE NIAGARA BOOK. its great power plant. Here the short inlet canal is 200 feet in width, extending inland from the river a distance of 1,200 feet, and de creasing in width to 120 feet at its upper end, where it is bridged by a stone structure lead ing from the office end of the power house to the building containing the electric trans formers. By this canal the water is carried into the power house by short entrance chan nels each 14 feet wide and 17 feet in depth, which lead to the steel penstocks that feed the water to the turbines located in the wheelpit below the power house floor. These entrance channels are placed at intervals of 40 feet from centre to centre along the east wall of the power house, and in them are cased the steel sluice gates by which the admission of the water is controlled. The power house itself is a massive structure, built of stone to harmon ize with the masonry of the canal, and the walls inside of the building are faced with white enamel brick. The steel roof-trusses that span the whole room are over 60 feet in width, and rest upon steel columns which extend beyond the face of the walls to carry the runway gird ers of an electric travelling crane of about 50 188 POWER HOUSE — EXTERIOR. POWER HOUSE — INTERIOR. THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. tons capacity, which commands the entire power house floor. The north end of the power house is extended in width to the edge of the canal, and in the east wing thus formed, various offices of the company, occupying four floors, are situated, and are accessible on the ground floor by a doorway to the left of the high arched portal which forms the main en trance to the building. The entrance was so proportioned that during the work of con struction loaded cars could pass through it into the main room of the power house, where the materials were unloaded and handled by the travelling crane. Over this main door way the arch-stones radiate to the ceiling of the vestibule, beneath which they are inter sected by sculptured stone work representing the seal of the company. This seal, designed by Frederick Macmonnies, the American sculptor, represents the Indian Chief Ni-a- ga-ra, standing in his canoe, paddle in hand, in the act of shooting the rapids. Around the border are represented the Muscalonge, the Kingfish of the Niagara River, alternating with arrow heads and one of the fossil shells of the Niagara group. 189 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Through the office door at the left of the entrance, visitors have access by a flight of stairs to a platform at the level of the second story, from which a second short flight of steps leads to a bridge that crosses the main room of the power station. From this bridge a view can be obtained of the electric generators and machinery which occupy the ground floor of the building. The generators now instaUed are ten in number, and are remarkable for their simplicity as well as for the enormous power they are capable of developing. The rotating parts of each consist of 87,000 pounds of metal, which revolves at the rate of 250 revo lutions per minute, suggesting, perhaps, a huge spinning top. They deliver a bi-phase al ternating current of 2,200 volts' pressure to the bus bars enclosed within the two enam- elled-brick structures which support the plat forms upon which are placed the various in struments and devices for controlling and raeasuring the current, and which correspond to the usual switchboards of a power station. Frora these bus bars the current is carried by cables led in subways beneath the floor of the power house, extending under the bridge upon 190 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. which the visitor stands, and thence out of the building across the canal by a bridge to the transformer house on the opposite side, from which the current is distributed at whatever pressure is required by the various consumers. Near each of the dynaraos or generators in the power house (which, by the way, are tech nically termed " alternators," to distinguish them from direct current generators) may be seen the governing mechanism required to regulate their speed, which has to be main tained with great uniformity. The revolving part of each generator is connected by means of a vertical steel shaft to the turbines, which are located in the wheelpit at a depth of about 141 feet below the level of the water in the sur face canal. Each turbine consists of a pair of wheels set about 10 feet apart, one above the other, at each end of a raassive cast-iron " wheel case " which is supported by the side walls of the wheelpit, which, at this point, is 16 feet in width. As before mentioned, the water is carried to the turbines by means of steel tubes or penstocks of 7 feet 6 inches in diam eter, which, when filled, contain a column of water weighing over 400,000 pounds, sup- 191 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ported, as are the turbines and wheel case, by the walls. The speed of the turbines is regu lated by means of metal ring-gates, raised and lowered by the governing mechanism, and their position determines the amount of water discharged, permitting but a slight leakage when entirely closed. So little friction is there in the bearings of the massive shafts connect ing the water wheels with the generators above, that when the ring-gates are closed, and the shght leakage past them constitutes the only power, the rotating speed, though reduced, will be maintained at from 50 to 90 revolutions per minute, and the raachinery raust be brought to rest by a powerful brake, which, in turn, can only be reheved by shutting off the water at the raain sluice gates and al lowing the penstocks to be emptied. This practically frictionless condition is due to a peculiar feature of the turbines, the upper wheel in each unit being acted upon from be low by the pressure of the water in the wheel case, and the arrangement such that the total weight of the revolving parts, including tur bine shaft and rotating parts of the generator, is supported on a cushion of water. One sec- 192 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. tion of the shaft is provided with rings which fit into grooves in the bearing, after the man ner of the thrust-bearing system of steamship propeller shafts, but these rings have to resist a pressure of only 3,000 pounds up or down, according to the amount of work being done and the condition of the water cushion which carries the load when the machinery is in operation. As a crowning example of what can be done by way of diminishing the friction in the verti cal shaft transmission, it may be of interest to note here that the seventh generator as seen from the bridge in the power house has lately been provided with an oil thrust-bearing which is fed by puraps capable of delivering oil to it under a pressure of 400 pounds to the square inch. This oil thrust is of novel and original design, and suppleraents the collar thrust-bearing referred to, and has been intro duced experimentally to take the place of the water cushion in event of passages to the upper turbine being obstructed, as by ice, in such a raanner as to decrease the balancing pressure. In testing this device the turbine was revolved by electricity, using its dynamo as a motor 13 193 THE NIAGARA BOOK. with its penstock empty, under which condi tion it was found that the bearing operated with perfect satisfaction while supporting a ro tating load of 148,500 pounds. Furthermore, when the speed had been reduced to 90 revo lutions per minute, ready for the application of the brake, and the main sluice gates en tirely closed so that no power was applied to the rotating mass, the bearing was so entirely frictionless that fuUy 51 minutes elapsed be fore the enormous rotating raSss came to in entire rest. This experiment also shows the utility of the field ring of the dynamo when acting as a fly wheel to steady the motion of the machine, and the inertia of the revolving mass is so great that it requires appreciable time for any change in the load to effect a change in the speed, thereby affording the governor the necessary time to cut off or in crease the water supply, and thus keep the speed of the generator constant. Between the fifth and sixth generators in the power house can be seen four direct-cur rent dynamos, each of which is operated by an independent turbine of the so-caUed Francis type. These generators supply current to the 194 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. rotating field magnets of the large alternators, and they also supply to the various electric motors used throughout the building, such as the travelling crane, the ten sluice gates and the many pumps for oU, air, and water. These motors are also connected to the switchboard that they may be operated by direct current furnished by the exciters, or by transformed current, through rotary transformers, from the main alternators. At the north end of the power house are three machines which have the appearance of electric raotors or gener ators, each with its horizontal axis and arraa- ture enclosed by stationary field magnets. These machines are controUed by a switch board and are the rotary transformers above referred to. They constitute one of the im portant iraproveraents made since the com pany first decided to adopt the alternating cur rent systera of generation and transmission, and from their collector rings and brushes four cables are laid from the static transforraers lo cated in the roora below them by which the bi phase alternating current is conveyed to the armature at the required voltage. On the opposite end of the arraature are other com- 195 THE NIAGARA BOOK. mutators and brushes, by means of which a direct current of 550 volts is delivered to the pole system of the Niagara FaUs terminus of the troUey road leading to Buffalo and to other places on the line. Two of these small machines represent the steam engine and dy namo outfit which, with the requisite boiler plant, would be required to do the same work in generating power by direct current of low pressure, and the contrast between steam- driven electric installation and the direct de livery of electricity from Niagara Falls might have been seen to advantage when, in the large power house of the railway to Buffalo, three rotary transforraers were set up in a corner to take the place of the many boilers, engines, and dynamos, which, since then, have stood unused. Reference has already been made to the brick structures in the power house which cor respond with the usual switchboard equipment of electric plants, and on which are placed the various instruments required by the attend ants to regulate the current controUing the dy namos and the current being generated. On these elevated platforms can be seen a number 196 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. of stands or cabinets, the larger of which are equipped with the instruments pertaining to each of the dynamos and the exciters. The smaUer stands, on which are electric lamps, support the levers which operate the current breakers of the main circuits, the lights indica ting when the current has been established. The switches or circuit breakers theraselves are operated by corapressed air, and are situ ated in the brick enclosure below the platform, where they can be seen through the glass doors that extend along one side of the struc ture. All of the recording instruments are located in the electrician's office at the north end of the building, where the main conduc tors pass out and across the canal to the trans former house on the opposite side. A passenger elevator located near the fifth and sixth large generators gives access to the ten iron floors or platforms in the wheelpit, the lowest of which is 132 feet below the power house floor. The first platform iraraediately below the raain floor is termed the " thrust- bearing deck," being at the level of the shaft bearing before mentioned that takes the end thrust of the rotating parts of the machinery. 197 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Here also can be seen the driving mechanism of the governors, and some of the massive levers that operate the ring gates of the tur bines as well as the neatly arranged system of iron and brass pipe conductors for the water and oil supply, and through open hatchways at this level one can see and appreciate the enorraous depth of the underground works, the huge penstocks and the rotating shafts transraitting power to the turbines. Since completing the work beyond the three units instaUed prior to 1895, the entire length of the pit has been lined with brick, and all the vari ous gangways and platforms constructed of iron and steel. The pit is lighted throughout by electricity, and being dry and kept scrupu lously clean, the interesting features of the work below the power house floor may be seen to advantage and with comfort, as com pared with the condition that existed during the early years of its use, when streams of water from underground springs jetted from the rock walls. These springs still exist, but their discharge is carried off by a perfect sys tem of drainage back of the brick walls that form, the lining. On the lowest deck may be 198 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. seen through a small trap-door the torrent of water which pours from the turbines, which are quite hidden by the spray that glistens in the light of the electric lamps. After the corapletion of the power house to its full capacity the line of the Junction Rail way was so changed as to make it advisable to bring its tracks into the south end of the build ing in order to admit the cars which deliver the lubricating oil required for the machinery, which is placed in tanks below the power house floor. From these stationary oil tanks of 5,000 gallons capacity the oil can be fed through a meter, by which it is measured, to the shaft bearings in the wheelpit, as it may be required to replace the slight loss in oil inci dent to the perfect automatic lubricating sys tem. The oil is lifted by puraps to an over head reservoir near the roof of the power house, from which height the various bearings are supplied by gravity, and after use the oil passes to the filtering or recuperating plant in the wheelpit, to be returned in good condition to the overhead source of supply. On the opposite side of the inlet canal stands the transformer house, the building con- 199 THE NIAGARA BOOK. structed of stone similar to that used in the other works, and in this building are located all of the large step-up transformers, which serve two purposes. First, to raise the pres sure or voltage of the current from 2,200 volts to 11,000 or 22,000 volts as may be required, and secondly, to convert the bi-phase current generated by the dynamos into a tri-phase sys tem, thus enabling three conductors of equal size to carry to a distance the same araount of electricity as four similar cables would do in the case of the bi-phase system. Four cables lead to each transformer, but three only are used in each of the several pole lines to Buffalo and to other points, including sorae of the near by industrial establishraents. Frora the trans- forraer house a tunnel or conduit is extended through which the cables conveying current to local consuraers are carried, and frora this conduit the branches extend to the plants of the several consuraers by an underground systera sirailar to that eraployed in large cities. Between the power house and the mouth of the inlet canal stands a building containing the filtering plant for the water supply of the city of Niagara FaUs. The pumps used for Hfting THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. the water from the canal to the filtering tanks are electrically driven, and the tanks are fitted with appliances which permit the daily clean ing of the filtering bed within them. The tanks are arranged in rows, and in each the water, as it coraes frora the river, can be seen pouring over a shield and flowing over the bed of sand through which it passes to a reservoir below. Frora this reservoir pipes convey the water to the wheelpit under the power house, where, in charabers excavated in the sohd rock, arched and Hned with brick, are powerful Riedler pumps actuated by impulse wheels of the Pelton type. The water by raeans of this machinery is pumped directly into the city mains at 60 pounds per square inch pressure for house domestic use, but in case of fire the pressure is raised to 120 pounds per square inch. The fire department of the city can therefore dispense with engines and fight the fires direct by hose only frora the plugs in the street, the pressure being about the sarae as that obtained by the raodern steam fire en gines. A stand pipe on the hill north of the city serves to regulate the pressure so far as the water supply for domestic use is concerned. THE NIAGARA BOOK. and an automatic valve arrangement cuts off the stand-pipe to prevent overflow when the pressure is raised for fire purposes. Visitors having access to the power house floor can obtain a fine view of the canal and the various buildings frora a wide paved space between the power house and the canal wall. They can also see the long rack extending the entire length of the building in front of the in lets or channels that lead the water to the re spective turbines. At the river end of the canal is a wooden boom to prevent logs and other large drifting matter from entering the waterways, the racks above alluded to serving to arrest the grass and other small floating matter that might otherwise enter the pen stocks. The river bed at the mouth of the canal has been deepened by dredging, and a broad stone causeway starting from the mainland irarae diately above this point crosses to Grass Isl and, which is thus rendered accessible for future improvement. From this great central station now finished and in full operation, over 50,000 electrical horse-power is being utilized in establishments 202 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. at Niagara Falls, Buffalo, Tonawanda, Lock- port and on the trolley hne between Niagara Falls and these neighboring comraunities. Electric power frora this station operates all the street car lines and supplies all the munici pal fighting in the city of Buffalo, distant twenty-six miles, and the Pan-American Ex position of 1 90 1, to be held in that city, will be Hghted and much of its machinery operated from this same central station at Niagara Falls. A large part of this 50,000 electrical horse power is used at Niagara FaUs by twenty ten ants, on the power corapany's lands, for the raanufacture, by electrolytic and electro chemical processes, of various metals and cheraicals, and the corapany, in addition to furnishing this electrical horse-power, supplies 8,000 hydrauHc power for the operation of the International Paper Corapany, its first power tenant in point of use of power. The beginning of the 20th century finds the work well advanced toward a further exten sion of the systera, already less than ten years old, and a new wheelpit to accommodate eleven additional turbines is being constructed on the east side of the inlet canal opposite the 203 THE NIAGARA BOOK. present central station, but located nearer the river. The general architectural features of the power house to be erected wiU be in har mony with the existing buddings, but will pro vide more commodious offices and will be of improved fireproof construction throughout. The machinery will embody the latest im provements known and suggested by the five years of experience with the present installa tion, that has proved so successful and eco nomical in the development of power at Niag ara Falls, and the best effort of those who have cooperated in developing the engineering fea tures of the present plan is being brought to bear upon the improvements in contempla tion. Those who are familiar with the sur roundings of Niagara Falls in the past cannot but be irapressed by the iraproveraents which have followed this great water-power develop ment. Outside of the natural attractions of the Falls, framed in their beautiful setting of lands forever reserved as a park on both sides of the river, fine avenues are taking the place of former dirt roads, permanent bridges span the stream, new and more substantial buUd ings are being erected throughout the city, 204 THE UTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. while cheap and rapid transportation has been established to points of interest before not readily accessible. More than 1,500 acres of land are under the control of the Niagara Falls Power Company and its allied corporations, extending to the east of the city and partly within its limits, and great industrial establish ments have grown up on reclaimed ground that ten years ago was too low for cultivation or use for any purpose. The town of Echota, the name signifying " A place of rest," has grown up upon the lands of the allied companies, the dwellings and their arrangeraent forraing a model village furnished with light, water, and a very com plete and perfect sewage-disposal system, while, as before mentioned, the tracks of the Junction Railway bring all parts of the com pany's land, and the industries to which power is furnished, into direct communication with the great railways of the State that pass through the city of Niagara FaUs. In regard to the character of the power gen erated and distributed, it is interesting to note that while the Cataract Construction Com pany was considering the problem of develop- 205 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ing the power of the Falls to the best interest of the Niagara FaUs Power Company, those who directed its affairs, with admirable fore thought and in the face of great opposition on the part of high technical authorities, adopted not only the alternating current system, whose advocates were then in the minority, but they fixed on a bi-phase alternating current of twenty-five full alternations per second, greatly below what was in use for Hghting purposes but considered as favorable to the transmission of power. By limiting the rate of alternations to what is best adapted to power transmission, a very high efficiency has been achieved, and the multi-phase alternating current lends itself to all the requirements of electrical energy by subsequent conversion into higher or lower pressure or to transformation into direct cur rent when desired. In point of fact, all the dy namos generate alternate current, which, in the case of direct current apparatus, is straight ened out by the addition of a commutator on the generator. This commutator has a cylin der formed of segmental bars of copper placed together like the staves of a barrel, and separated by insulating raaterial so connected 206 Photograph by Nielson. THE AMERICAN FALL FROM BELOW. THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. to the coils of the arraature that the brushes under which the bars sweep carry to the con ductors the pulsations of electricity that are in the right direction, thus enabling the gener ator to furnish a constant or direct current. An alternating current, on the other hand, passes to the external circuit without rectifica tion, and raay be raised or lowered by static transformers, or it may be converted by rotary transformers into direct current of any re quired pressure or voltage. The application of this system in the development of power at Niagara Falls has proved most successful, and its wonderful elasticity has grown daily more apparent since the first alternators were put in motion in 1895. Since the plant at Niagara FaUs was first put in operation in 1895, the great advantage of power transmission by raeans of electricity has been recognized and has rapidly gained favor with raanufacturers all over the country. As compared with all other modes of long dis tance transmission, it has been accepted as un doubtedly the best, and even for a short trans mission, as from the steam engine or the water wheels to the machines to be operated, elec- 207 THE NIAGARA BOOK. tricity has been found more economical than transmission by shafting, belts, and pulleys. Very many big establishments have erected large electrical generating stations to drive their machinery by motors, either connected directly to the raachines to be operated or to groups of raachines, not only saving thereby the loss due to ordinary shaft-transraission, but by doing away with belts and overhead puUeys, much space is secured for the better handling of material by cranes or other hoist ing devices also operated by electricity. In the case under consideration, as at Buffalo, elec tricity delivered from Niagara Falls has proved