All is change.
Eternal progress.
No Death!
The author of the sentiment is unknown, but no one has more truly voiced the spirit of the great cataract. From the edge of the cliff on Luna Island is to be obtained the finest view down the gorge. Along the front of the American Fall are to be seen the immense masses of wave-washed rocks which have fallen from the cliff above. From rock to rock stretch frail wooden bridges, the more important of which lead to the cave.
Luna Island is the last point which one can reach from Goat Island toward the American shore. Proceeding toward the Canadian Fall, one reaches at a short distance the Biddle Stairs. Here a break in the foliage reveals a grand view down the gorge with the Canadian Fall directly in front. A stairway leads to a wooden building down which runs a spiral stairway to the rocks below. This stairway received its name from Nicholas Biddle, of old National Bank fame, who proposed this means of reaching the rocks below and offered a contribution for its construction. The offer was rejected, but his name was given to the structure. A trip to the rocks below this point is well worth while, difficult though it be; the descent of the spiral stairway is eighty feet. Turning to the right one comes out upon a ledge of rock with the roaring waters below and the line of the cliff above, along the top of which objects appear at only half their real size. Passing around a short curve there bursts upon one's view the fall which forms the Cave of the Winds—a most beautiful sheet of water. The passage of the cave can hardly be described by the pen. Here one is assailed on all sides by fierce storms and clouds of angry spray. The cave seems at first dark and repelling, for in this maddening whirl of wind and water one is at first almost blinded; but as soon as the eye becomes accustomed to the darkness, it can follow the graceful curve of the water to where it leaves the cliff above. The dark, forbidding, terraced rocks are seen dripping with water. The passage of the cave is too exciting to be essayed by persons with weak hearts, but the return across the rocks in front of it on a bright day is genuinely inspiring. Here the symbol of promise is brought down within one's very reach; above, around, on all sides are to be seen colours rivalling the conception of any artist—whole circles of bows, quarter circles, half circles, here within one's very grasp. The far fabled pot of gold is here a boiling, seething mass of running, shimmering silver. If possible, more glorious than all else, up above, along the sky-line, there appears the shining crest of the American Fall, glimmering in the sunlight like the silvery range of some snow-covered mountains.
The Cave of the Winds.
In size the cave is about one hundred feet wide, a hundred feet deep, and about one hundred and sixty feet high. At one point in the cave, on a bright day, by standing in the very edge of the spray, one becomes the centre of a complete circle of rainbows, an experience probably unequalled elsewhere.
About half-way between the stairway and the cave is the point from which, in 1829, Sam Patch made his famous leap, elsewhere described.
On the side of the Horseshoe Fall is to be found a fine position from which to view the mighty force of the greater mass of waters. For some distance along the front of the fall immense masses of rock have accumulated. The trip over these rocks is fraught with danger and is taken by very few. For those who care to take the risk, the sight is well worth the effort. Just above at the crest are Terrapin Rocks, where formerly stood Terrapin Tower. Professor Tyndall went far out beyond the line of Terrapin Rocks to a point which has been reached by very few of the millions of visitors to this shrine. Passing along the cliff toward Canada, Porter's Bluff is soon reached, which furnishes one of the grandest views of the Horseshoe Fall. Fifty years ago, from this point one could see the whole line of the graceful curve of the Horseshoe; since that time the rapid erosion in the middle of the river (where the volume is greatest) has destroyed almost all trace of what the name suggests. The sides meet now at a very acute angle, the old contour having been entirely destroyed.