to be not only cheaper than that devel oped by fuel, but has the advantage of con stancy and of avoidance of all risk from sudden shortage of coal as caused by strikes or exces sive cost of power incident to the rise in price of fuel. Great as are the coal fields of Amer ica, they are not exhaustless, nor does the coal yield the whole of its heat units when con sumed. Even under the most improved methods of consumption and utilization it is but a small fraction of the theoretical power that serves a useful purpose, and Nature offers 208 THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. no promise of reproduction of coal to take the place of that taken from the earth. On the other hand, the overflowing water of the great Falls of Niagara, which has been passing for ages almost unused to the sea, can be utilized as a source of power with positive assurance as to its continuity and stability at all times. The Cataract of Niagara derives its power from the orderly operation of the laws of na ture. The constantly acting force of gravita tion speeds the river to the ocean, where its waters are vaporized and returned inland to be deposited by condensation on the rainsheds feeding lakes and rivers. Over the iraraense area which constitutes the drainage basin of the Great Lakes, the varying climatic condi tions producing drought or flood seem to aver age themselves, and this, together with the vast storage capacity of the lake reservoirs, renders the volume of water subject to scarcely notice able variations, exactly as the ocean seeras to show little rise or fall other than that of the tide. To this condition is due the great uni formity of the flow of the river from Lake Erie to the Falls, making it the nearest possible ap proach to perpetual motion. A small im- 14 209 THE NIAGARA BOOK. pounded mass of water rarely represents a uni form source of water power, as it is likely to be reduced by drought or suddenly increased by flood, according to the conditions affecting the condensation of the vapors passing inland from the ocean. It is this apparent uniformity at all seasons that gives the Niagara River, with its great lake reservoirs behind it, an al most unique advantage as a source of power, and has warranted such an expenditure of thought and money in its development. The capitalists who have invested so liberally in this great work have done so with full appre ciation of the difficulties to be encountered, and with abiding faith in the ultimate success of the undertaking. The spirit of specula tion has not controlled the development, but from the outset it has been the aim of those in terested to make it a commercial success by the application of the best engineering methods and the highest manufacturing skill. Through what was known as the Niagara Falls Inter national Coramission, which met in London in 1890-91, careful and extensive consideration was given to the state of the arts in the genera tion of hydraulic power and its transmission THE VTILIZATION OF NIAGARA'S POWER. and utilization. The conclusions thus arrived at helped to determine the nature of the in stallation, and in carrying out the work every attention has been paid to durabihty and con struction, economy in the use of power, and the best methods of securing the greatest con tinuity of service in generation and transmis sion to consumers under tha cliraatic and acci dental causes tending to interrupt it. Although the nature and magnitude of the development were without precedent, and called for the invention of special raachinery and appliances, the engineering skill applied to this, based on sound scientific principles and practical experience, raised the work above the level of mere theory and experiment, and this is evidenced in the successful operation of the plant and the high efficiency attained with it from the outset. The 50,000 horse-power now being utihzed will, on completion of the work in progress, be increased to more than 100,000 horse-power, and this great energy is rendered available without disturbing in the least the natural beauties of the Falls. On the contrary, the development lends a new attrac tion to Niagara, both for those who are inter- THE NIAGARA BOOK. ested in the work from an engineering stand point, representing as it does the most ad vanced state of the arts, and also to the general public, who cannot but be impressed with the magnitude of the undertaking and the thought of this great power being turned to the uses of man. Not only is it being utilized close at hand, but it is finding its way further and further from its source, and the frequently repeated inquiry as to whether this energy may be transmitted to Buffalo and distant points where fuel is dear is finding its answer in the increased demand for power thus trans mitted, as each year discovers new markets and new uses for it. THE NIAGARA BOOK. PART II. First Authentic Mention of N. F. Mark Twain. Niagara, First and Last. William Dean Howells. As It Rushes By. Edward S. Martin. Famous Visitors at N. F. Rev. Thomas R. Slicer. PART II. THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. By Mark Twain. Extracts from Adam's Diary. Monday. — This new creature with the long hair is a good deal in the way. It is always hanging around and following me about. I don't Hke this; I am not used to company. I wish it would stay with the other animals. . Cloudy to-day, wind in the east; think we shall have rain. . We? Where did I get that word? I remember now — the new creature uses it, Tuesday. — Been exaraining the great waterfall. It is the finest thing on the estate, I think. The new creature calls it Niagara Falls — why, I am sure I do not know. Says it looks like Niagara FaUs. That is not a rea son, it is mere waywardness and imbecility. I get no chance to name anything myself. The new creature names everything that comes 215 THE NIAGARA BOOK. along, before I can get in a protest. And always that same pretext is offered — it looks Hke the thing. There is the dodo, for in stance. Says the moraent one looks at it one sees at a glance that it " looks like a dodo." It will have to keep that name, no doubt. It wearies me to fret about it, and it does no good, anyway. Dodo ! It looks no more Hke a dodo than I do. Wednesday. — Built rae a shelter against the rain, but could not have it to rayself in peace. The new creature intruded. When I tried to put it out it shed water out of the holes it looks with, and wiped it away with the back of its paws, and raade a noise such as some of the other aniraals raake when they are in dis tress. I wish it would not talk; it is always talking. That sounds like a cheap fling at the poor creature, a slur; but I do not mean it so. I have never heard the human voice before, and any new and strange sound intruding it self here upon the solemn hush of these dream ing solitudes offends my ear and seems a false note, And this new sound is so close to me ; it is right at my shoulder, right at my ear, first on one side and then on the other, and I am 216 Photograph by Nielsoi ROCK OF AGES AND CAVE OF THE WINDS. THE FIRST AVTHENTIC MENTION. used only to sounds that are more or less dis tant from me. Friday. — The naming goes recklessly on, in spite of anything I can do. I had a very good name for the estate, and it was musical and pretty — Garden of Eden. Privately, I continue to caU it that, but not any longer publicly. The new^creature says it is all woods and rocks and scenery, and therefore has no resemblance to a garden. Says it looks like a park, and does not look like anything but a park. Consequently, without consulting me, it has been new-named' — Niagara Falls Park. This is sufficiently high-handed, it seems to me. And already there is a sign up : KEEP OFF THE GRASS. My life is not as happy as it was. Saturday. — The new creature eats too rauch fruit. We are going to run short, most Hkely. " We " again — that is its word; mine, too, now, from hearing it so much. Good deal of fog this morning. I do not go out in the fog myself. The new creature does. It goes out in all weathers, and stumps right in with 217 THE NIAGARA BOOK. its muddy feet. And talks. It used to be so pleasant and quiet here. Sunday. — PuUed through. This day is get ting to be more and raore trying. It was se lected and set apart last Noveraber as a day of rest. I had already six of them per week be fore. This morning found the new creature trying to clod apples out of that forbidden tree. Monday. — The new creature says its name is Eve. That is all right, I have no objections. Says it is to call it by, when I want it to come. I said it was superfluous, then. The word evi dently raised me in its respect; and indeed it is a large, good word and will bear repetition. It says it is not an It, it is a She. This is prob ably doubtful; yet it is all one to rae; what she is were nothing to me if she would but go by herself and not talk. Tuesday. — She has littered the whole estate with execrable names and offensive signs : This way to the Whirlpool. This way to Goat Island. Cave of the Winds this way. She says this park would make a tidy sum mer resort if there was any custom for it. Sum mer resort — another invention of hers — ^just 2X8 THE FIRST AVTHENTIC MENTION. words, without any raeaning. What is a sum mer resort ? But it is best not to ask her, she has such a rage for explaining. Friday. — She has taken to beseeching me to stop going over the FaUs. What harm does it do ? Says it makes her shudder. I wonder why; I have always done it — always Hked the plunge, and the excitement and the coolness. I supposed it was what the Falls were for. They have no other use that I can see, and they must have been made for something. She says they were only made for scenery — lik.e the rhinoceros and the mastodon. I went over the FaUs in a barrel — not satis factory to her. Went over in a tub — still not satisfactory. Swam the Whirlpool and the Rapids in a fig-leaf suit. It got much dam aged. Hence, tedious complaints about my extravagance. I am too much hampered here. What I need is change of scene. Saturday. — I escaped last Tuesday night, and travelled two days, and built me another shelter in a secluded place, and obliterated my tracks as well as I could, but she hunted me out by means of a beast which she has tamed and calls a wolf, and came making that pitiful 219 THE NIAGARA BOOK. noise again, and shedding that water out of the places she looks with. I was obliged to return with her, but will presently emigrate again when occasion offers. She engages herself in many foolish things; among others, to study out why the animals called lions and tigers live on grass and flowers, when, as she says, the sort of teeth they wear would indicate that they were intended to eat each other. This is foolish, because to do that would be to kill each other, and that would introduce what, as I understand it, is caUed " death " ; and death, as I have been told, has not yet entered the Park. Which is a pity, on some accounts. Sunday. — Pulled through. Monday. — I believe I see what the week is for; it is to give time to rest up from the weari ness of Sunday. It seems a good idea. . . . She has been climbing that tree again. Clod ded her out of it. She said nobody was look ing. Seems to consider that a sufficient justi fication for chancing any dangerous thing. Told her that. The word justification moved her admiration — and envy, too, I thought. It is a good word. Tuesday. — She told me she was made out THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. of a rib taken from my body. This is at least doubtful, if not raore than that. I have not missed any rib. . . . She is in much trou ble about the buzzard; says grass does not agree with it; is afraid she can't raise it; thinks it was intended to live on decayed fiesh. The buzzard must get along the best it can with what it is provided. We cannot overturn the whole scheme to accommodate the buzzard. Saturday. — She fell in the pond yesterday when she was looking at herself in it, which she is always doing. She nearly strangled, and said it was most uncomfortable. This raade her sorry for the creatures which live in there, which she calls fish, for she continues to fasten names on to things that don't need them and don't come when they are called by thera, which is a raatter of no consequence to her, she is such a nuraskuU, anyway; so she got a lot of them out and brought them in last night and put them in my bed to keep warm, but I have noticed them now and then all day and I don't see that they are any happier there than they were before, only quieter. When night comes I shall throw them outdoors. I wiU not sleep with them again, for I find them clammy and THE NIAGARA BOOK. unpleasant to He araong when a person hasn't anything on. Sunday. — Pulled through. Tuesday. — She has taken up with a snake now. The other animals are glad, for she was always experimenting with them and bother ing them; and I am glad because the snake talks, and this enables me to get a rest. Friday. — She says the snake advises her to try the fruit of that tree, and says the result will be a great and fine and noble education. I told her there would be another result, too — it would introduce death into the world. That was a mistake — it had been better to keep the remark to myself; it only gave her an idea — she could save the sick buzzard, and furnish fresh meat to the despondent lions and tigers. I advised her to keep away frora the tree. She said she wouldn't. I foresee trouble. WiU emigrate. Wednesday. — I have had a variegated time. I escaped that night, and rode a horse all night as fast as he could go, hoping to get clear out of the Park and hide in sorae other country before the trouble should begin; but it was not to be. About an hour after sun-up. THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. as I was riding through a flowery plain where thousands of animals were grazing, slumber ing, or playing with each other, according to their wont, all of a sudden they broke into a tempest of frightful noises, and in one moment the plain was a frantic commotion and every beast was destroying its neighbor. I knew what it meant — Eve had eaten that fruit, and death was corae into the world. . . . The tigers ate my horse, paying no attention when I ordered them to desist, and they would have eaten me if I had stayed — which I didn't, but went away in much haste. ... I found this place, outside the Park, and was fairly comfortable for a few days, but she has found me out. Found me out, and has named the place Tonawanda — says it looks like that. In fact I was not sorry she came, for there are but raeagre pickings here, and she brought some of those apples. I was obliged to eat them, I was so hungry. It was against my principles, but I find that principles have no real force except when one is well fed. . . . She carae curtained in boughs and bunches of leaves, and when I asked her what she meant by such nonsense, and snatched them away 223 THE NIAGARA BOOK. and threw them down, she tittered and blushed. I had never seen a person titter and blush before, and to rae it seeraed unbecoming and idiotic. She said I would soon know how it was myself. This was correct. Hungry as I was, I laid down the apple half-eaten — cer tainly the best one I ever saw, considering the lateness of the season — and arrayed myself in the discarded boughs and branches, and then spoke to her with some severity and ordered her to go and get some more and not make such a spectacle of herself. She did it, and after this we crept down to where the wild- beast battle had been, and collected some skins, and I made her patch together a couple of suits proper for public occasions. They are uncorafortable, it is true, but styHsh, and that is the main point about clothes. ... I find she is a good deal of a companion. I see I should be lonesome and depressed without her, now that I have lost my property. An other thing, she says it is ordered that we work for our living hereafter. She will be useful. I will superintend. Ten Days Later. — She accuses me of being the cause of our disaster ! She says, with ap- 224 THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. parent sincerity and truth, that the Serpent assured her that the forbidden fruit was not apples, it was chestnuts. I said I was inno cent, then, for I had not eaten any chestnuts. She said the Serpent informed her that " chest nut " was a figurative term meaning an aged and mouldy joke. I turned pale at that, for I have made many jokes to pass the weary time, and some of them could have been of that sort, though I had honestly supposed that they were new when I made them. She asked me if I had made one just at the tirae of the catastro phe. I was obliged to adrait that I had raade one to rayself, though not aloud. It was this. I was thinking about the Falls, and I said to myself, " How wonderful it is to see that vast body of water tumble down there ! " Then in an instant a bright thought flashed into my head, and I let it fly, saying, " It would be a deal more wonderful to see it tumble up there ! " — and I was just about to kill myself with laughing at it when all nature broke loose in war and death and I had to flee for my life. " There," she said, with triumph, " that is just it; the Serpent mentioned that very jest, and called it the First Chestnut, and said it was i\5 225 THE NIAGARA BOOK. coeval with the creation." Alas, I am indeed to blame. Would that I were not witty; oh, that I had never had that radiant thought ! Next Year. — We have named it Cain. She caught it while I was up country trapping on the North Shore of the Erie; caught it in the timber a couple of miles from our dug-out — or it might have been four, she isn't certain which. It resembles us in some ways, and may be a relation. That is what she thinks, but this is an error, in my judgment. The differ ence in size warrants the conclusion that it is a different and new kind of animal — a fish, per haps, though when I put it in the water to see, it sank, and she plunged in and snatched it out before there was opportunity for the experi ment to determine the matter. I still think it is a fish, but she is indifferent about what it is, and will not let rae have it to try. , I do not understand this. The coming of the creature seems to have changed her whole nature and made her unreasonable about experiments. She thinks more of it than she does of any fjf the other animals, but is not able to expl?dn why. Her mind is disordered — everything §hows it. Sometimes she carries the fish in 226 THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. her arms half the night when it complains and wants to get to the water. At such times the water comes out of the places in her face that she looks out of, and she pats the fish on the back and makes soft sounds with her mouth to soothe it, and betrays sorrow and solicitude in a hundred ways. I have never seen her do like this with any other fish, and it troubles me greatly. She used to carry the young tigers around so, and play with them, before we lost our property, but it was only play; she never took on about thera like this when their dinner disagreed with them. Sunday. — She doesn't work, Sundays, but Hes around all tired out, and likes to have the fish wallow over her; and she raakes fool noises to amuse it, and pretends to chew its paws, and that makes it laugh. I have not seen a fish before that could laugh. This raakes rae doubt. ... I have come to like Sunday myself. Superintending all the week tires a body so. There ought to be more Sun days. In the old days they were tough, but now they come handy. Wednesday. — It isn't a fish. I cannot quite make out what it is. It raakes curious devil- 227 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ish noises when not satisfied, and says " goo- goo " when it is. It is not one of us, for it doesn't walk; it is not a bird, for it doesn't fly; it is not a frog, for it doesn't hop; it is not a snake, for it doesn't crawl; I feel sure it is not a fish, though I cannot get a chance to find out whether it can swira or not. It raerely lies around, and fnostly on its back, with its feet up. I have not seen any other aniraal do that before. I said I believed it was an enigma; but she only admired the word without under standing it. In ray judgment it is either an enigma or some kind of a bug. If it dies, I will take it apart and see what its arrange ments are. I never had a thing perplex rae so. Three Months Later. — The perplexity augments instead of diminishing. I sleep but little. It has ceased frora lying around, and goes about on its four legs now. Yet it differs frora the other four-legged animals, in that its front legs are unusually short, consequently this causes the main part of its person to stick up uncomfortably high in the air, and this is not attractive. It is built much as we are, but its raethod of traveUing shows that it is not of our breed. The short front legs and long 228 THE FIRST AUTHENTIC MENTION. hind ones indicate that it is of the kangaroo family, but it is a marked variation of the spe cies, since the true kangaroo hops, whereas this one never does. StiU it is a curious and interesting variety, and has not been cata logued before. As I discovered it, I have felt justified in securing the credit of the discovery by attaching my name to it, and hence have called it Kangaroorum Adamiensis. . . . It must have been a young one when it came, for it has grown exceedingly since. It must be five times as big, now, as it was then, and when discontented it is able to make from twenty-two to thirty-eight times the noise it made at first. Coercion does not modify this, but has the contrary effect. For this reason I discontinued the systera. She reconciles it by persuasion, and by giving it things which she had previously told it she wouldn't give it. As already observed, I was not at horae when it first carae, and she told me she found it in the woods. It seeras odd that it should be the only one, yet it must be so, for I have worn rayself out these many weeks trying to find another one to add to ray collec tion, and for this one to play with; for surely 229 THE NIAGARA BOOK. then it would be quieter and we could tame it more easily. But I find none, nor any vestige of any; and, strangest of all, no tracks. It has to live on the ground, it cannot help itself; therefore, how does it get about without leav ing a track? I have set a dozen traps, but they do no good. I catch all small animals except that one; animals that merely go into the trap out of curiosity, I think, to see what the milk is there for. They never drink it. Three Months Later. — The Kangaroo still continues to grow, which is very strange and perplexing. I never knew one to be so long getting its growth. It has fur on its head now; not like kangaroo fur, but exactly Hke our hair except that it is much finer and softer, and instead of being black is red. I am like to lose my mind over the capricious and harass ing developments of this unclassifiable zoologi cal freak. If I could catch another one — but that is hopeless; it is a new variety, and the only sample; this is plain. But I caught a true kangaroo and brought it in, thinking that this one, being lonesome, would rather have that for company than have no kin at all, or any animal it could feel a nearness to or get sym- 230 THE FIRST AVTHENTIC MENTION. pathy from in its forlorn condition here among strangers who do not know its ways or habits, or what to do to make it feel that it is among friends; but it was a raistake — it went into such fits at the sight of the kangaroo that I was convinced it had never seen one before. I pity the poor noisy Httle animal, but there is noth ing I can do to raake it happy. If I could tame it — but that is out of the question; the more I try the worse I seera to raake it. It grieves me to the heart to see it in its little storras of sorrow and passion. I wanted to let it go, but she wouldn't hear of it. That seemed cruel and not like her; and yet she raay be right. It might be loneHer than ever; for since I cannot find another one, how could itf Five Months Later. — It is not a kan garoo. No, for it supports itself by holding to her finger, and thus goes a few steps on its hind legs, and then falls down. It is probably some kind of a bear; and yet it has no tail — as yet — and no fur, except on its head. It still keeps on growing — that is a curious circum stance, for bears get their growth earlier than this. Bears are dangerous — since our catas trophe — and I shall not be satisfied to have 231 THE NIAGARA BOOK. this one prowling about the place much longer without a muzzle on. I have offered to get her a kangaroo if she would let this one go, but it did no good — she is determined to run us into all sorts of foolish risks, I think. She was not Hke this before she lost her mind. A Fortnight Later. — I examined its mouth. There is no danger yet; it has only one tooth. It has no tail yet. It makes more noise now than it ever did before — and mainly at night. I have moved out. But I shall go over, mornings, to breakfast, and see if it has more teeth. If it gets a mouthful of teeth it will be time for it to go, taU or no tail, for a bear does not need a tail in order to be dan gerous. Four Months Later. — I have been off hunting and fishing a month, up in the region that she caUs Buffalo; I don't know why, un less it is because there are not any buffaloes there. Meantime the bear has learned to pad dle around all by itself on its hind legs, and says " poppa " and " momma." It is certainly a new species. This resemblance to words may be purely accidental, of course, and may have no purpose or meaning; but even in that 232 THE FIRST AVTHENTIC MENTION. case it is stiU extraordinary, and is a thing which no other bear can do. This imitation of speech, taken together with general absence of fur and entire absence of tail, sufficiently in dicates that this is a new kind of bear. The further study of it will be exceedingly interest ing. Meantime I will go off on a far expedi tion among the forests of the north and raake an exhaustive search. There must certainly be another one somewhere, and this one will be less dangerous when it has corapany of its own species. I will go straightway; but I wiji muzzle this one first. Three Months Later. — It has been a weary, weary hunt, yet I have had no success. In the meantime, without stirring from the home estate, she has caught another one! I never saw such luck. I might have hunted these woods a hundred years, I never would have run across that thing. Next Day. — I have been comparing the new one with the old one, and it is perfectly plain that they are the same breed. I was going to stuff one of them for my collection, but she is prejudiced against it for some reason or other; so I have relinquished the idea, 233 THE NIAGARA BOOK. though I think it is a raistake. It would be an irreparable loss to science if they should get away. The old one is tamer than it was, and can laugh and talk like the parrot, having learned this, no doubt, from being with the parrot so much, and having the iraitative fac ulty in a highly developed degree. I shall be astonished if it turns out to be a new kind of parrot; and yet I ought not to be astonished, for it has already been everything else it could think of since those first days when it was a fish. The new one is as ugly now as the old one was at first; has the same sulphur-and-raw- meat complexion and the same singular head without any fur on it. She calls it Abel. Ten Years Later. — They are boys; we found it out long ago. It was their coming in that small, immature shape that puzzled us ; we were not used to it. There are some girls now. Abel is a good boy, but if Cain had stayed a bear it would have improved hira. After all these years, I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning; it is better to live outside the Garden with her than inside it with out her. At first I thought she talked too much; but now I should be sorry to have 234 THE FIRST AVTHENTIC MENTION. that voice fall silent and pass out of my life. Blessed be the chestnut that brought us near together and taught me to know the goodness of her heart and the sweetness of her spirit ! 235 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. By William D. Howells. I. In the spring of i860 I wrote a Hfe of Lin coln. It was what is called a campaign life, and in its poor way it was a part of the elec tioneering enginery of a canvass destined to be, if not the most memorable in our history, at least of the farthest effect. To be quite honest, I must own that my book, as I now look back on the facts, probably served the mysterious uses, and performed the vague of fices of a fifth wheel to a coach, in forwarding the fortunes of the man whose Hfe it celebrated before he was so famous as to need no blare of trumpets, not to say willow whistles, evermore. What seems strange is that the great renown of Lincoln has not reacted upon one of his earhest biographies; that this has dropped as 236 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. wholly in obHvion as if it was the story of no body; the coach indeed arrived in glory, and was found to be the car of victory, the fiery chariot of freedora; but the fifth wheel seems to have stopped somewhere on the way. My book was published in Columbus, O., and I did not wait for its assured success be fore setting forth upon some travels which had long invited rae. The publisher had so much faith in it as to be wUling to supply rae in ad vance with a certain sum of raoney, say fifty dollars in Ohio money, and a letter of credit, addressed to several publishers in Boston and New York, to the amount of some hundred and ninety doUars more. I meant to explore those distant capitals, and to take in the won ders and delights of the St. Lawrence route to Quebec, and to acquaint myself with the manners and customs of strange peoples, so far as they were to be studied in Canada. For this journey, a great deal of raoney was needed, and I took all I had. I do not know why I should have thought it well to spend my whole substance upon this venture, but I seem to have done so; and I had no compunctions, so far as I can remember, in spending so much 237 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of this vast sum in Ohio money, which I then believed the best money in the world. I found later that it was worth only eighty-five or ninety cents on the dollar in Boston ; one was liable to these surprises in the days of State banking; but as yet I was troubled with no misgivings when I left Columbus, and took my way to Buffalo, where I thought I might fitly rest a day or two, and recruit my strength for the irapression of Niagara which I was eager to receive. I spent raost of this stay in my room at the hotel, writing letters for a Cincinnati paper, which had agreed to take them from me. The passion for summer cor respondence has not yet died out of journal ism, but even then I fotmd its impulses uncer tain, and many of the letters I wrote on that journey were never printed. I am not sure that this was a loss to literature; but it cer tainly was a loss to me in that Ohio money which was the best in the world. When I was not writing, I was wandering about the streets of Buffalo, and viewing its monuments from the platform of a horse car, or from its pave ments, not so much crowded then as now. I forget what the monuments were in that day; 238 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. I even forget who were the editors of the pa pers, whom I visited after the simple journal istic usage of the tirae, and conversed with in their offices. But they probably had their re venge, and forgot who I was much sooner. I recall, however, that it was aU very stirring and interesting, and that I tried to view the novelties I found everywhere in the manner of my favorite authors, and to describe them in their style. The chief of these authors was then Heinrich Heine, and I did my best to give such an account of Buffalo as he would have written in English if he had been there in my place. As soon as I had corapleted the his tory of my observations, which was more con siderable than the observations themselves, I pushed on to Niagara Falls. IL One always experiences a vivid emotion frora the sight of the Rapids, no raatter how often one sees thera, but I am safe in saying that one sees them for the first time but once. After that one has the feeling of a habitui towards them, a sort of friendly and familiar 239 THE NIAGARA BOOK. appreciation of their terrific beauty, but cer tainly not the thrill of the pristine awe. It is even hard to recall that : the picture remains, but not the sense of their mighty march, or of their gigantic leaps and lunges, when they break ranks, and their procession becomes a mere onward tumult without form or order. I had schooled myself for great impressions, and I did not mean to lose one of them ; they were all going into that correspondence which I was so proud to be writing, and finally, I hoped, they were going into literature : poems, sketches, studies, and I do not know what all. But I had not counted upon the Rapids taking me by the throat, as it were, and making my heart stop. I still think that above and below the Falls, the Rapids are the most striking features of the spectacle. At least you may say soraething about thera, compare them to something; when you come to the Cataract it self, you can say nothing; it is incomparable. My sense of it first, and my sense of it last, was not a sense of the stupendous, but a sense of beauty, of serenity, of repose. I have always had to take rayself in hand, to shake myself up, to look twice, and recur to what I have heard 240 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. and read of other people's impressions, before I am overpowered by it. Otherwise I am simply charmed. I hurrie.d out to look at it, and I spent the afternoon in taking a careful account of my impressions, and trying to fit phrases to my emotions for that blessed correspondence. Then I went back to my room and began to put them down on paper while they were still warm. That pleasant room in the hotel is very vivid in my memory yet. It had a green lattice- door opening into the corridor, and when I left the inner door ajar, a dehcious current of sumraer breeze and afternoon sunshine drew through it from the window looking out on a sweep of those Rapids. It was what they call a single room, but it seemed very spacious at that time, and it had a little table in it, where I wrote my letters to the Cincinnati paper. I lived two weeks in that room, and I made a vast deal of copy, including some poems, I be lieve, which never got printed, any more than raost of my letters, though I did not confine the test of their merit to one editor alone. i6 241 THE NIAGARA BOOK. III. Apart from these Uterary enterprises of mine there was not a great deal to occupy me in the hotel. I suppose there are moraents when the hotels at Niagara are fuU, but I never happened there at those moments, and my hotel at the time of the first visit was far from crowded, though it was in the days before the war when Southerners were reputed to visit the Falls in great numbers. We dined at midday to the music of a brass band, which raust have been more than usually brazen, to have affected my nerves the way it did, for at twenty-three the nerves are not sensitive. Very likely there were a variety of brides and grooms there, but I did not know them from the rest: so little is one condition of life able to distinguish another. There was a period when these young couples were visible to rae, afterwards; and then, when I was very rauch older, they vanished again, and were no more to be found by the eye of earlier age than by the eye of earlier youth. I believe I saw num bers of pretty young girls, who then appeared to me stately and raature woraen, of great splendor and beauty, and of varying raeasures 242 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. of haughty inapproachabUity. I raade the ac quaintance of no one in the hotel, but by a sort of affinition, which I should now be at a loss to account for, I fell in with two artists who were painting the Falls and the Rapids, and the scenery generally, and I used to go about with thera, and watch them at their work. They were brothers, and very friendly fellows, not much older than I, and because I liked them, and was reaching out in every di rection for the raaterials of greater and greater consciousness, I tried to see Niagara as ac tively and pervasively iridescent as they did. They invited me to criticise their pictures in the presence of the facts, and I did once inti mate that I failed to find all those rainbows, of different sizes and shapes which they had rep resented on the surface of the water every where. Then they pointed the rainbows out with their forefingers and asked. Didn't I see them there, and there, and there? I looked very hard, and as I was not going to be out done in the perception of beauty, I said that I did see them, and I tried to believe that I saw them, but. Heaven knows, I never did. I hope this fraud wiU not be finaUy accounted against 243 THE NIAGARA BOOK. me. Those were charming fellows, and other pictures of theirs I have found so faithful that I ara still a little shaken about the rainbows. My artists were from Ohio, and though I was too ignorant then to affirm that Ohio art was the best art in the world, just as Ohio money was the best, still I was very proud of it, and I suppose I renowned those invisible irides cences in my letter to the Cincinnati paper. We walked all about the Falls, and over Goat Island, and to and frora the Whirlpool, and it was a great advantage to me to be in the artists' company, for they knew all the loveli est places, and could show me the best points of view. I drove nowhere, because I had a fear, bred of much newspaper ruraor and humor, that my accumulated treasures would not hold out against the rapacity of a single Niagara hackman. A dollar was a dollar in those days, especially if it were a dollar of Ohio money, or at least it was so till you got to Bos ton; and I was not wiUing to waste any of mine in carriage fares. But to be honest about those poor fellows, I always found the Niagara hackmen, when I visited their doraain in after years, not only civil but reasonable, and I have 244 Photograph by Curtis. LUNA ISLAND IN WINTER. NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. never regretted the money I spent upon them; it was no longer Ohio money, to be sure. Sorae places I could not walk to on that first visit, and as there was no suspension bridge then near the Falls, I took a boat when I wished to cross to the Canada side, and a raan rowed me over the eddies of the river where they reeled away from the plunge of the Cata ract. I do not think I crossed more than once, or had any wish to do so, after I had visited the battlefield of Lundy's Lane, where a vet eran of the fight, so weU preserved in alcohol that I should not be surprised if he were there yet, gave rae an account of it frora the top of a tower in which he seeraed to be fortified. That poor little carnage has shrunken into so small a horror since the battles of the great war, then impending, that I feel somewhat like excusing the mention of it now; but when I visited the scene in i860, 1 was aware of several emotions which, if not of prime importance on the spot, were very capable of being worked up into something worth while in my letter to the Cincinnati paper. I tried to give thera a Heinesque cast, and I raade a good deal of the tipsy veteran. In the course of a literary 245 THE NIAGARA BOOK. life one is obliged to practise these econoraies, and I advise the beginner in our art against throwing away anything whatever. But what is the need of advising him? He would not be able to do so if he wished. He belongs to what he has seen, as much as it belongs to him, and he owes it a debt of expression which will weigh upon him till he complies with its just deraand. The trouble is with what he has not seen, and decidedly he had better not be ad vised against throwing that away. The more of that he throws away the better; and the reader can have very little notion how much he is profiting by my profusion in this respect. IV. Really, however, I did see a great many things at Niagara on that first visit, and I am sorry to say that I saw them chiefly on the Canada side. My patriotisra has always felt the hurt of the fact that our great national cataract is best viewed frora a foreign shore. There can be no denying, at least in a confi dence like the present, that the Canadian Fall, if not raore raajestic, is certainly more massive, 246 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. than the American. I used to watch its mighty wall of waters with a jealousy almost as green as themselves, and then try to believe that the knotted tumble of our Fall was finer. I could only make out that it had more appar ent movement. But at times, and if one looked steadily at any part of the Cataract, the de scending floods seeraed to hang in arrest above the gulfs below. .Those Hquid steeps, those precipices of molten emerald, all broken and fissured with opal and crystal, seemed like heights of sure and firmset earth, and the mists that climbed them half-way were as still to the eye in their subtler sort. This effect of im mobility is what gives its supreme beauty to Niagara, its repose. If there is agony there, it is the agony of Niobe, of the Laocoon. It moves the beholder, but itself it does not move. I spent a great deal of time trying to say this or something like it, which now and al ways seemed to me true of Niagara, though I do not insist that it shall seem so to others. I could not see those iridescences that every where iUumined the waters to my artist friends, and very likely the reader, if he is a person of feeble fancy, small syrapathy, and 247 THE NIAGARA BOOK. indifferent morals, will find nothing of this Repose that I speak of in Niagara. I imagine him taking my page out into the presence of the fact, and demanding. Now where is the Repose ? Well, all that I can say is that it has always been there on the occasion of my visits. On the occasion of my first visit there was even a shelf of the Table Rock still there, and I went out and stood upon it, for the sake of saying that I had done so in my letter to the Cincin nati paper, though I might very well have said it without having done so, and I am almost sorry that I did not, when I remember how few of those letters that paper printed. There was no great pleasure in the experience. You were supposed to get a particularly fine view of the Horse Shoe Falls, but I got no view at all, on account of a whim of the mist. Weeks earlier a large piece of the rock had faUen just a few moments after a carriage full of people had driven off it, and I did not know but an other piece might fall just a few moraents be fore I walked off it. I was not in a carriage, and my portion of Table Rock did not fall till some three months later; that was quite soon 248 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. enough for me; I should have preferred three years. I do not know whether it was my satisfac tion in this hair-breadth escape or not, but I had sufficient spirits immediately after to join a group of people near by who were taking peeps over a precipice at something below. I did not know what it was, but I thought- it might be something I could work up in my letters to that Cincinnati paper, and I waited my turn among those who were lying succes sively on their stomachs and craning their necks over the edge; and then I saw that it was a man who was lying face upwards on the rocks below, and had perhaps been lying there some time. He was a very green and yellow melancholy of a man, as to his face, and in his workman's blue overalls he had a trick of swimming upwards to the eye of the aesthetic spectator, so that one had to push back with a hard clutch on the turf to keep from plunging over to meet him. I made a note of this mor bid impulse for primary use in my letters to that Cincinnati paper, and secondary use in a poem, or sketch, or tale; and then I crawled back and went away, and was faint in secret 249 THE NIAGARA BOOK. for a while. It was strange how fully sufficing one little glirapse of that poor man was. No one knew who he was or how he had fallen over there, but after the first glance at him (I believe I did not give a second) I felt that we did not part strangers. Now I raeet people at dinner and pass whole evenings with thera, and cannot remeraber their faces so as to place thera the next week. But I think I could have placed that poor man years afterwards. To be sure the circumstances are different, and I am no longer twenty-three. V. Do they still, I wonder, take people to see a place not far above the Canadian Fall, where a vein of natural gas vents itself amid the trouble of the waters, and the custodian sets fire to it with a piece of lighted newspaper? They used to do that, if you paid thera a quarter, in a Httle paviHon built over the place to shut out the unpaying public. By comparison with the great gas wells which I saw in combustion long after at Findlay, this was a very feeble rush Hght conflagration indeed, but it had the 250 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. merit of being much more mysterious. I, for instance, did not know it was natural gas, or what it was, and the custodian sagely would not say; the raystery was probably part of his stock in trade. There were raany mysteries, maintained at a profit, about Niagara then, and not the least of them was Terrapin Tower, which stood at the brink of the Araerican Fall, and was reached by a series of stepping stones and bridges amidst the rapids. The mystery of this was that any human being should wish to go up it, at the risk of his life, but every body did. I myself found a bridal couple (of the third espousals) in it when I ventured a vast deal of potential literature in its frail keep ing; no terrapin, I fancy, was ever so rash as to ascend it, from the day it was built to the day it was taken away. What is so amusing now to think of, though not so amusing then, is that all the while I was clambering about those heights and brinks, I was suffering from an inveterate vertigo, which made plain ground rather difficult for me at tiraes. At odd raoraents it became necessary for me to lay hold of something and stay the reeling world; and the recurrence of these exigencies 251 THE NIAGARA BOOK. finally decided me against venturing into the Cave of the Winds. Upon the whole I am glad I did not penetrate it, for now I can think it what I Hke, and if I had seen it I probably could not do that. I compromised by de scending the Biddle Stairs, which had a rail to hold on by, and which, I have no doubt, amount to much the same thing as the Cave of the Winds. At any rate, when I got to the bottom of them, I wondered why in the world I had come down. I do not know whether under the present socialistic regime, or state control, of the FaUs, there are so many marvels shown as under the old system of private enterprise. But I am sure that their number could have been greatly reduced, with advantage to the visitor. If you find a marvel advertised, and you learn that- you cannot see it without paying a quarter, every coin upon your person begins to burn in an intense sympathy with your curiosity, and you cannot be content till you have seen that marvel. This was the principle of human na ture upon which private capital had counted, and it did not matter that the Falls themselves were enough to glut the utmost greed of won- 252 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. der. Their prodigious character was eked out by every factitious device to which the penalty of twenty-five cents could be attached. I remember that at the entrance of Prospect Park, if not within the sacred grove, a hardy adventurer had pitched his tent and announced the presence of a five-legged calf within its canvas walls, in active competition with the great Cataract. I paid ray quarter (my Ohio money was all paper, or I might have thought twice about it) in order to make sure that this calf was in no wise comparable to Niagara. I do not say that the picture of the calf on the outside of the tent was not as good as some pictures of Niagara that I have seen. It was at least as much like. I hope that all this is not decrying the attrac tions of any worthy adjunct of the Cataract, such as the Whirlpool. There is of course no other such, and I was proud and glad to believe that the Whirlpool was chiefly on the American side, or the first part of it, or was at first nearly if not solely accessible from our territory ; and I did not find out till long after that I was wrong. The Whirlpool, seen from the heights around it, has that effect of sculp- 253 THE NIAGARA BOOK. turesque repose which I have always found the finest thing in the Cataract itself. Like that it is impassioned, while the Rapids are passion ate. From the top the circling lines of the Whirlpool seeraed graven in a level- of chal cedony; the illusion of arrest was so perfect that I was alraost sorry ever to have lost it, though I do not know what I could have done with it if I had kept it. I duly studied my phrases about it for my letters to that Cincin nati paper, and it is probably from some of them, printed or unprinted, that I speak now. These things linger long in the raind ; and it is not always from frugality that" the observer of the picturesque uses the same terms again and again. Happily, I ara not obliged to describe the Whirlpool to the reader, as I was then, and I have no impression to impart except this sense of its worthy unity with the Cataract in what I may call its highest aesthetic quality, its repose. VI. If the reader does not believe in this, he may go and look; but there is one fact of this first visit of mine to Niagara which he must help- 254 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. lessly take my word for. That fact is Blondin, who is closely allied in my raind with the Whirlpool, because I saw him cross the river above the frantic Rapids not far from it. If this association is too mechanical, too ma terial, then I will go farther, and say that when Blondin had got such a distance into the dan ger, he, too, became an illusion of Repose; and I defy the most sceptical reader, who was not then present, to gainsay me. Why those rapids just below the large Sus pension Bridge were chosen to stretch Blon din's cable over, I do not know, unless it was because the river narrows to a gorge there, and because those rapids are more horrid, in the eighteenth-century sense, than any other feature of Niagara. They have been a great deal exploited since Blondin's time by adven turers who have attempted to swim them, and to navigate them in barrels and buoys and India-rubber balls, or if not quite India-rubber balls, I do not know why. But at that time no craft but the Maid of the Mist, the little steara boat which used to run up to the foot of the cataract, had ever dared thera. She, indeed, flying from the perennial pun involved in her 255 THE NIAGARA BOOK. name, not to mention the sheriff's officer who had an attachment for her, weathered the rapids and passed in and out of the Whirlpool, and escaped into the quiet of Canadian waters, with the pilot and her engineer on board. Afterwards I saw her at Quebec, where she had changed her name, as other American refugees in Canada have done, and had now become the Maid of Orleans, in recognition of her peace ful employ of carrying people to and from the Isle of Orleans. But her adventurous voy age was still fresh on the lips of guides and hackmen when I was first at Niagara, and I looked at the Rapids and the Whirlpool with an interest peculiarly fearful because of it. As usual, I walked to the scene of the ex ploit I was about to witness, but there were a good many people walking, and they debated on the way whether Blondin would cross that day or not. It had been raining over night, and some said his cable was not in condition; others, that the guys which stayed it on either side were too slack, or too taut from the wet. Nevertheless, we found a great crowd on the Canada shore, which seemed to comraand the best view of Blondin as weU as of Niagara, and 256 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. the Araerican shore was dense with specta tors, too. As the hour drew near for Blondin to do his feat, we were lost in greater and greater doubt whether he would do it or not, and perhaps if a vote had been taken the scep tics would have carried the day, when he sud denly danced out upon the cable before our unbelieving eyes. The dizzy path was of the bigness of a ship's cable, at the shore, but it seemed to dwindle to a thread where it sank over the centre of the gulf, down toward those tusked and froth ing breakers. They seemed to jump at it, Hke a pack of maddened wolves, and to pull one another back, and then to tumble and flow away, forever different, forever the same. The strong guys starting frora the rocks of the precipice and the level of the rapids could stay it, after aU, only a little part of its length, and beneath them and up through them, the black cedars thrust their speary tops, with that slant toward the middle of the gorge, which raust be frora the pull of the strong draft between its walls. They raade a fine contrast of color with the floods breaking snowy white from their bulks of glassy green; and for the rest 17 257 THE NIAGARA BOOK. there was the perfect blue of the summer heaven over all. There was no testing of the guys, whether they were slack or taut, or of the cable, whether it was in condition, and in fact no one thought of either, such was the surprise of see ing that pink figure of a man spring out into space from sorae source which I, at least, had not observed. He was in the conventional silk fleshings of the rope-dancer, and he car ried a very long balancing pole. At first there was some reality in the apparition. One felt he was a fellow-man about to dare death for our arauseraent, but as he began to run down the slope of the cable toward the centre, one rapidly lost this sense, and beheld hira as a mere feature of the general prospect. Per- ¦ haps he was aware of this effect and chose to startle us back to our consciousness of his hu manity, or perhaps it was a wonted trick, in tended to heighten the interest of the specta cle. At any rate, in the very middle of the river, he seeraed suddenly to falter, and he swayed frora side to side as if he were going to faU. A sort of groan went through the crowd, and several woraen fainted. Then 258 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. Blondin made beHeve to recover himself, and began to climb the slope of his cable to the further shore. I do not know just how far this was, but I think it may have been well on to half a mile; as to the height above the rapids where the cable hung it looked Hke a hundred and fifty feet. I made some vague notes of these raatters after Blondin vanished into the crowd beyond, but there was not much time for conjecture. He carae into sight again al raost at once, a little puppet, running down the farther slope of the cable, and growing a little and a little larger as he drew near. Pres ently one noticed that he had left his balancing pole behind, and was tripping forward with outstretched arms. I stood where I could see him weU, on his return, and I looked at hira with something of the interest one might feel in a man who had come back from the dead and had put on his earthly personality again. I do not re member his face, which was no doubt as good or as bad a face as any mountebank's or raon- arch's, but his feet seeraed to rae the very raost intelligent feet in the world, pliable, sinuous, clinging, educated in every fibre, and full of 259 THE NIAGARA BOOK. spiritual sentience. They had the air of know ing that the whole man was trusted to them, and, such as he was, that he was in their power and keeping along. They rose and fell upon the cable with an exquisite accuracy, and a delicate confidence which had nothing fool hardy in it. Blondin's head might take risks, but it was clear that Blondin's feet took none; whatever they did they did wittingly, and with a full forecast of the chances and consequences. They were imaginably such feet as Isaac Tay lor conjectures we may have in another life, where the intellect shall not be seated in the brain alone, but shall be issued to every part of the body, and present in every joint and limb. They were an immense consolation to me, those feet, and when Blondin went tripping gayly out upon them over his rope again, I breathed much more freely than I had before; they had, as it were, personally reassured me, and given rae their honor that nothing should happen to him; those feet and I had a sort of common understanding about him, and I do not think they respected him any more than I did for risking his life in that manner. He went down the rope and up the rope, dwin- 260 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. dUng from a pink man to a pink puppet as be fore, and going to nothing in the crowd. Then he came to something once more, and began to grow from a puppet into a man again, but with soraething odd about him. He had re sumed his balancing pole, and he had some thing strange on his feet, those wise feet, and, as he drew nearer, we could see that he had wooden buckets on them, of about the bigness of butter firkins; I tell it, not expecting rauch to be believed, for I did not believe it when I saw it. But till he arrived, I could say to myself that there were no bottoms in those buckets, and that his sagacious feet, though somewhat impeded, had still no doubt a good chance to save him, if he lost his head, and would be equal to any coraraon eraergency. That was the opinion of everyone about rae, and though I knew how vexed with hira the feet must be, I did not whoUy lose patience till I was told by one who saw the buckets after Blondin stepped out of thera, that they had wooden bottoms Hke any other butter firkins. Then I was glad that I did not see his feet again, for I could imagine the look of cold disgust, the look of haughty injury they must 261 THE NIAGARA BOOK. wear at having been made privy to such a mere brutal audacity. The man himself looked cool and fresh enough, but I, who was not used to such vio lent fatigues as he must have undergone in these three transits, was bathed in a cold per spiration, and so weak and worn with making them in sympathy that I could scarcely walk away. Long afterwards I was telling about this experience of mine — it was really more mine than Blondin's — in the neat shop of a Venetian pharmacist, to a select circle of the physicians who wait in such places in Venice for the call of their patients. One of these civilized men, for all comraent, asked : " Where was the government ? " and I answered in my barbar ous pride of our individualism, " The goverri- raent had nothing to do with it. In America the government has nothing to do with such things." But now I think that this Venetian was right, and that such a show as I have tried to describe ought no more to have been per raitted than the fight of a man with a wild beast. It was an offence to morality, and it 262 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. thinned the frail barrier which the aspiration of centuries has slowly erected between hu manity and savagery. But for the tirae being I made no such reflections. I got back to ray hotel and hastened to send off a whole letter about Blondin to that Cincinnati paper; and to this day I do not know whether they ever printed it or not. I try to make fun of it now, but it was not funny then. All the way round on that tour, my view of the wonders of nature and the raonuraents of man was obscured by my anxiety concerning the letters I wrote to that Cincinnati paper; and at all the hotels where I stopped I hurried to examine the files of the reading-room and see whether it had kept faith with me or not. Across many years, across graves not a few, I can reach and recall the hurt vanity, the just resentment, and the baffied hope that were bound up in that early experience of editorial frailty. VII. My first visit to Niagara was paid in the midsummer of the year, and the midsummer of my Hfe. All nature was rich and beautifully 263 THE NIAGARA BOOK. alive amid scenes which I think are of her noblest. There were places where the fresh scent of the waters was mixed with the fra grance of wild flowers; the birds which sang inaudibly in the immediate roar of the Cataract made themselves sweetly heard in the heart of Goat Island. Everywhere there were pretty young girls, in the hats which they were then beginning to wear after a long regime of bon nets, and their hats had black plumes in them that drooped down as near to the cheeks of the pretty young girls as they could get. I can scarcely help heaving a sigh for the wrinkles in those cheeks which the plumes, if they StiU drooped instead of sticking militantly up on the front and back of the hats, would not be so eager to caress now; but I will not insist a great deal upon a sort of sigh which has been often known in print already. I think it rauch more profitable to note that all the entourage of Niagara was then private property, and was put to those money-making uses at the expense of the public which form one of the hoHest attributes of that sacred thing. I never greatly objected to the paper- mills on Goat Island; they were impertinent 264 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. to the scenery, of course, but they were pic turesque, with their low-lying, weather-worn raasses in the shelter of the forest trees, beside the brawling waters. But nearly every other assertion of private rights in the landscape was an outrage to it. I will not even try to recall the stupid and squalid contrivances which de faced it at every point, and extorted a coin from the insulted traveller at every turn. They are all gone now, and in the keeping of the State the whole redeemed and disenthralled vicinity of Niagara is an object lesson in what public ownership, whenever it comes, does for beauty. I had the eagerness of a true believer to see this result, and even before I went to look at the cataract on my last visit a winter ago, I drove about and made sure from the liberated landscape that the people were in possession of their own. It was wonderful, even in mid winter, the difference in dignity and prosperity that not so rauch appeared as seeraed to re appear, and to find in the beholder's conscious ness a sense of what that divine prospect raust have been when the eye of the white raan first gazed upon it. The landscape had got back 265 THE NIAGARA BOOK. something of its youth, and in ray joy in it I got back something of mine. I do not say that I got rauch. At fifty, one is at least not twice as young as at twenty-five. But I was very fairly young again when I came to Niagara in the raidwinter of ray raidwinter year, and I was certainly as impatient as I could have been a quarter of a century earlier to see the ice-bridge below the Falls and the ice-cone that their breath had formed ; in fact, I had waited a good deal longer to see them. Shall I own that at first sight these were a disappointment? . At first sight the Falls themselves are a disappointment, for we come to thera with something other than the image of their grand and siraple adequacy in our rainds, and seek to raatch thera with that dis- terapered invention of the ignorant fancy. I had supposed the ice-cone was a sharp peak, jutting up in front of the Cataract, not reflect ing that it must.be what it always is, a rounded knoll, built up finely, finely, slowly, slowly, out of the spectral shapes of mist, seized by the frost and flung down upon the frozen river. When you remeraber that this ice-cone is formed of the innumerable falls of these ghosts, 266 THE BREAKING OF THE ICE BRIDGE. Photographs by H, Wilson Saunders. THE ICE BRIDGE. NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. I think one ought to be content with the Roraanesque dome-shape of the mound, how ever Gothic one's expectation may have been. I do not deny that I should still prefer the pin nacle, but that is because I prefer Gothic archi tecture; and I advise the reader not to hope for it. If he has a pleasure in delicate decoration, the closely stippled slopes of the ice-cone will give it to him; it is like that fine jeweU^r's work on the grain of dead gold where the whole sur face is fretted with infinitesiraal points. When these catch the sun of such a blue midwinter sky as lifted its speckless arch above the ice- cone on the day I saw it, the effect is all that one has a right to ask of mere nature. I am trying to hint that I would have built the ice- cone somewhat differently, if it had been left to me, but that I am not hypercritical. If it seems a little low, a Httle lumpish in the retro spect, still it has its great qualities, which I should be the last in refusing to recognize. The name ice-bridge had deceived rae, but the ice-bridge did not finally disappoint rae. It is not a bridge at all. It is the channel of the river blocked as far as the eye can see do\yn the gorge with huge squares and oblongs of 267 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ice, or of frozen snow, as they seem, and giving a realizing effect to all the remembered pic tures of arctic scenery. This was curiously heightened by some people with sleds araong the crowds, making their way through the ice pack from shore to shore; there wanted only the fierce dash of some Esquimaux dog-team and the impression would have been perfect. It was best to look down upon it all from the cHffs, when at times the effect was more than arctic, when it was lunar: you could fancy yourself gazing upon the face of a dead world, or rather a plaster raask of it, with these small black figures of people crawling over it like flies. It was perfectly still that day, and in spite of the diapason of the Falls, an inner si lence possessed the air. From the cliffs along the river the cedars thrust outward, armored in plates of ice, like the irameraorial effigies of old-time warriors, and every cascade that had flung its bannerol of mist to the summer air, was now furled to the face of the rock and frozen fast. Again a sense of the repose, which is the secret of Niagara's charm, filled me. There was repose even in the peculiar traffic of Niagara when we penetrated to a shop de- 268 NIAGARA, FIRST AND LAST. voted to the sale of its bric-a-brac for some photographs of the winter scenery, and we fancied a weird surprise and a certain statu esque reluctance in the dealer. But this may have been merely our fancy. I would insist only upon the mute imraobility of the birds on the feather fans behind the glazed shelves, and a mystical remoteness in the Japanese objects mingled with the fabrics of our own Indians and the imported feldspar cups and vases. Our train went back to Buffalo through the early winter sunset, crimson and crimsoner over the rapids, and then purple over the ice where the river began to be frozen again. This color was so intense that the particles of ice along the brink were like a wilding growth of violets — those candied violets you see at the confectioner's. 269 AS IT RUSHES BY. By E. S. Martin. The great Northwest has two ways of reach ing tide-water. It filters down the Mississippi, losing impetus as it goes southward, until, too much enervated to dig itself a channel, it rolls sluggishly on between artificial levees and slips unobtrusively into the Gulf by a dozen different passages. The farther south it goes the more irresponsible it becomes and the more need it has of assistance. To get it safely emptied is a constant care, calling for perpet ual labor and Congressional appropriations. At fhe least neglect it slops lazily over, and settles down on the surrounding country. How differently it cOmes East, navigating the great western lakes one after another, and finally crowding impetuously into the Niagara River and over its precipice with a roar and a jarring crash, and then out through Ontario and the swift St. Lawrence to the Ocean! 270 AS IT RUSHES BY. Journeying southward it blends imperceptibly with the region it traverses, so that it is hard to say where the West leaves off and the South begins. But it drops down upon the East with an enormous plunge that leaves no doubt of the whereabouts of the line of demarcation. Beyond Niagara is the West. Here the East begins, equal to the West in energy and vim, but different. The West never merges with the East as it does with the South. It coraes to Niagara in overwhelming force and thun ders at its gates, and then rolls off northeast erly and out through the British provinces. It asks nothing of man except to be let alone. It has dug its own channel with its own tools, and forraed itself a basin of ample size to hold it. It is responsible, self-reHant, fully able to take care of itself, and ever ready to do any odd jobs that offer as it surges along. It seems to gather energy frora the invigorating influences that raeet it in its progress. Colonel IngersoU carae to Niagara one day and looked at the tribute of the great North west as it surged by, and said : " Niagara FaUs is a dangerous place." There was disparagement in the Colonel's 271 THE NIAGARA BOOK. tone, and disparagement is something to which Niagara is not much used. Whatever native it was that heard him stared and asked : " Do you mean the hackmen ? " " No ! " said the eminent orator. " I mean those great rushing waters. There is nothing attractive to me in thera. They are really dan gerous. There is so much noise; so much tumult. It is simply a mighty force of nature, one of those tremendous powers which is to be feared for its danger." The native's eyebrows went up at that. It is true enough that the Niagara River is not one that a cautious person would care to navi gate, particularly above the Falls, but the Colonel, though not anchored to anything, was at least on firm land. The reflection sug gested itself, that he had imperfectly diagnosed his own sensations, and that his dissatisfaction, which was obviously genuine, really sprung from the traditional disagreement of two of a trade. How could an orator be edified by a tone besides which his own best utterance was but a squeak? To make impressions is the orator's business, not to receive them. But at Niagara, Nature does the talking and has her 272 AS IT RVSHES BT. say out, and man's part is to listen and to di gest. It was a high compliment that the great talker paid to the river by his instinctive dis approval, and perfectly consistent with his point of view were his continuing remarks : " What I Hke in Nature is a cultivated field where men can work in the free, open air; where there is quiet and repose, not turraoil, strife, turault, fearful roar, or struggle for raas- tery. I do not like the crowded, stuffy work shop where life is a slavery and drudgery, where men are slaves. Give rae the calra, cultivated land of waving grain, of flowers, of happiness." So spoke the raan of superabundant energy, not unnaturally perferring scenes that seem to require some stirring up to those where all the requisite agitation coraes ready furnished to hand. It is true that to the professional regu lator, Niagara bristles with discourageraent. There is comparatively Httle left there for man to do. To keep his hands off and let Nature take her course is the chief boon that is asked of him. But it is about the last place in the world to be compared to a stuffy workshop where men are slaves. Indeed, the very pith i8 273 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of its contrast to the " cultivated land of wav ing grain " lies in the absence here of con spicuous signs of huraan labor. Work was traditionally imposed upon raan for his sins. Even if the natural man is not rightfully lazy, he is at least entitled to love leisure, and prefer the rainiraum of toil. Surely Niagara is fit to refresh his jaded spirit. If he sighs at the foot of the Pyramids to think of the vast industry that was the cost of their construction, he is conversely entitled to exult at the resistless might ofthe Niagara River emptying its floods into its self-chiselled gorge. Only the planets wandering in their courses, harnessed to the sun, are so fit to stir an exultation of repose. Laborious raan sits on our river's brink and nteditates on the great spectacle of labor saved. The Falls must go themselves. Within the tnemory of man it has never been found needful even in the dryest times to operate them by artificial means. In sight or out of sight there is no apparatus for pumping water back into Lake Erie to keep the Cataract go ing. Neither has it ever been found necessary to dam the lake to keep the water from run ning out, nor to bail it out to keep it from run- 274 Ul Photograph l.iy Nielson. THE CWE OF THE WINDS IN WINTER. AS IT RVSHES BY. ning over. Nature has done everything. The lake is always full, the river never ceases to drain it. The precipice that the torrent goes over is not absolutely permanent or changeless, but Hke the rest of the appara tus it takes care of itself, asking nothing of man but to stand from under when its fea tures shift. The great lesson of Niagara is to maintain a respectful attitude towards Nature. She is irresistible; not to be thwarted, not to be turned aside. It is our affair to study her courses, to get out of her way when she wants the whole road, and to make her do our work by the simple expedient of raaking our desires consistent with her raethods. In this feature of the Falls He their special adaptation to be gazed upon by young per sons who have just entered the raarried state and assuraed the more serious burdens of life. It is not accident that brings the newly mar ried to Niagara. It is instinct. It is good for thera to be here, and some subtle influence has taught them to know it. Seeking for enter tainment not to be laboriously won, but of a sort that stimulates the faculties while it pro- 275 THE NIAGARA BOOK. motes reflection, they find it here. The river entertains them. It speaks to them in contin uous discourse without exacting any reply. It distracts their attention gently from one an other, which is a kindness, and when they speak together it prevents alien ears from overhearing what they say. It is uniformly, kind to them — so long as they hug the bank — and then it gives thera so raany useful points for the shaping of their future destinies! It teaches them to let things slide when opposi tion wiU do no good. It stands to them for the resistless stream of life which sweeps us all over its falls first or last, so that it pays us to float tranquilly while we may and not mar so brief a passage with altercation. The in dividuality of so impetuous a flood can hardly fail to make its impression on them, suggest ing that every individuality, even that of a married woman, has a right to its own devel opment, and comes swifter and safer to a tran quil haven if left reasonably free to follow out its natural course. But only dense raen bully their wives any way, and possibly such men are too impervious to instruction to gather the wisdom of Niagara 276 AS IT RVSHES BY. as it rushes by. But its wisdom is always there for those who can seize it, and for all coraing time its banks promise to be trod by men and women who have need at least to try. 277 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAG ARA FALLS. By Rev. Thomas R. Slicer. The earliest description in Hterature of the FaUs of Niagara was raade by the priest and historian Father Hennepin, the associate of the explorer La Salle, who built, in 1679, the Griffin, to which appertains the honor of being the first vessel to sail the Great Lakes. The reference is entitled " A description of the Fall of the River Niagara which is to be seen betwixt the Lake Ontario and that of Erie." We give the commonly accepted version : " Betwixt the Lake Ontario and Erie, there is a vast and prodigious Cadence of Water, which falls down after a surprising and aston ishing manner, insomuch that the Universe does not afford its parallel. 'Tis true, Italy and Suedeland boast of some such things; but 278 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. we may well say they are but sorry patterns, when compared to this of which we now speak. At the foot of this horrible Precipice, we meet with the River Niagara, which is not above a quarter of a league broad, but is wonderfully deep in some places. It is so rapid above this Descent, that it violently hurries down the wild beasts while endeavoring to pass it to feed on the other side, they not being able to with stand the force of its Current which inevitably casts them headlong above six hundred feet high. " This wonderful Downfall is compounded of two cross-streams of Water, and two Falls, with an isle sloping along the middle of it. The waters which fall from this horrible Preci pice do foam and boyl after the most hideous manner imaginable, making an outrageous noise, more terrible than that of Thunder; for when the wind blows out of the South, their disraal roaring may be heard more than Fif teen Leagues off. " The River Niagara having thrown itself down this incredible Precipice, continues its impetuous course for Two Leagues together, to the great Rock above mentioned, with inex- 279 THE NIAGARA BOOK. pressible rapidity. But having passed that, its irapetuosity relents, gliding along more gently for the other Two Leagues, till it arrives at the Lake Ontario or Frontenac. " Any Bark or greater Vessel may pass from the Fort to the foot of this huge Rock above mentioned. This Rock Hes to the Westward, and is cut off from the Land by the River Ni agara about Two Leagues farther down than the great Fall, for which Two Leagues the people are obliged to transport their goods overland; but the way is very good, and the Trees are very few, chiefly Firs and Oakes. " From the great Fall unto this Rock, which is to the West of the River, the two brinks of it are so prodigious high, that it would make one tremble to look steadily upon the water, rolling along with a rapidity not to be ira agined. Were it not for this vast Cataract, which interrupts Navigation, they raight saU with Barks or greater Vessels, raore than Four Hundred and Fifty Leagues, crossing the Lake of Hurons, and reaching even to the farther end of the Lake of Illinois, which two Lakes we may easily say are Httle Seas of fresh Water." 280 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. There are other accounts by Tonti, Hontan, and other early voyagers, but they are not especially to the purpose of this recital. At the beginning of the present century, there limped, with an ankle sprained, to the shores of Lake Erie, from the borders of the forest, a young Englishman, whose tastes and conceit were in strong contrast to the primitive simplicity of the scene on which he entered. Perhaps no greater tribute has ever been paid to the charm of the Falls of Niagara than is suggested by the fact that they reconciled the raind of Tom Moore to the disgusting ex periences of travel in America, where, to his thinking, the promiscuous huddling together of all sorts of people in the stage-coaches was a symbol of the mixed character of a Republi can Government. A raan who had been petted by an indulgent faraily and flattered by a social circle, which sang his songs and laughed at his wit, found the unsettled society of the New World not easy to adjust to his fastidious taste ; he had done us the honor to look over our country, and had served it up in his letters as " an interesting world, which with all the defects and disgusting peculiarities of its na- 281 THE NIAGARA BOOK. tives, gives every promise of no very distant competition with the first powers of the East ern heraisphere." When the vaUeys of the Mohawk and the Genesee had been traversed, Moore was so rauch touched by their natural beauty that he exclairas : " Such scenery as there is around me ! it is quite dreadful that any heart, born for sublimities, should be doomed to breathe away its hours araidst the rainiature productions of this world, without seeing what shapes nature can assume, what wonders God can give birth to." But he had not yet seen the Falls. He is about to start upon his journey to the FaUs of Niagara in a wagon. On July 22d he sends back by the driver of the wagon a letter to be forwarded to his mother, written from upper Chippewa : " Just arrived within a mile and a half of the FaUs of Niagara, and their tremen dous roar at this moment sounding in my ears." Two days later he writes : " I have seen the Falls, and ara all rapture and araazeraent. . . . Arrived at Chippewa within three railes of the Falls to dinner Saturday, July 2 1 St. That evemng walked toward the Falls, 282 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. but got no further than the Rapids, which gave us a prelibation of the grandeur we had to expect. " Next day, Sunday, July 22d, went to visit the Falls. Never shall I forget the impres sions I felt at the first glimpse of them which we got as the carriage passed over the hill that overlooks thera. We were not near enough to be agitated by the terrific effects of the scene, but saw through the trees this raighty flow of waters descending with calra mag nificence, and received enough of its grandeur to set iraagination on the wing; imagination which even at Niagara can outrun reality. " I felt as if approaching the very residence of the Deity; the tears started into my eyes; and I remained for moraents after we had lost sight of the scene, in that dehcious absorption which pious enthusiasra alone can produce. We arrived at the New Ladder and descended to the bottom. Here all its awful sublimities rushed full upon me. But the former ex quisite sensation was gone. I now saw all. The string that had been touched by the first impulse, and which fancy would have kept for ever in vibration, now rested at Reahty. Yet 283 THE NIAGARA BOOK. though there was no more to imagine, there was much to feel. My whole heart and soul ascended toward the Divinity in a swell of de vout admiration, which I never before ex perienced. . . . Oh! bring the Atheist here, and he cannot return an Atheist ! " The chief value of these attempts at descrip tion is not that they describe or fail to describe this natural phenomenon, but that they do de scribe the mind of the beholder; for it is ever a fact that when a great subject is dealt with by the huraan mind we get a double lesson; if the mind be competent we get a description of the subject, but in any event we get a portrait of the raind. In no instance does this more ap pear than in the contrasting way in which Ni agara clairaed the attention of three noted woraen: Mrs. Jameson, Harriet Martineau, and Margaret Fuller. One would suppose that Mrs. Jameson's sense of beauty in art would have prepared her mind for at least an esctasy; or was it that her mind, already winged for the flights of imagination, and used to deal ing with art-forms in the galleries of Europe, did not find it easy to place itself en rapport 284 Photograph by Curtis. MOONLIGHT. FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. with a canvas so large as that on which the beauties of Niagara are painted by an unseen hand, in colors which are never two moments alike. Whatever raay be the psychological reason, it is necessary to relate that Mrs. Jameson would rather not have seen Niagara. It was in 1837 that her visit was made to the Falls in the last part of January of that year. When she had stood face to face with them she exclairas : " Well, I have seen these cataracts of Niagara which have thundered in ray raind's ear ever since I can remember — which have been my childhood's thought, my youth's de sire, since first my imagination was awakened to wonder and to wish. I have beheld thera, and shaU I whisper it to you — but, O tell it not araong the Philistines — I wish I had not ! I wish they were still a thing to behold, a thing to be iraagined, hoped, and anticipated, sorae thing to live for — the reality has displaced frora ray mind an illusion far more raagnificent than itself. I have no words for my disap pointment, yet I have not the presumption to suppose that all I have heard and read of Niagara is false or exaggerated — that every expression of astonishment, enthusiasm, rap- 285 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ture is affectation or hyperbole. No; it must be my own fault. Terni, and some of the Swiss cataracts leaping from their mountains, have affected me a thousand times raore than all the immensity of Niagara. Oh, I could beat myself, and now there is no help — the first moraent, the first impression, is over — is lost; something is gone that cannot be re stored. What has come over my soul and senses? I ara no longer Anna — I am meta morphosed — I ara translated — I ara an ass's head, a clod, a wooden spoon, a fat weed grow ing on Lethe's bank, a stock, a stone, a petri faction, for have I not seen Niagara, the won der of wonders, and felt — no words can tell what disappointraent ! " My Imagination had been so impressed by the vast height of the FaUs that I was con stantly looking in an upward direction, when, as we came to the brow of the hill, my com panion suddenly checked the horses, and ex clairaed, ' The Falls ! ' I was not for an in stant aware of their presence ; we were yet at a distance looking down upon thera; and I saw at one glance a flat, extensive plain; the sun having withdrawn its beams for a moment, 286 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. there was neither Hght nor shade nor color. In the midst were seen the two great cataracts, but merely as a feature in the wide landscape. The sound was by no means overpowering. And the clouds of spray which Fannie Butler called so beautifully the ' everlasting incense of the waters,' now condensed, ere they rose, by the excessive cold, fell round the base of the cataracts in fleecy folds, just concealing that furious embrace of the waters above and the waters below. " All the associations which in imagination I had gathered round the scene, its appalling terrors, its soul-subduing beauty, power, and height, and velocity, and iraraenslty, were aU diminished in effect, or wholly lost. I was quite silent — my soul sank within me." It would seem from the account of Mrs. Jaraeson that she had a most practical mind, for she was evidently dehghted by the fact that a " Httle Yankee boy, with a shrewd, sharp face and twinkling black eyes, could not palm off a flock of gulls on her for eagles." The one sense of comfort that visited her arises from the fact that though the FaUs were not complementary to her mood, the smart boy was complimentary 287 THE NIAGARA BOOK. to her smartness, saying. " Well, now you be dreadful smart — smarter than many folks that come here." She tried the Falls from every point and found them from every point of view equally trying, and confesses at last, " The FaUs did not make on my mind the im pression that I had anticipated, perhaps for that reason, even because I had anticipated it; but ' it was sung to me in my cradle,' as the Gerraans say, that I should live to be disap pointed even in the Falls of Niagara." No two woraen could have been more un like than Mrs. Jameson and Margaret Fuller, and yet one is haunted with the feehng that although Mrs. Jaraeson has so eloquently de scribed " Art, sacred and legendary," Mar garet Fuller was no less than Mrs. Jameson a soul sensitive to all influences of Art; but she lifts her eyes to the great Cataract and sees it by the Hght that fell from the mysterious and sacred centre of her own impenetrable soul. She says : * " The spectacle is, for once, great enough to fill the whole life, and supersede thought, giving us only its own presence. ' It * " At Home and Aboard ; or, Things and Thoughts in America and Europe." 288 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. is good to be here ' is the best as it is the sim plest expression that occurs to the mind," and adds further : " So great a sight soon satisfies, making us content with itself and with what is less than itself. Our desires once realized, haunt us again less readily. Having ' Hved one day,' we would depart and become worthy to Hve another. My nerves, too rauch braced up by such an atmosphere, do not well bear the continual stress of sight and sound. For here there is no escape from the weight of per petual creation; all other forras and raotions corae and go, the tide rises and recedes, the wind, at its raightiest, moves in gales and gusts, but there is really an incessant, an in defatigable mo.tion. Awake or asleep, there is no escape; still this rushing round you and through you. It is in this way I have most felt the grandeur — something eternal, if not infinite. " At times a secondary rausic arises ; the Cataract seems to seize its own rhythm and sing it over again so that the ear and soul are roused by a double vibration. This is sorae effect of the wind, causing echoes to the thun dering anthem. It is very sublirae, giving the 19 289 THE NIAGARA BOOK. effect of a spiritual repetition through all the spheres." Margaret Fuller speaks of Niagara as " the one object in the world that would not dis appoint." She says of the Falls : " Daily their propor tions widened and towered upon my sight, and I got, at last, a proper foreground for these sublime distances. Before coming away I think I really saw the full wonder of the scene. After a while it so drew me into itself as to inspire an undefined dread, such as I never knew before, such as may be felt when death is about to usher us into a new existence. The perpetual trampling of the waters seized my senses. I felt that no other sound, however near, could be heard, and would start and look behind me for a foe." I realized the identity of that mood of nature in which these waters were poured down with absorbing force, with that in which the Indian was shaped on the sarae soU." There is a touch of nature in Margaret Ful ler's confession, " The Whirlpool I like very rauch." She was quite capable of making her friends feel that she could be as " sternly 290 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. solemn," as impenetrable to the eye as the Whirlpool itself. The poetic side of her na ture was satisfied with the beautiful forest on Goat Island and that wealth of wild flowers of which it was said by Sir Joseph Hooker, that more varieties were to be found on Goat Isl and than anywhere else in Araerica in the sarae expanse of wildwood. Harriet Martineau's impressions were de rived frora a point not described by either of the other women before named. It was on her second visit to Niagara that we have frora her a description of her sensations in passing behind the American Fall. Miss Martineau says: " Frora the raoment that I perceived that we were actually behind the Cataract and not in a mere cloud of spray, the enjoyment was intense. I not only saw the watery curtain before me like the terapest- driven snow, but by raoraentary glances could see the crystal roof of one of the most wonder ful of Nature's palaces. The precise point at which the flood quitted the rock was marked by a gush of silvery light, which, of course, was brighter where the waters were shooting for ward, than below where they fell perpendicu- 2gi THE NIAGARA BOOK. larly." She then describes quite graphically her successful effort to reach Terraination Rock. We turn now to another English mind, in terested in an intense way in human welfare, interested as Miss Martineau was, but how different in the expression of that interest ! It is a strange contrast which it exhibits in pres ence of the great flood. The raind that created Mr. Pickwick and David Copperfield will have something to say original even about Niagara. But Dickens was at heart a poet. His fiction was, perhaps, exaggeration of the facts, but the facts were forever fixed by it; and brought face to face with Nature in such aspects as make the mighty Cataract, we should expect to have called out from his soul that religious response which raystery and majesty never failed to evoke; and we are not disappointed. He says : " Whenever the train halted I listened for the roar, and was constantly straining ray eyes in the direction where I knew the FaUs raust be, from seeing the river rolling on toward them; every moment expecting to be hold the spray. Within a few minutes of our 292 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. stopping, not before, I saw two great white clouds rising up slowly and majestically from the depths of the earth. That was all. At length we ahghted, and then for the first time I heard the mighty rush of water and felt the ground tremble under ray feet." He climbed down the steep and slippery bank, raade un- secure to the foot by rain and half-melted ice, to face the Fall, but was not content with this view. A little ferryboat that then plied from one side to the other carried him and his party across the river below the FaUs, while he was more and more astounded by the vastness of the scene. He says : " It was not until I carae on Table Rock and looked, great Heaven ! on what a fall of bright green water — that it carae upon me in its full majesty. Then I felt how near to my Creator I was standing; the first effect, and the enduring one, instant and last ing, of the tremendous spectacle, was peace. Peace of mind, tranquillity, calra recoUections of the dead, great thoughts of eternal rest and happiness ; nothing of gloora or terror. Niag ara was at once stamped upon ray heart, an image of beauty, to reraain there, changeless and indelible, until its pulses cease to beat for- 293 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ever. I never stirred in all that time from the Canadian side whither I had gone at first. I never crossed the river again; for I knew there were people on. the other shore, and in such a place it is natural to shun strange company.* To wander to and fro all day and see the cata racts from all points of view; to stand upon the edge of the great Horse Shoe Fall, mark ing the hurried water gathering strength as it approached the verge, yet seeraing, too, to pause before it shot into the gulf below; to gaze frora the river's level up at the torrent as it came streaming down; to climb the neigh boring heights and watch it through the trees, and see the wreathing water in the rapids, hurrying on to take its fearful plunge; to lin ger in the shadow of the solemn rocks three miles below, watching the river as, stirred by no visible cause, it heaved and eddied and awoke the echoes, being troubled yet far down beneath the surface, by its giant leap; to have Niagara before rae, lighted by the sun and the moon, red in the day's decline, and gray as * The contrast in this particular between Diclcens and N. P. Willis opens up an interesting chapter in the natural differ ences in literary temperament as it deals with human life. 294 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. evening slowly feU upon it; to look upon it every day, and wake up in the night and hear its ceaseless voice, this was enough. I think, in every quiet season now, still do those waters roll and leap and roar and tumble all day long; still are the rainbows spanning them a hun dred feet below. Still when the sun is on them do they shine and glow like molten gold. Still when the day is gloomy do they fall like snow, or seera to crumble away like the front of a great chalk cliff, or roll down the rock like dense white smoke. But always does this raighty stream appear to die as it comes down, and always from its unfathomable grave arises that tremendous ghost of spray and mist, which is never laid; which has haunted this place with the same dread solemnity since darkness brooded on the deep, and that first flood before the deluge — light — came rushing on Creation at the word of God." Nothing could be more characteristic of that strange commingling of wonder and re serve in a human nature than the way in which Hawthorne came toward, and yet not quite to the FaUs again and again. He says : " I had liHgered away frora it and wandered to other 295 THE NIAGARA BOOK. scenes. My treasury of anticipated enjoy ments comprising all the wonders of the world had nothing else so magnificent; I was loath to exchange the pleasures of hope for those of memory so soon." There was nothing of the severe Yankee temperament in Hawthorne's attitude toward this great scene; it was rather that infusion of French self-indulgence which made him dread to count a delight, as a thing he had had. He says : " At length the day carae, I walked toward Goat Island and crossed the bridge; above and below rae were the rapids, a river of impetuous snow, with here and there a dark rock amid its whiteness, resisting all the physical fury as any cold spirit did the moral influences of the scene." We raay go with Hawthorne along the path if we will. " On reaching Goat Island, which separates the two great segments of the Falls, I chose the right hand path and followed it to the edge of the American Cascade; there, while the faUing sheet was yet invisible, I saw the vapor that never vanishes and the eternal rainbow of Niagara. I gained an insulated rock and observed a broad sheet of briUiant and unbroken foam, not shooting in a curved 296 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. line frora the top of the precipice, but falHng headlong down from height to depth." When Hawthorne had made the round of the island and had seen the Falls from every available coign of vantage, he stops, as was his custom, to take an account of his mental sensations. " Were ray long desires fulfilled, and have I seen Niagara? But would I had never heard of Niagara until I beheld it ! Blessed were the wanderers of old, who heard its deep roar sounding through th-e woods as a summons to its unknown wonder, and approached its awful brink in all the freshness of native feel ing; had its own raysterious voice been the first to warn me of its existence, then, indeed, I might have fallen down and worshipped; but I had come haunted with a vision of foam and fury and dizzy cliffs, and an ocean turabling down out of the sky — a scene, in short, which Nature had too rauch good taste and calm sim pUcity to realize. My mind had struggled to adapt these false aspects to the reality, and finding the effort vain, a wretched sense of dis appointraent weighed rae down. I climbed the precipice and threw myself on the earth, feeling that I was unworthy to look at the 297 THE NIAGARA BOOK. great Falls and careless about observing them again." It would be strange, indeed, if the author of " Twice-Told Tales " did not find some " wonder " in this repetition to hira in other terras of that which he had already im agined. So he says of the night which suc ceeded the first day visit : " As there has been, and may be for ages to come, a rushing sound was heard, as if a great terapest was sweeping through the air. It raingled in my dreams and made them full of storm and whirlwind. Whenever I awoke I heard this dread sound in the air, and the windows rattling as with a mighty blast. I could not rest again until, looking forth, I saw how bright the stars were and that every leaf in the garden was motion less. Never was summer night more calm to the eye, nor a gale of autumn louder to the ear. The rushing sound proceeds from the rapids and the rattling of the casements is but an effect of the vibration of the whole house shaken by the jar of the Cataract. The noise of the Rapids draws the attention from the true voice of Niagara, which is a dull, muffled thunder, re sounding between the cliffs. I spent a wake ful hour at midnight in distinguishing between 298 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. its reverberations, and rejoiced to find that ray former awe and enthusiasm were reviving. " GraduaUy, and after much contemplation, I carae to know by my own feelings that Niag ara is indeed a wonder of the world, and not the less wonderful because time and thought must be employed in comprehending it." And here follows the sanest advice to those who have felt at first the sense of disappointment that the Cataract is not so great as they had conceived : " Casting aside all preconceived notions and preparation to be awe-struck or delighted, the beholder raust stand beside it in the simplicity of his heart, suffering the raighty scene to work its own impression. Night after night I dreamed of it, and was gladdened every raorning by the sensations of growing capacity to enjoy it." This description by Hawthorne, from which these brief quotations have been made, con tains nothing truer to a fine nature than that in which he states his last irapressions of the FaUs : " I sat upon Table Rock ; never before had ray raind been in such perfect unison with the scene. There were intervals when I was conscious of nothing but the great river roU- 299 THE NIAGARA BOOK. ing calmly into the abyss; rather descending than precipitating itself, and acquiring tenfold majesty from its hurried motion. It came like the raarch of destiny; it was not taken by sur prise, but seemed to have anticipated in all its course through the broad lakes that it must pour their collected waters down this height." The impression made by the water where it falls is noted by Hawthorne and by few be sides — the stillness with which it slips away from the stroke of the Cataract, seeming scarcely to move in its eddies, which are only the slight surface of the great depth of waters in the narrow gorge into which it falls. He says of this: "When the observer has stood still and perceived no lull in the storra and stress, that the vapor and the foam are as ever lasting as the rock which produces them, all this turmoil assumes a sort of calmness; it soothes while it awes the mind." Hawthorne is quite right in feeling that Ni agara cannot be seen in " company " or wor shipped by platoons; for one wants to steal to some unobserved retreat from which to look out and feel, as he says, " The enjoyment which becomes rapture, more rapturous be- 300 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. cause no poet shared it, nor wretch devoid of poetry profaned it ; the spot so faraous through the world was all mine." This sarae feeling was shared by Charles Kingsley. He says: " I long to simply look on in silence whole days at the exquisite beauty of form and color." To Dean Stanley the first sight of the Falls seemed " an epoch, like the first view of the pyramids, or the snow-clad range of the Alps." His first view of it was at raidnight under a full raoon. To him it seeraed an " emblem of the devouring activity and ceaseless, restless, beating whirlpool of existence in the United States. But into the moonlight sky there rose a cloud of spray twice as high as the FaUs theraselves, silent, majestic, immovable. In that silver column, glittering in the moonlight, I saw an image of the future of Araerican des tiny, of the pillar of light which should emerge from the distractions of the present — a like ness of the buoyancy and hopefulness which characterizes you, both as individuals and as a nation." Professor Tyndall's raind had not been robbed of its sentiraent by the rainute contem^ 301 THE NIAGARA BOOK. plation of incident and detail, as Darwin suf fered an atrophy in the appreciation of poetry, as he himself confesses. It is to Professor Tyndall we owe this bit of poetic prose in which he describes the Whirlpool : " The scene presented itself as one of holy seclusion and beauty. I went down to the water's edge, where the weird lonehness and loveliness seem to increase. The basin is enclosed by high and almost precipitous banks, covered, when I was there, with russet woods. A kind of mys tery attaches to gyrating water, due, perhaps, to the fact that we are to sorae extent ignorant of the direction of its force. It is said that at a certain point in the Whirlpool pine trees are sucked down to be ejected mysteriously else where. The water is the brightest emerald green ; the gorge through which it escapes is narrow and the motion of the river swift though silent; the surface is steeply inclined, but it is perfectly unbroken. There are no lateral waves, no ripples, with their breaking bubbles, to raise a raurraur, while the depth is here too great to allow the inequality of the bed to ruffie the surface. Nothing can be more beautiful than this sloping, liquid mirror 302 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. formed by the Niagara in sliding from the Whirlpool." If one wishes to know the measure of the raind of N. P. Willis, he may gain it from WiUis's description of the Falls of Niagara. It does not suit our purpose to quote it here. It is the same mixture of poetry and comraon place, of incident and contact with people, that raade Mr. Willis the ideal magazine writer of that time. It is strange to note how different points seem to be the centre of focussed thought to different rainds. To Mrs. Trollope it was the centre of the Horse Shoe, which seemed " the most utterly inconceivable." " The faraous torrent converges there, as the heavy raass pours in, twisted, rolled, and curled together; it gives the idea of irresistible power such as no other object every conveyed to rae. The raighty caldron into which the deluge pours, the hundred silvery torrents congregated around its verge, the smooth and solemn raoveraent with which it rolls its raas sive volurae over the rock, the liquid emerald of its long unbroken waters, the fantastic wreaths which spring to meet it, and then the 303 THE NIAGARA BOOK. shadowy mist that veUs the horrors of the crash below, constitute a scene almost too enormous in its features for man to look upon." To Charles Dudley Warner it is at a differ ent point the mind pauses and feels its most irapressive moment. " Nowhere is the river so terrible as where it rushes, as if maddened by its narrow bondage, through the canon, flowing down the precipice and forced into this contracting space, it fumes and tosses and raves with a vindictive fury, driving on in a passion that has almost a human quahty in it; and restrained by the walls of stone from being destructive, it seems to rave at its own im potence, and when it reaches the Whirlpool it is like a hungry animal, returning and licking the shore for the prey it has missed." Prof. Richard Proctor is impressed by the terrible force of the Niagara at the same spot. Speaking of the fatal attempt of Captain Webb to swira the -Whirlpool Rapids he says: " He maybe did not know what a rough estimate of the energies at work in Niagara should have shown, that araid that mass of water which de scends from the basin below the FaUs to the 304 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. engulfing vortex of the Whirlpool, the body of the biggest and strongest living creature must be as powerless as a drop of water in mid- Atlantic." When Anthony Trollope assures us in his discussions upon novel-writing that all that a novelist needs is a table and chair with a bit of shoeraaker's wax upon the seat of it, we sus pect that he is only excusing his own volumin ous production. But he does not lack poetic inspiration, as the following quotations will show : " But we will go on at once to the glory and thunder and the raajesty, and the wrath of that upper hell of waters. We are still on Goat Island. Advancing beyond the path lead ing down to the lower Fall, we corae to that point of the island at which the waters of the raain river begin to descend. Go down to the end of the wooden bridge, seat yourself on the rail, and then sit till all the outer world is lost to you. There is no grander spot about Niag ara than this. The waters are absolutely around you. Here, seated on the rail of the bridge, you will not see the whole depth of the FaU. In looking at the grandest works of Na ture and of art, too, I fancy it is never well to 20 305 THE NIAGARA BOOK. see all. There should be something left to the imagination and much should be half con cealed in mystery. The greatest charm of a mountain range is that wild feeling, there must be something strange, unknown, desolate in those far-off valleys beyond. And so here, at Niagara, that converging rush of waters raay fall down, down at once into a hell of rivers, for what the eye can see. It is glorious to watch thera in their first curve over the rocks. They come green as a bank of emeralds; but with a fitful flying color, as though conscious that in one moment more they would be dashed into spray and rise into air pale as driven snow. The vapor rises high into the air and is gathered there, visible always as a perraanent white cloud over the cataract; but the bulk of the spray which fills the lower hol low of that horseshoe is like a tumult of snow. " This you will not fully see from your seat on the rail. The head of it rises ever and anon out of that caldron below, but the caldron itself will be invisible. It is ever so far down, far as your own iraagination can sink it. But your eyes will rest full upon the curve of the waters. The shape you will be looking at is that of a 306 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. horseshoe, but of a horseshoe rairaculously deep frora toe to heel; and this depth becoraes greater as you sit there. That which at first was only great and beautiful, becoraes gigantic and sublirae till the mind is at a loss to find an epithet for its own use. To realize Niagara you must sit there 'till you see nothing else than that which you have come to see. You will hear nothing else and think of nothing else. At length you wiU be at one with the turabling river before you. You will find yourself among the waters as though you be longed to thetn. The cool liquid green will run through your veins, and the voice of the Cataract will be the expression of your heart. You will fall, as the bright waters fall, rushing down into your new world with no hesitation and with no dismay; and you will rise again as the spray rises, bright, beautiful, and pure. " One of the great charras of Niagara con sists in this — that over and above that one great object of wonder and beauty, there is so rauch Httle loveliness; loveliness especially of water, I mean. There are little rivulets run ning here and there over little falls, with pen dant boughs above thera, and stones shining 307 THE NIAGARA BOOK. under their shallow depths. As the visitor stands and looks through the trees, the Rapids glitter before him, and then hide themselves behind islands. They glitter and sparkle in far distances under the bright foliage till the re membrance is lost and one knows not which way they run. " Of all the sights in this earth of ours which tourists travel to see — at least of all those which I have seen — I ara inclined to give the palra to Niagara. I know no other one thing so beautiful, so glorious, so powerful." When we know that Bayard Taylor visited the FaUs of Niagara we instantly desire to know what irapression was made upon a mind which had contemplated such a wide range and variety as this great traveller had seen and had elsewhere described. He thus brings his poetic imagination to the contemplation: " The picturesque shores of the river, the splendid green of the water, and the lofty line of the upper plateau in front, crowned with Brock's Monument, and divided by the dark yawning gorge of Niagara, form a fitting ves tibule to the grand adytum beyond. The chasra grows wider, deeper, and more precipi- 308 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. tons with every mile, until, having seen the Suspension Bridge apparently floating in mid air on your right, you look ahead, and two miles off you catch a glimpse of the emerald crest of Niagara, standing fast and fixed above its shifting chaos of snowy spray. " I have seen the Falls in all weathers and at all seasons, but to ray mind the winter view is most beautiful. I saw thera first in the hard winter of 1854, when a hundred cataracts of ice hung from the cliffs on either side, when the raasses of ice brought down frora Lake Erie were wedged together at the foot, uniting the shores with a rugged bridge, and when every twig and every tree and bush in Goat Island was overlaid an inch deep with a coat ing of solid crystal. The air was still and the sun shone in a cloudless sky. The green of the Fall, set in a landscape of sparkling silver, was infinitely more briUiant than in the sura mer, when it is balanced by the trees, and the rainbows were alraost too glorious for the eye to bear. I was not impressed by the sub Hraity of the scene nor even by its terror, but solely by the fascination of its wonderful beauty, a fascination which constantly terapted 309 THE NIAGARA BOOK. me to plunge into that sea of fused emerald and lose rayself in the dance of the rainbows. With each succeeding visit Niagara has grown in height, in power, in majesty, in solemnity; but I have seen its climax of beauty." Reference has been made in this writing to the reraarkable fact that the greater Araerican poets have not attempted to describe Niagara. The fact is easily discernible in their writings; but the cause of this apparent neglect of a therae which has tempted so many feebler singers must be sought in the laws of the hu raan raind as affected by the contact of that which transcends all rhythmic expression. It would seem that the greater the gift of expres sion for the less overpowering appeal of Na ture to the soul, the raore irapotent in this presence the poets have felt. There are not wanting, indeed, poeras about Niagara — there is one which flows like the river itself, un- damraed for forty thousand Hnes; and in some of these individual lines there are perhaps sev eral Hnes together which seem to catch the swing of the great Cataract; though at best they are a shrill piping to its raighty diapason; they are Hke the song of the wren on its banks. 310 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. Even Mrs. Sigourney's lines are felt by her to be inadequate : Ah, who can dare To lift the insect-trump of earthly hope, Or love, or sorrow, 'mid the peal sublime Of thy tremendous hymn ? Even Ocean shrinks Back from thy brotherhood and all his waves Retire abashed. For he doth sometimes seem To sleep like a spent laborer and recall His wearied billows from their vexing play, And lull them to a cradle calm ; but thou With everlasting, undecaying tide, Dost rest not, night or day.'' "Thou dost make the soul A wondering witness of thy majesty. And as it presses with delirious joy To pierce thy vestibule, dost chain its step, And tame its rapture with a humbling view Of its own nothingness, bidding it stand In the dread presence of the Invisible, As if to answer to its God through thee.'' These are perhaps the best of the lines written by Mrs. Sigourney; but their inade quacy is felt by any one who compares thera with a moment's recollection of his own feel ings in the presence they attempt to describe. 311 THE NIAGARA BOOK. The lines of Lord Morpeth are well known ; they seera raost raeraorable for the sincere ex pression of that good will which he hoped might ever subsist between the nations, his own and America : " Oh! may thy waves which madden in thy deep There spend their rage nor climb the encircling steep ; And till the conflict of thy surges cease The nations on thy banks repose in peace." There seeras to be a widespread conviction that the oft-quoted lines of John G. C. Brain- ard are " the noblest lines inspired by the great Cataract." They are notable as rising in the raind of a New England editor who had never seen the Falls, and are said to have been the work of a few moments — an improvisation : " The thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain While I look upward to thee. It would seem As if God poured thee from ' His hollow hand ' And hung his bow upon thine awful front, And spoke in that loud voice which seemed to him Who dwelt in Patmos for his Savior's sake ' The sound of many waters ' and had bade Thy flood to chronicle the ages back, And notch his cent'ries in the eternal rock. 312 FAMOUS VISITORS AT NIAGARA FALLS. " Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we That hear the question of that voice sublime ? Oh ! What are all the notes that ever rung From war's vain trumpet by thy thundering side ! Yea, what is all the riot man can make In his short life to thy unceasing roar ! And yet bold babbler, what art thou to Him Who drowned a world and heaped the waters far Above its loftiest mountains ? — a light wave That breaks and whispers of its Maker's might." There are many other expressions of those who from all parts of the world have matched the feebleness of speech against the stress of feehng; but we forbear to quote further. The extracts given above will prove sufficient for their purpose if they constitute a pleasure to the receptive raind, susceptible to the influ ences of the scene they visit, and if they prove a gentle warning to the too eager expression of words which so often hide rather than reveal thought. 313 THE NIAGARA BOOK. PART III. BUFFALO AND THE PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION. PLAN OF THB CITY OF BUFFALO. PART III. A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. All visitors to Niagara Falls during the summer of 1901 will wish also to see something of Buffalo, and of the Pan-American Exposition. The following pages give some brief general information, and mention a few of the things in Buffalo which a visitor will find most interesting, in different lines. For One Day in Buffalo. In the morning see the manuscripts in the Buffalo Library, back of the Soldiers' Monument, on Main Street, opposite Court Street ; then down Main Street two blocks to the Erie County Savings Bank building ; up Niagara Street one block to the D. S. Morgan build ing, for the view from the roof ; along Niagara Street one block to Franklin Street, then one block to the left to the City Hall (exterior only), and to the left again along Church Street past the Prudential building to St. Paul's Cathedral, seeing the interior (Erie Street en trance always open). Down Main Street again, a few steps, to the great Ellicott Square building, with its central court. One block back of the Ellicott Square building is the new post office, the tower of which may 317 THE NIAGARA BOOK. be well seen from the further Ellicott Square entrance. Then take car to the foot of Main Street, and take a small boat "up the creek and back" to see the com merce of Buffalo. Stop somewhere, if possible, and go on board a vessel unloading grain. In the afternoon drive "to the Front and around the Park." When approaching the Park tell the driver you wish to see the Crematory and the Red Jacket Monu ment. Or take one of the wagonette or automobile lines and ride up Delaware Avenue from Niagara Square to the Exposition Grounds. The City of Buffalo. The city of Buffalo has, by the census of 1900, a pop ulation of 352,387, standing eighth among the cities of the United States. It leads the world in its commerce in flour, wheat, coal, fresh fish, and sheep, and stands second only to Chicago in lumber. In cattle and in hogs, only Chicago and Kansas City exceed it. It is a centre for lithographing and railroad printing, and also for beer breweries, lard refining, meat packing, soap and starch. Its railroad yard facilities are the greatest in the world, and are being increased rapidly. The new steel plant at Stony Point has a capital of over twenty million dollars, and has already expended $1,500,000 for its land. In marine commerce, although the season is limited to six months, Buffalo is exceeded in tonnage only by London, Liverpool, Hamburg, New York, and Chicago. Better still, it is a city of homes. Strangers view with delight its shaded streets and spacious lawns, alike in the most and least fashionable quarters of the 318 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. city. Block houses are few and far between, and through wise preventive measures the more serious tenement-house evils have never been allowed to de velop. The climate in summer is delightful, and it is one of the healthiest cities in the country, with a limitless supply of pure water. It has one of the first free municipal bath houses in existence ; the Paris Exposition of 1900 has pronounced its crfiche the best managed in the world, and its new Albright Art Gallery will be unrivalled for its purposes. It has more miles of asphalt pavement than any other city, and is a paradise for bicyclers, who may be seen on its streets almost every day in the year. Socially it combines the cordiality of the West with the conservatism of the East, and in few large cities does money play so slight a part in social demarcations. Coal and food supplies are so low in price that it is one of the cheapest of the large cities in which to live. Although the city and surround ing country are very flat, with little of the picturesque, it has a beautiful series of parks in which to drive, the shores of Lake Erie and of the Niagara River are ac cessible after leaving the immediate suburbs, and Niagara Falls is but twenty miles away. A general view of the topography of the city and harbor may be had from the roof of the D. S. Morgan Building, Niagara and Pearl streets, or from the roof of the Lenox, on North Street, near Delaware. Buffalo River and Harbor. The visitor should on no account fail to see some thing ofthe commerce of Buffalo, its elevators and coal trestles, and he will be amazed at the muddy little stream 319 THE NIAGARA BOOK. the commerce of which, though restricted to the six months of the navigation season, is exceeded, as stated above, in this country only by New York artd Chicago, and abroad only by London, Liverpool, and Hamburg. The season's commerce of Buffalo in flour, grain and coal alone equals ten per cent, of the yearly foreign trade of the entire United States. Buffalo has thirty-two elevators in addition to floating or transfer elevators. It is exceedingly interesting to watch the steam shovels unloading a cargo of grain, and their rapidity is marvellous, sometimes reaching 25,000 bushels per hour. A steamer has entered port at 9.20 a.m., discharged 77,000 bushels of wheat, taken on 2,300 tons of coal, and been ready to sail at 7 P.M. The coal trestles on the Buffalo River and Harbor are the largest in the world, one of the Lackawanna Railroad exceeding a mile in length. The shipping facilities of Buffalo may be seen most easily by taking one of the small boats at the foot of Main Street, and going " up the creek " and back. Erie Canal. This canal, said to be the largest in existence except ing one in China, extends 348 miles, from Buffalo to Albany, and was completed in 1825, at an original cost of $9,000,000, being put through, with great ridicule and opposition, by Governor De Witt Clinton, and being nicknamed "Clinton's Big Ditch." It quickly paid for itself in tolls, and at once reduced the cost of getting a barrel of flour from Buffalo to Albany, from ten dollars in three weeks' time, to thirty cents and one week's time. Before the completion of the New York 320 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. Central Railroad it carried thousands of passengers and emigrants ; it now carries freight only. It has fifteen single locks and fifty-seven double, the working of which may be seen most effectively at Lockport, twenty- five miles from Buffalo. The canal may be seen most pleasantly in a drive to the Front; most easily upon Main Street, a block below the New York Central Railroad station; and most effec tively by going a short distance down Erie Street, as far as the Grand Trunk station, or by taking a Belt line train between the Exposition Grounds and the main New York Central station. Architectural Features. Among public buildings those best worth seeing arch itecturally are the new Post Office, Washington and Swan Streets ; the City Hall, Delaware Avenue and Eagle ; the 74th Regiment Armory (Lansing), Niagara and Prospect Streets, and the Buffalo State Insane Asylum (Richardson), immediately southwest of the Exposition Grounds. In banks, office buildings, etc., the Buffalo Savings Bank (Green & Wicks), at the corner of Main and Genesee Streets ; the small Bank of Commerce (Green & Wicks), Main Street, below Seneca ; the great Ellicott Square Building (Burnham), said to be the largest office building in the world, with 600 offices, 40 stores and 16 counting rooms ; the Erie County Savings Bank Building (Post), Main and Erie Streets, and the Prudential Building (Adler & Sullivan, Chicago), Pearl and Church Streets, the most handsomely finished office building in Buffalo. The Medical School of the 21 321 THE NIAGARA BOOK. University of Buffalo (George Cary), on High Street, a little to the east of Main Street, is a handsome and a well-equipped building. The Buffalo General Hospital is a short distance farther down the same street. Among private residences may be mentioned the four houses by McKim, Mead & White, three at the north west and one at the southwest corner of Delaware and North Streets ; the house of Truman G. Avery (New- comb, Boston), on the Circle ; the house and stable of William Hamlin (Marling & Burdett, Buffalo), 1058 Delaware Avenue, and that of George V. Forman (Green & Wicks), Delaware Avenue. Richardson has two houses in Buffalo — of W. H. Gratwick, 776 Dela ware Avenue, and George Bleistein, 438 Delaware Avenue. Churches, the Crematory, the Red Jacket Monument, etc., are mentioned under separate headings. A drive up Delaware Avenue from the Terrace to Ferry Street, with a digression down North Street and around the Circle, will show the best of the private architecture of Buffalo. Churches. Buffalo has some 200 churches. Those npted below as most desirable for a visitor to see are selected mainly for architectural reasons. St. Paul's Cathedral. — The cathedral church of the Episcopal diocese of western New York. It was built in 1850, of brown sandstone, and its beautiful spire rises to a height of 268 feet. It stands in the heart of the business district, at the corner of Main and Erie Streets. The interior is well worth seeing, and the side entrance, on Erie Street, is always open. 322 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. Temple Beth Zion. — On Delaware Avenue, between North and Allen Streets, and adjacent to the Twentieth Century Club. Built in 1890, the architects being Edward A. and William W. Kent, of Buffalo. It is of Medina brown sandstone, of Byzantine architecture with Romanesque features. The interior decoration ofthe great dome is unusual and very effective. Of especial interest is a tablet from the St. Paul's Episcopal congre gation, in commemoration of their use in 1888 of the for mer Beth Zion Synagogue, at a time when the Episco pal cathedral could not be used, through an explosion of natural gas. Another similar tablet is from the Delaware Avenue Baptist Society. Services are held in the Syn agogue on Saturdays at 10 a.m. and on Fridays at 7.30 P.M., to which the public are welcome. First Presbyterian Church. — On "The Circle," where North Street changes to Porter Avenue. Built in 1890, of Medina sandstone, the architects being Green & Wicks, of Buffalo. The high campanile is a landmark from long distances. The interior also is well worth seeing. St. Louis' Catholic Church (French and German). — At the corner of Main and Edward Streets. Its spire is especially worthy attention. St. Joseph's Cathedral. — Far down town, at the corner of Franklin and Swan Streets. It has a carillon of forty-three bells, but a small portion of which are in use. Delaware Avenue Baptist Church. — On Delaware Avenue, between Bryant and Utica Streets. Erected in 1894 at a cost of some $200,000. The interior is mag nificent. 323 TEE NIAGARA BOOK. St. Andrew's Episcopal Church. — Far over on the East Side, on Goodell Street, near Michigan. Notable for the extreme simplicity, severity and inexpensiveness of its construction, and for its very high church services. Buffalo Library. Centrally located, adjoining the little park in which stands the Soldiers' Monument, on Main Street, between Lafayette and Clinton. The library was started in 1836, the present building being erected in 1887. It was taken by the city as a free public library in 1897, and is notable for the enormous popular use which has developed since that date. Its cards are held by 65,703 citizens of Buffalo, and the number of books circulated in 1900 was 981,235. Although this total is exceeded by several libraries in this country, it is stated that in no other single building in the world is there so large a number of books given out per annum. A feature of the library is the open shelf room, in which over 19,000 carefully selected volumes are thrown open to full access and withdrawal by the public. The children's room, on the second floor, is always interesting, but has no especially distinctive features. On the main floor of the library is a remarkably fine collection of original manuscripts, by far the largest and most valuable in this country, excellently arranged under glass for inspection by visitors. They range in date from Melanchthon and Bacon to Emerson's Repre sentative Men (entire) and Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. One letter is from George Ticknor, introducing at length Charles Sumner to the poet Southey. Another is from John Bright to Theodore Tilton. Other names, 324 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. selected almost at random, are Miss Alcott, Aldrich, Bal zac, Beaconsfield, Beranger, Blake, Charlotte Bronte ; interesting unpublished letters from Robert Browning and Mrs. Browning, Bryant, Burke, Burns, Aaron Burr, Carlyle, Clay, Cleveland, Coleridge, Cooper, Cowper, Jefferson Davis, Dickens, Dryden, Dumas, George Eliot, Benjamin Franklin, Gladstone, Grant, Thomas Gray, Greeley, Bret Harte, Hawthorne, Heine, Hogg, Holmes, Hood, Howells, Hugo, Washington Irving, Sam John son, Keats, Lamartine, Lamb, Lincoln, Longfellow, Lowell, Lytton, Cardinal Newman, Macaulay, Poe, Pope, Reade, Richter, Rossetti, Rousseau, Ruskin, Scott, Shelley, Southey, Tennyson, Thoreau, Trollope, Voltaire, Washington, Webster, Whitman, Whittier, Wordsworth, etc. They are in no case autographs only, though some are of but a few lines. The library is open on Sundays from ii a.m. 109 P.M. In the same building are the Academy of Natural Science, the Buffalo Historical Society, which after 1901 will occupy the marble New York State building of the Pan-American Exposition, and the Academy of Fine Arts. All are free to the public. The Fine Arts Academy has some excellent pictures, a notable collection of etchings and, a good collection of casts. After 1901 it will be housed in the magnifi cent Albright Art Gallery. Grosvenor Library. A pleasant and quiet reference library of some 50,000 volumes, at the corner of Franklin and Edward Streets. Not open evenings. 325 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Mr. R. B. Adam has a noteworthy private library per taining to Johnson and Burns, and in lesser degree to Ruskin, which he is usually very glad to show to those especially interested. Washington Market. Those unfamiliar with city market stalls of this nature will find this quite unique. It is on Chippewa Street, but a block to the east of Main, and is open on Tues days, Thursdays, and Saturdays, the latter being the better day to choose. The little stalls, the carts, the bustling market women, all have a curiously foreign appearance. The Elk Street Market, at Elk, Perry, and Market Streets, is still larger, but less accessible. Wading Pond, Humboldt Park. This is a shallow pool of water 550 feet in diameter, with stone coping and sandy bottom, sloping gradually to a depth of only three feet at the centre. On pleasant afternoons or holidays, it is filled with wading children, some pushing baby carriages, and is a most picturesque and interesting sight. Its distances, great in them selves, seem still more enormous to children, and they get great pleasure from it, and from the general excite ment of the place. The park has other attractive fea tures, in fountains, aquatic plants, etc. It is about two miles from the centre of the city, and may be reached by the Genesee Street and Best Street cars. Forest Lawn Cemetery. An attractive spot, covering 267 acres of forest, lawn, and stream. It is immediately adjacent to the Park 326 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. Meadow and to the Pan-American Exposition grounds. The visitor should see, and can hardly fail to see, the statue of Red Jacket, erected by the Buffalo Historical Society to the memory ot the last chief of the once pow erful Seneca tribe. The monument should properly have been placed in the heart of the busy city, which would have given greatly added force to the inscription on the base, the words of Red Jacket himself: " When I am gone, and my warnings are no longer heeded, the craft and avarice of the white man will prevail. My heart fails me when I think of my people so soon to be scattered and forgotten." Near-by is the Blocher Monument, which Baedeker de scribes as " a piece of crude realism having strong local admirers." It shows, under a glass canopy, a young man upon his deathbed, with the father and mother, in life size, on either side, and an angel hover ing above. The monument to Francis W. Tracy, by Augustus St. Gaudens, is very simple, and is not apt to be found by the visitor unless by special inquiry. Crematory. This beautiful little building, of brown sandstone cov ered with English ivy, is on Forest Avenue, opposite the Forest Lawn Cemetery, and not far from the Pan- American grounds. It was built in 1885, the first cre mation taking place that year. Its use is now suffi ciently common to excite little or no comment. It contains a chapel for funeral services. Visitors are not allowed to see the process of incineration, but the method used is clearly explained and shown. 327 THE NIAGARA BOOK. Clubs. The chief social clubs ofthe city are as follows : Buffalo Club. — This is the representative club of the city, having over 400 members. It has a handsome club-house, at the corner of Delaware Avenue and Trinity Place, which is especially noticeable for its beau tiful natatorium and billiard room. Saturn Club. — A smaller and more exclusive club, at the corner of Delaware Avenue and Edward Street. The club is chiefly noted for its "no treating" rule, and for the unique and original nature of many of its entertainments and accessories. At one end of the large lounging hall is the motto, in wrought iron letters, from Izaak Walton's "Complete Angler," " Good Com pany and Good Discourse are the very Sinews of Vir tue," while at the other end of the hall, over the win dows, in much smaller letters,, is written, "Here the women cease from troubling and the wicked are at rest." The chief points of interest in the building are the large hall, running up through the two stories, with leaded glass windows opening into the library and corridors above, the handsome and well-equipped library on the Delaware Avenue front, the caf6, with its unique inscriptions, and the St. Patrick's Room in the base ment. University Club. — A pleasant club mainly of the younger college men, started in 1894, and at present occupying a former residence of the Hon. Wilson S. Bissell, 295 .Delaware Avenue, between Chippewa and Tupper Streets. Twentieth Century Club. — A woman's club, with a 328 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. very beautiful club house on Delaware Avenue, below North Street. The club house is rarely open evenings, but is much used through the day. It has a good li brary and reading room, music room, main court, and a concert hall which is often rented for entertainments. Its decorations and furnishings are artistic and quite unique. Country Club. — Of the usual nature, purposes and membership of country clubs. The club was incor porated in 1889, and occupied the house which is now the headquarters of the Board of Women Managers, at the Pan-American Exposition. They had good stables, some twenty acres of land, and the use of the park lands adjoining for polo and for golf. The site selected for the Pan-American included all the ground rented by the Country Club, and it was obliged to take tem porary quarters on Amherst Street, farther to the east. The club has an excellent membership, and its horse shows and contests are largely attended. Ellicott Club. — This is a men's lunching club, organ ized in 1895, with large and very handsome rooms on the tenth floor of the Ellicott Square Building. Its main dining hall is much in use for large dinners, dances, etc. Separate rooms are provided for women, or for members accompanied by women. The club has been very successful. Admission to all these club houses is, of course, possible only through a card from one of their mem bers. Fresh Air Mission. The Fresh Air Mission Hospital, for sick babies, is a most attractive building, admirably located on the beach 329 THE NIAGARA BOOK. of Lake Erie, at Athol Springs, ten miles from Buffalo, and may be reached either by the Pennsylvania or the Lake Shore Railroad. The return trip may easily be made in a morning or afternoon. The hospital is within easy walking distance from the station. The Fresh Air Mission proper, at Cradle Beach, is thirteen miles farther out on the same railroads, the nearest station being Angola, from which there is a drive of two miles. This also is admirably situated, and has attractive buildings excellently adapted for their purposes. The little Cradle Banks, which are conspicuous every summer throughout Buffalo, take in upwards of $i,ooo every year, (last summer it was over $3,000) in small sums. It is hoped that this summer their receipts may be greatly increased. The society has no endowed fund. Fire Tugs. Those coming from inland cities will be interested in Buffalo's fire-tugs, a valuable safeguard for the city's extensive river and harbor property. Presidents Cleveland and Fillmore. There have been two Buffalo presidents. Those in terested may see the old law office of President Cleveland in the Weed Block, at the corner of Main and Swan Streets ; while the home of President Fillmore is now a large boarding-house, or almost hotel, "The Fillmore House,'' on Niagara Square, at the corner of Delaware Avenue and Genesee Street. The house has been coi>- siderably added to. 330 4*IJ«a'""*-'l'^' iin:i,m'.«,n"". .-'¦-¦^.ii- ¦""- ¦'¦¦ _^.y Brocks IPb Monument Kif*/ioe V> I'i"l'= Brother 1 8^ Y Sta^^Ni^^l^'"''^'^ '^ ^- Capynght 1001 6y f^i^^^ttf^Awa-JVortftr^p go.. Buffalo, iV. J". NIAGARA FALLS AND VICINITY. THE NIAGARA BOOK. Hotels and Boarding Houses. The Hotel Iroquois is one of the best hotels in the United States, and its caf^ is not approached in cuisine by any other hotel or restaurant in Buffalo. Its billiard rooms and bar are costly and magnificent. It is, however, in the business portion of the town. The Lenox is a large apartment house and hotel of the finest type, and in the most fashionable residence portion of the city, being on North Street, just west of Delaware Avenue. The view from the roof is well worth seeing. The Niagara Hotel is delightfully located at the Front, opposite Prospect Park. If the management in igoi is as good as it promises to be, it will be a delightful place at which to stay. The Genesee, New Tifft, Broe- 2el and Mansion House are all good hotels. Statler''s Hotel and the Park Hotel are new and temporary struc tures, adjacent to the Pan-American grounds. The Statler Hotel has the better location, but is much larger, having accommodations for 5,000 people. It is of two stories only. A large number of apartment houses and some business blocks have been turned into hotels for the Pan-American year. There are many good boarding houses in Buffalo. Pan-American visitors desiring accommodations in them, or in good private houses, would best write to the Bureau of Information ofthe Pan-American Exposi tion, which will furnish them full and prompt informa tion, with prices. Theatres. The only thoroughly first-class theatre in Buffalo at present is the Star. The Teck Theatre has a stock com- 332 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. pany, and usually presents melodramas of the better grade. It is an excellent and very comfortable theatre, with low prices. Shea's Theatre is a large variety hall, ofthe best of its kind, with clean shows and very large audiences. The Lyceum Theatre is a good low-priced theatre. The Court Street is a low-priced house, with entertainments mainly of the variety order, and adapted mainly for male audiences. Newspapers. The " Buffalo Morning Express " (one cent) and the " Buffalo Commercial" — an afternoon paper, and the only two-cent daily paper now published in Buffalo — are the daily papers of highest grade. The evening "News" (one cent) is an excellent paper, as are also the evening " Times" and " Enquirer," and the morning "Courier" and "Review." There are three good daily papers in German, and one in Polish. The Sunday edi tions are all five cents. Information for Shopping. Flint & Kent, 554 Main Street, carry the highest grade of stock in general dry goods, and next to them come the Adam, Meldrum & Anderson Company, 404 Main Street, a much larger general department store. J. N. Adam & Company, directly opposite, at 389 Main Street, and the William Hengerer Company, at 256 Main Street, are other very large department stores, of the highest standing, and with a somewhat cheaper gen eral line of goods. T. E. Dickinson & Co., 254 Main Street, stand easily first in jewelry, silver, etc. T. C. Tanke, and King & Eisele, are other good stores in 333 THE NIAGARA BOOK. this line. In crockery and glass, Walbridge & Co., 392 Main Street, have the largest and best assortment, though Irwin R. Brayton, 692 Main Street, has a better stock in the choicest grades. For men's furnishings of high grade, the best stores are : W. C. Humburch, 329 Main Street ; Kinne & Kinne Company, 357 Main Street, and Flint & Kent, 554 Main Street. Among the better book stores are : Peter Paul & Co., 448 Main Street ; Otto Ulbrich, 386 Main Street ; H. H. Otis & Sons, 284 Main Street, and the larger dry-goods stores. For flowers may be mentioned : Palmer, Rebstock, Zimmerman, Scott, Anderson, etc. For carriages, C. W. Miller is so very much the largest establishment that he alone can be mentioned here, though some oi the smaller concerns are equally good ; automobiles may be obtained at low rates from the Woods Motor Vehicle Company; the "Automobile Station, No. i," and, from J. L. Langdon (Locomobiles). Practically the only baggage delivery is that of C. W. Miller, 8 East Eagle Street. On presentation of railroad tickets he will check baggage direct from the house to destina tion, and for a slight extra charge will include delivery at house at destination. The best candy stores are Huyler's, Gager's, and Faxon, Williams & Faxon. Almost all the retail stores of importance are on Main Street, between Seneca and Tupper. There are, of course, many good stores in Buffalo in addition to the few which we have mentioned here. DOCTORS; The surgeons and physicians in these lists are all of high professional standing and reputation, and except 334 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. in the list of dentists only those are included who are on the staff of some one of the leading hospitals. There are many other excelent doctors in Buffalo, but it seems well forthe purposeof this book, to make this distinction. Those whose names are printed in italics are homeop- athists. General Physicians. — Henry R. Hopkins, 444 Frank lin Street ; C. C. Wyckoff, 482 Delaware Avenue ; Charles Cary, 340 Delaware Avenue ; Charles G. Stock ton, 436 Franklin Street ; John Parmenter, 519 Frank lin Street ; DeLancey Rochester, 469 Franklin Street ; John H. Pryor, 56 Allen Street ; B. J. May cock, 33 Allen Street ; A. M. Curtiss, 780 West Ferry Street ; Truman f. Martin, 279 North Street. Surgeons. — Roswell Park, 510 Delaware Avenue ; John Parmenter, 519 Franklin Street ; Herman Mynter; 566 Delaware Avenue ; W. C. Phelps, 148 Allen Street; W. W. Potter, 284 Franklin Street ; Eugene A. Smith, 1018 Main Street. Nervous Diseases. — James W. Putnam, 525 Dela ware Avenue ; W. C. Krauss, 371 Delaware Avenue. Children's Diseases. — Dr. W. H. H. Sherman, 666 Main Street ; Irving M. Snow, 476 Franklin Street. Skin Diseases. — Ernest Wende, 471 Delaware Avenue ; Grover W. Wende, 471 Delaware Avenue. Women's Diseases. — M. D. Mann, 37 Allen Street ; P. W. Van Peyma, 445 William Street ; M. A. Crockett, 452 Franklin Street ; G. R. Stearns, 201 Linwood Avenue ; Jessie Shepard, 21 Irving Place. Eyes and Ears.—hnc\t.x\ Howe, 183 Delaware Avenue; H. Y. Grant, 399 Delaware Avenue : Elmer E. Starr, 523 Delaware Avenue ; F. W. Hinkel, 412 Frank- 335 THE NIAGARA BOOK. lin Street ; A. A. Hubbell, 212 Franklin Street ; E. Park Lewis, 454 Franklin Street. Nose and Throat. — F. W. Abbott, 523 Franklin Street ; W. S. Renner, 361 Pearl Street ; Max Keiser, 388 Franklin Street ; E . Park Lewis, 454 Franklin Street. Dentists.— V^. C. Barrett, 208 Franklin Street ; M. B. Straight, 80 W. Huron Street ; F. E. Howard, 331 Franklin Street; C. E. Wettlaufer, 157 North Pearl Street. Drives. The stereotyped drive in Buffalo, is "around the Front and to the Park,'' a drive of a couple of hours. Now that the Park Lake is included, for the summer, in the Exposition Grounds, this portion ofthe drive will be deprived of much of its beauty, yet the Park Meadow is very attractive and restful. Delaware Avenue is one of the famous residence streets of the country. Lin wood Avenue is also an attractive street, and North Street, Summer Street, Ferry Street, etc., all have beau tiful residences and lawns. A drive to Humboldt Park will show the more thickly settled portion of the city, largely German. The Wad ing Pond is worth seeing, on afternoons or school holidays. Those who wish longer drives, and who have the courage to pierce the belt of railroads which surround the city, and the monotonous territory of the immediate suburbs, may try the river road to Tonawanda (distant about ten miles) ; may take the ferry to Fort Erie at the foot of Ferry Street and drive to Niagara Falls along the Canadian shore of the Niagara River, or such por- 336 .t FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. tion of this twenty-mile distance as they may elect ; or may drive through Cazenovia or South Park, and to Athol Springs (distant about eleven miles), and on along the lake shore as much farther as they may desire. All the most beautiful portion of the drive is after passing Athol Springs. Bicycle Trips. There are many beautiful bicycle trips about Buffalo for those who take rides of thirty to forty miles, or by taking a train one way the distance can often be halved. Recourse should be had to the bicycle stores and book stores for books descriptive of different trips and routes. The favorite century run is from Erie to Buffalo, along the shore of Lake Erie, with excellent roads all the way, and of course this may be taken from any intermediate point. By taking the Lake Shore or the Pennsylvania train to Silver Creek, one may have a ride of forty-five miles back to Buffalo, usually with the wind, the greater part being along the shore of Lake Erie. A delightful ride of ten miles may be had by taking the same trains to Lake View, riding back along the lake to Athol Springs, and taking a return train there on either road. A beautiful trip is to take the Erie Railroad train to Hamburgh, ride seven or eight miles along the precipi tous banks of Eighteen-mile Creek to North Evans, nine miles along the shore of Lake Erie to Athol Springs, and then take the train or ride back the eleven miles to Buffalo. The trip to Tonawanda (ten miles distant) is a very favorite one, there being asphalt or brick pavement all the way. The same trip along the tow-path of the Erie 22 337 THE NIAGARA BOOK. canal is very much more beautiful, though not so. good riding. The ride to Niagara Falls along the Canadian bank of the Niagara River (take boat to Canada at foot of Ferry Street) is magnificent, but the road is only fair, and sometimes hardly that. The trip from Niagara Falls on down the river to Lake Ontario is very beauti ful, and is best on the American side. An interesting, though uneven, trip is to ride from Port Colborne on Lake Erie to Port Dalhousie on Lake Ontario, twenty-five miles, along the Welland Canal. Customs entries may be required in passing into Canada save at Niagara Falls, where there is usually no hindrance or trouble. Bicyclers at Niagara Falls should not fail to ride to and around the Dufferin Islands. No bicycle rider should fail, while in Buffalo, to ride up Delaware Avenue from the Terrace to Ferry Street, and to ride down North Street to the Front. The streets are much more beautiful seen in this way than in driv ing behind horses. Bicycle riders in Buffalo are obliged to carry bells, but are not obliged to carry lamps. Trips by Boat. Those who desire a trip on Lake Erie will find vari ous excursions advertised in the daily papers, the boats usually leaving from the docks at the foot of Main Street. For an excursion on the lake, the trip to Port Colborne is as good as any, and Port Colborne itself is interesting as one terminus of the Welland Canal, from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario. A shorter ride is to Crystal Beach, a miniature Coney Island, on the Canadian shore of Lake Erie. An all-day's trip maybe had by taking a boat 338 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. for Erie. None of these boats are of very high grade, but all are entirely seaworthy. The trips down the Niagara River are also interest ing. The trip by boat down the river to Niagara Falls is decidedly worth taking. The trip up the Great Lakes from Buffalo is an inter esting and delightful one. The best boats to take are the " Northwest " and " North Land," which are both beau tiful vessels, magnificently finished and furnished, and with an excellent cuisine. The boats of the Erie & Western Transportation Company (Lake Anchor Line) are good, though not new, and with a much simpler table. B0-4TING. There is very little boating in Buffalo. The Buffalo Yacht Club, at the foot of Porter Avenue, " The Front," has a three-story building, with dock and pier. It has a membership of something over 200, with annual dues of $15.00. Boats may be chartered at the foot of Ferry Street, reached by the electric cars or the Belt Line trains. Street Cars. There is a complete system of "transfers" in Buf falo, and visitors changing from one street car line to another may obtain free transfer tickets from the con ductor. THE PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION. The name Pan-American, of course, means all American, and the Exposition is therefore one of all America ; or, as it is sometimes put, of the three 339 PLAN OF THE PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION. A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. Americas— North, Central, and South. The Exposition is intended to illustrate and to celebrate the achieve ments ofthe Western Hemisphere during the nineteenth century, and no exhibits have been admitted except from the Western Hemisphere and the outlying dependencies of the United States in the Sandwich Islands, Samoa, the Philippines, and Guam. This restriction is confined to the Exposition buildings; the amusements and exhibits on the Midway come from all quarters qf the globe. The Pan-American Exposition is a monument to the public spirit, the liberality, and the good taste of the citizens of Buffalo. The idea was first formally pre sented to the public at a dinner held at the Hotel Iroquois, January 21, 1899, and the response was cor dial and immediate. $427,000 was subscribed at the dinner, the newspapers all took up the movement with enthusiasm, and within six days, and almost before any organized canvassing could be got under way, over a million dollars ($1,114,000) of stock had been subscribed Tor by over ten thousand different people, in amounts ranging from $10 to $25,000 ; and at this writing over eighty-eight per cent of the amount so sub scribed has been collected, and seven per cent, more is considered collectable. The total stock subscription reached $1,731,520, from nearly twelve thousand sub scribers. In March, 1899, the State of New York gave to the Exposition its special sanction, and voted an ap propriation of $300,000 ; and in the same month it was indorsed by the United States Congress, and an appro priation of $500,000 voted. The invitations to partici pate sent to the other countries of the hemisphere have been from the National Government, through the De- 341 THE NIAGARA BOOK. partment of State. Mr. J. J. Albright, a public-spirited citizen of Buffalo, contributed $400,000 for a permanent marble art gallery, to stand upon the grounds of the Exposition, and the Buffalo Historical Society contrib uted $45,000, under an arrangement by which the New York State Building at the Exposition was to be per manent, and to become the home of the Historical Society at the close of the Exposition. A bond issue of $2,500,000 was authorized, and promptly taken up by banks and capitalists. The total cost of preparing the Exposition, including the Midway — which surpasses in quality and scope anything of the kind yet seen in this country — exceeds ten million dollars. The Exposition has been most fortunate in its choice of a director-general — the Hon. William I. Buchanan. Mr. Buchanan has had ample previous experience in expositions, beginning with the World's Fair, at Chicago, and has since been the Minister of the United States to the Argentine Republic, resigning this posi tion to assume the direction of the Pan-American Ex position. It is probable that no other citizen of the United States has so wide an official acquaintance in South America or is more highly respected. He has great executive ability, an enormous capacity for detail, and is an untiring worker. He is a man of broad cul ture and of quick and keen judgment. The Board of Directors of the Exposition consists of twenty-five men, representative of the best elements of the city. It was this body which had the difficult task of mapping out the scheme of the Exposition, selecting the site, the architects, etc. The architects were not chosen by any competitive process, but were selected 342 < mX A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. by the Board of Directors, and are as follows : Carr^re & Hastings, New York ; Howard, Cauldwell & Morgan, New York ; Babb, Cook & Willard, New York ; Pea- body & Stearns, Boston ; Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, Boston ; Green & Wicks, Buffalo ; George Cary, Buffalo ; Esenwein & Johnson, Buffalo. The Director of Works is Newcomb Carlton, of Buffalo ; Director of Color, C. Y. Turner, of New York ; Director of Sculp ture, Karl Bitter, of New York ; the Landscape Archi tect is Rudolf Ulrich, and the Chief of the Electrical Department, Henry Rustin, with Luther Stieringer as Consulting Expert. The visitor must not expect buildings of the height or size of those at Chicago. The whole style of archi tecture and the whole scheme of the Exposition are an utter change from the Chicago type. To compare this Exposition with the one at Chicago is like trying to compare Cervantes and Aristotle. The buildings are low, with red-tiled roofs ; are brilliant with color, are rich with ornament, with domes and towers and turrets, with balconies and loggias, and, above all, with pergolas, or arbors, covered with thickly growing vines. These vine-covered arbors are so numerous as to form a distinctive feature of the Exposition, which is rich in all phases of landscape work. The grounds of the Exposition are not as large as at Chicago. They are, however, a mile long and half a mile wide, covering 350 acres, which is quite enough territory for people to cover. They include the beauti ful Park Lake ofthe City of Buffalo, which D. H. Burn- ham, of Chicago, has called the most beautiful artificial or park lake of which he knows. 343 TEE NIAGARA BOOK. Some of the chief points on which this Exposition prides itself, and which are therefore especially worthy of mention, are as follows. It is claimed that in the points mentioned this Exposition surpasses any that has been held : Electrical Effects. — The electrical features are said to exceed in variety, in novelty, and in quantity, those of all other expositions. The unlimited forces of Niagara Falls supply the motive power. No arc lights are used, except inside the buildings ; but the small incandescent lights, which it was at first promised should exceed 200,000, it is now stated, are over 500,000 in number. The Electrical Tower is the crowning feature of the Exposition. Sculpture. — More groups of sculpture, and more of original sculpture (all by artists of this hemisphere) than at any previous exposition. Eountains and Canals. — The electrical fountain in the North Bay, the Fall, seventy feet high, in front of the Electric Tower ; the Fountain of Abundance, the Fountains of Man, of Prometheus, of Lycur gus, the Fountains of Nature, of Ceres, of Kronas, the Courts of Lilies and of Cypresses, the cascades at either end of the Triumphal Bridge ; the Park Lake, the Mirror Lakes, the Canal (a mile long, and bordered in its entire length by a walk shaded by a double row of poplars) which winds among the buildings — all these offer enchanting water effects. Elowers and Vines. — The landscape work is rather of the Italian order, with sunken gardens, terraces, flowers, vines, shrubs, and carefully arranged 344 A FEW PAGES ABOUT BUFFALO. groups of trees. Hundreds of thousands of spring bulbs — five tons of crocuses, tulips, hyacinths, etc. — have been set out, and roses and other flowers will follow in their season in almost equal profusion. Color Effects. — The work of coloring, or rather of illuminating in color, for this better describes the method followed, such a mass of buildings, with such intricacy of ornament and of detail, is a stu pendous one. At this writing the work is not so complete that it can be fairly judged, and it can only be said that it is being done very boldly, and with great capability and taste. Such lavish use of color is something new in architecture, and is an original and striking feature of this Exposition, which has already given to it the name ofthe Rain bow City. The Grand Courts. — The view points, or "Courts of Honor" of this Exposition, are well planned and surprisingly extensive. It is claimed that the Es planade will hold 250,000 people, and opening out of this is the Court of Fountains, and beyond that the Plaza. 77^1? Stadium. — A noble building, the arena for sports and athletic contests, with seating capacity for 12,000 persons. A delightful innovation. The Midway.— Th'is Exposition has given the "Mid way" an important position, close to the main buildings, though without allowing any portion to interfere with the architectural effects of the Expo sition proper. The high grade of almost all of the Midway attractions is something surprising, and they form an instructive as well as an amusing 345 THE NIAGARA BOOK. feature. The broad avenue winding through the Midway is nearly three-quarters of a mile in length. It will be seen from this review that the Pan-Ameri can Exposition is really noteworthy in the originality of many of its features. The Art Gallery offers still another excellent feature in that all the work exhibited, which is of course wholly from American, or Pan-American. artists, must be original, no copies being admitted. For the first time a separate building is devoted to the Graphic Arts and never before have Ethnology and Music been given such commanding and conspicuously central structures. The different exhibit buildings are so small com paratively that the exhibits have had to be much re stricted, only a small portion of those offered being accepted. The choice seems to have been made, how ever, with great care and with great impartiality, with especial attention everywhere to exhibits which tell their story in a striking and graphic manner. It is neither possible nor desirable to furnish here any detailed description of, or guidp to, the Exposition. We have told something of its history, its purpose, and its execution. We consider it noteworthy among ex positions for its originality and excellence, and it reflects great credit upon the capacity and culture of those who have created it, and upon the city which has given it birth. 346 INDEX. Abbott, Francis, the "Her mit," 6i Adam's Diary, 215 Allen, Sadie, barrel trips of, 68 American Fall, 15, 32, etc. Animals at Niagara, 173-176 Anti-Masonic Agitation (1826), "3 "Ararat," H2 As It Rushes by, 270 Aveiy on the Log, 76 Bath Island, 31 Balleni and the tight-rope, 74 Barrels used to go through rap ids, 66, 67 Bicycles, 26, 43, 50 May be rented by the day at Niagara Falls Bicycle, "Water-, 86 Biddle stairs, 81 Birds at Niagara, 174-176 Robin, 174 Oriole, 174 Blue-bird, 174 Gold-finch, 174 ¦Wilson's Thrush, 175 "Wood-thrush, 175 Cat-bird, 175 Crows, 175 Gulls, 175 Cedar-birds, 175 Bald-headed Eagle, 175 Indigo-bird, 176 Scarlet Tanager, 176 King-fisher, 176 Black Rockri8i2), 108 Burned (zZi'^, 109 Blondin and the tight-rope, 72 Mr. Howells describes, 255 Boundary Line between U. S. and Canada, no " Bowser " and his boat, 71 British Campaign of 1759, 102 Brock, General (1812), 107 Brook's Monument, 42, 49, 57, 108 Brides and Grooms at Niagara, 275 . Buffalo, 317-339 Architectural features, 321 Asphalt, 50 Bicycle trips, 319, 337 Boat trips, 337 Boating, 338 Burned 1813, 109 Commerce, 318, 320 Coal, 318, 320 Churches, 321 Cemetery, 326 Crematory, 327 Clubs, 328 President Cleveland, 330 Delaware Avenue, 336, 338 Doctors, 334. Drives, 334 Erie Canal, 320 Fresh Air Mission, 329 Fire tugs, 330 President Fillmore, 330 Grain elevators, 320 Harbor and river, 319 Hotels, 332 Libraries, 324 Manuscripts in library, 324 Market, 326 Mr. Howells visits, 238 Newspapers. 333 One day in Buffalo, 317 Pan - American Exposition 339-346 River and Harbor, 319 Red Jacket monument, 327 Statistics, 318 Shopping guide, 333 Street-cars, 339 347 INDEX. Buffalo, 232 Theatres, 332 Views, 319, 332 Wading-pond, 326, ^^6 Burning of the Caroline, 62, 115 Burning Spring, 27, 250 Burnt Ship Bay, 103 Cables to transmit power, 190 Cain, where raised, 226 unimproved, 234 Calcareous soil, 163 Calverley and his wire cable, y6 Campbell's voyage in lile-pre- server, 70 Canal, Hydraulic Power, 180 Caroline, burning of the, 62, 115 Cataract Construction Co., 184 Cave of the Winds Description, 4 Dimensions, 7 Safety, 10 Cost, 6, 57 Discovery of, 62 Wedding near the, 86 Doring's Band in, 89 Geology of, 143 Cayuga Creek, 100 Cessions and treaties, 105 Champlain, 91 Charlevoix (1721), 95 "Chestnut," the forbidden fruit, 22s The original, 225 Chippewa, Battle of (1814), 109 Clinton Age, 145 Coleridge, 24 Commercial History of N. F., 116 Coronelli's Map (i688), 94 Crandall, Bryant B., supposed suicide of, 88 Cruciferse, Spring-flowering, 170 Death on the Ice-mountain, 79 Declaration of Independence, 106 De Nonville, Marquis {1687), loi Detroit, trip of the, 80 Devil's Hole, 48 Devil's Hole Massacre, 104 Dixon and the wire cable, 75 Disappearance of Wm. Morgan, "3 Doring's Band in Cave of the Winds, 89 Dramatic Incidents, 59 Dufferin Islands, 25 Dynamos, 190 Echota, The town of, 205 Eden, Garden of, identical with Niagara, 215 Electric Generators, 190 England acquires Niagara (1763), Erie Canal completed (1825), 112 Erosion. 149, 161 Eve, 216 Excavation of the Gorge, 150, 160, 163 Famous visitors at Niagara Falls, 278 Father Hennepin, 278 La Salle, 278 Tonti, 281 Hontan, 281 Tom Moore, 281 Mrs. Jameson, 285 Margaret Fuller, 288 Sir Joseph Hooker, 291 Harriet Martineau, 291 Charles Dickens, 292 Nathaniel Hawthorne, 295 Charles Kingsley, 301 Dean Stanley, 301 Professor Tyndall, 301 N. P. Willis, 303 Mrs. Trollope, 303 Charles Dudley Warner, 304 Professor Richard Proctor, 304 Anthony Trollope, 305 Bayard Taylor, 308 Mrs. Sigourney, 311 Lord Morpeth, 312 Fauna of Niagara Falls, 158 Quadrupeds, 174 Birds, 174, 17s, 176 Farini, on the tight-rope, 73 on stilts, 89 Fenian War (1866), 116 Ferns, 172, 173 Ostrich fern, 172 Sensitive fern, 173 348 INDEX. Ferns, Royal fern, I7'5 Interrupted fern, 173 Cinnamon fern, 173 Bladder fern, 173 Shield fern, 173 Christmas fern, 173 Beech fern, 173 Walking fern, 173 Spleen-wort fern, 173 Cliff-brake fern, 173 Common-brake fern, 173 Maiden-hair fern, 173 Polypody fern, 173 Ferryboat service, old, 84 First railroad in America, 102 Flora and Fauna of Niagara Falls, 158 Flora,, vast abundance of, 165 Trees, 165, 166, 167, 168 Flowers, 169, 170, 171, 172 Ferns, 172, 173 Flack's death, 69 Flowers, 169, 170, 171, 172 Liver-worts, squirrel cups, 169 Meadow Rue, 169 Wild Columbine, 169 May Apple, 169 Blood-root, 170 Squirrel-corn, 170 Dutchman's breeches, 170 Crinkle root, 170 Spring cress, 170 Rock cress, 170 Violets (four), 17c Spring-beauty, 170 Crane's bill, 170 Virginian saxifrage, 170 Mitre-worts (two), 170 Spreading phlox, 171 Greek valerian, 171 Dog-tooth, 171 Adder's tongue, 171 Bell-wort, 171 Indian turnip, 171 Trilliums (two), 171 St. John's wort, 171 Grass of Parnassus, 171 Painted-cup, 171 Lilies, 171 Orchids, 171 Hare-bell, 172 Flowers, golden-rods, 172 Sun-flowers, 172 Star-flowers, 172 Downey thistle, 172 Shorn gentian, 172 Bluets or innocence, 172 Liatris cylindracea. 172 Apocynum andros:emifoli- um, 172 Milkweed, 172 Fire-lily, 172 Lady's slipper, 172 Morning glory, T72 Wild roses, 172 Fort du Portage, or Little Ni agara, 102 Fort Erie, captured by Ameri cans (1814), 109 Fort George, capture of, IS13, 108 Fort Niagara, 43, 100, loi, 102, 106 Fort Schlosser (1813), 109 France cedes Canada to Eng land, 105 French occupation of Niagara, 99 Grology of Niagara Falls, 123 Generators, electric, 190 Glacial period, 136 Goat Island, 31 Why so named, 83 Origin, 162 Gorge, Niagara, 38 Early crossings of, 84 A true cafion, 132 Excavation of, 150, 160, 163 Gorge Road, 38, 58 Graham and his barrel, 66 Grand Island, 50, 103, 112 Great Lakes, The Geology of, 136, 138, 139, 140 "Griffon," first boat on the Lakes, loi Hazlett and his barrel, 67, 68 Hennepin, Father Descriptions of Niagara by, 30. 93i 94. 278 " Hermit of Niagara," 61 349 INDEX. " Hero of the whirlpool rapids," 66 Herbs, flower producing, 169 Historic Niagara, go Holm's, Campanius, " New Swe den " (1702), 94 Horseback, crossing ice-bridge on, 86 Horse-power, now utilized, 202 to be available, 211 Horseshoe Falls, 16, 21, 32 Howells, William Dean First visits to Niagara, 239 Last visits to Niagara, 263 Describes Blondin, 25s Hydraulic Power Canal, 180 ICE-BRIDGE, 45 Sudden movement of, 85 Crossing, on horseback, 86 Crossing, in automobile, 87 Mr. Howells describes, 266 Ice-palace. 85 Illumination by search-light, 83 Incidents, Dramatic, 59 Famous, 112 Incident, a sad, yy Indians, knowledge of Niagara, 91 At Niagara, 104 Indian Lore, 119 IngersoU, Col. Robt. G , at Niag ara, 271 Inspiration Point, 20 Isle de Marine, 103 Jenkins and his velocipede, 74 Johnson, SirWm., British Gen eral, 102 Joncaire burns Ft. Little Niag ara, 102 Kangaroorum Adamiensis, 229 Kendall swims the rapids, 67 L'Allement, Jesuit Father (1641), 92 La Honton's, " Voyages " (1703), 94 La Salle, 30, 100, 278 Land Titles to Niagara, in Le Clercq, Father (1691), 94 Leslie, "The American Blon din," 88 Lewiston, 41, 48, 100 Named for Governor Lewis, 107 Burned (1813), 109 Original site of Falls, 161 Lewiston Bridge, destroyed, 81 Limestone formation, 145, 146 Little Falls, early outlet of Great Lakes, 139, 146 Local History of Niagara, 120 Luna Island, 31, 32 Lunar Rainbow, 33 Lundy's Lane, battle of (1814), 109 McNab, Sir Allen (1837), 115 Maid ofthe Mist, 13 Story of Original, 64 "Dummy," 78 Indian Legend of, 119 Manchester (burned 1813), 109 Medina formations, 145, 148 Mills at Niagara, 180 Michigan, The Pirate, 60 Modern History of Niagara, 97 Mollusca, 162 "Morgan's Dungeon" (1826), 113 Morgan, William, disappearance of, 113 Music of Niagara, 23 Navy Island, 103 Newark, Capture of, 1813, 108 Niagara Why so named, 53, 215 Historic, 90 Early mentions of, 9'i Indians at, 91 Modern History of, 97 Ownership of, 98 French occupation of, 99 Why Brides and Grooms visit, 275 The great Lesson of, 275 Poetry of, 310 " Niagara." the name, 95, 96 Niagara, first and last, 236 Niagara Falls Unconquered by man, 77 Geology of, 123 350 INDEX. Niagara Falls Eventual fate of, 156 !• lora and Fauna of, 158 Power of, 178 Mr. Howell's first visits, 239 Mr. Howell's last visits, 263 Famous visitors at, 278 Niagara Falls Hydraulic Power & Mfg. Co., 180 Niagara FaUs Power Co., 184 Niagara limestone, 145 Niagara shale, 145 Niagara River When it ran dry, 53 Is in fact a strait, 131 A new-made stream, 133 First existence of, 140 , Earlier courses of, 141 Nissen and his boat, 71 Noah, Maj. M. M., Jewish lead er (1824), 112 "Ongiara," 93 *' Onguiaarha," 92 Ontario, Lake, 42, 43, 49 Ownership of Niagara, 98 Pan-American Exposition, 339- 346 Architects, 343 Area, 343 Art gallery, 346 Color effects, 343, 345 Director-General, 342 Electrical effects, 344 Ethnology, 346 Finances. 341 Flowers and vines, 344 Fountains, 344 Graphic Arts, 346 Inception, 341 Meaning of name, 339 Midway, 345 Music, 346 Officials, 343 Purpose, 341 Statistics, 341 Sculpture, 344 Stadium, 345 Parliament of Upper Canada (1792), 108 Patch, Sam, and his high jump, 60 Patriot War (1837), 114 Peere and the wire cable, 75 Percy's trip through the rapids, 69 Penstocks, 191 Petrified Leaves, 49 Poetry of Niagara, 310 Portage Road, loi Porter, Augustus, 180 Porter, General Peter B. (1814), no Potts and his barrel, 67 Power of Niagara Falls, 178, 179, 202, 203 Power-house. 18S Prideaux, General (1759), 102 Prince of Wales (i860), 107 Programmes for one day, 52 , Prospect Park, 29, 14 Quadrupeds, 174 Queenston, 41, 49 Original site of the Falls, 150 Queenston Heights, 107 Queen Victoria Park, 18, 78 Ragueneau, Jesuit Father (1648), 92 Rainbows, ig Lunar, 33 Mr. Howells describes, 243 Rapids, Upper, 28 whirlpool, 39 Recession of Falls, 55, 149, 134 Surveys to determine, 151 Rescues, 79, 82, 87 of two dogs, 80 Revolutionary War, 106 Robinson, Joel, 64, 120 Rock of Ages. 15 Romantic Marriages, 86 Sanson's Map. 92 Schlosser, Captain Joseph, 103 Schlosser landing, 115 Searchlight illumination, 83 Shale formations, 145 Smyth, General Alexander, 1812, 108 351 INDEX. Soil, fertility of the, 163 Soule's attempt to swim rapids, 71 Spelterina walks tight-rope, 74 Spring, The, 36 State Reservation, 78, 118 Statistics, 53 Stilts, Farini on, 89 Stone Chimney, relic of British fort, 103 St. Lawrence, Vale of the, 13S Suicide (?) of Crandall, 88 Sunday, a day to rest from, 218 Sundays, should be more, 227 Superfluous, a good word, 218 Surfeys of the Falls, 151 Suspension Bridge, destroyed, 81 Table Rock, 20 Fall of, 63 Mr. Howells tells about, 248 Terrapin Tower, 81, 251 Thayer, E. M. , Music of Niag ara, 23 Three Sister Islands, 34 " Three Mountains," 100, loi "Thunder of the Waters," 96 Tight-rope exploits Blondin, 72 Signor Farini, 73 Signor Balleni, 74 Maria Spelterina, 74 Steve Peere, 75 Samuel John Dixon, 75 Clifford M. Calverley, 76 J. E. De Leon, 87 Harry Leslie, 88 Tonawanda, 223 Toronto, 43 Tramway up "Three Moun tains," IOI Treaty of 1763, 105 of Paris, 106 of Ghent, no Trees, 165, 166, 167, 168 Cucumber, 165 Tulip, i6s Maples (four), 165 Sumach (five), 166 Plum, 166 Cherry (two), 166 Crab-apple, 166 Trees; Thorn (three), 166 Cornel (six), 166 Viburnums (six), 166 Sassafras, 167 Native Laurel, 167 Ash (two), 167 Linden or Bass-wood, 167 Butternut, 167 Hickory (four), 167 Beech, 167 Chestnut, 167 Oak (nine), 167 Elm (two), 168 Birch (three), 168 Alder, 168 Willows (six), 168 Poplars (four), 168 White Cedar, 168 Red Cedar, 168 Juniper, 168 American "Yew or Ground Hemlock, 168 White Pine, 168 Hemlock-Spruce, i68 Tunnel, power, 185 United States and Canada, no Utilization of Niagara's power, 178 Evershed's plans for, 182 Organization ot Companies for, 184 Van Rensselaer, Gen. (1812), 107 Visitors, Famous, at Niagara Falls, 278 See " Famous Visitors at N. F. " in Index Walks, 48 War of 1812, 106 Waterfalls How formed, 124 of Yosemite Valley, 126 of Lauterbrunnen, 126 of the Ohio at Louisville, 127 of Island of Anticosta, 127 of Trenton, 128 of Niagara, 128, etc. 352 INDEX. We, a new word, 215 Webb and his fatal swim, 65 What to See, 3 When Niagara ran dry, 63 Whirlpool, 40, 49 Mr. Howells's visits, 253 Whirlpool Rapids, The, 39 Swimming through, 65, 67, 71 Whirlpool rapids, through, in Barrels, 66, 67, 68 Through, in boats, 68, 69, 70, 71 Willow Island, 36, 25, 50 Winter, 44 "Youngstown, 43 Burned (1813), 109 353 YALE UNIVERSITY a390Q 2_^0,0_2 2 0_3 7 G 9 b