The water of this said river Niagara is of a most peculiar colour, like a turquoise when it turns green. It was like a thick stream of verdigris, full of pale milky streaks, whirls, eddies, and counter-currents, and looked as if it were running up by one bank, and down by the other. I sat in the sun, on the floor of the boat, revising my verses.
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Arrived on the other side, i. e. Canada, there was a second pause, as to how we were to get conveyed to the Falls. My father, ——, and D—— betook themselves to an inn by the road-side, which promised information and assistance; and —— and I, clambering up the heights of Queenston, sat ourselves down under some bushes, whence we looked towards Lake Ontario, and where he told me the history of the place; how his countrymen had thumped my countrymen upon this spot, and how the English general Brock had fallen near where we sat. A monument, in the shape of a stone pillar, has been erected to his memory; and to the top of this —— betook himself to reconnoitre; which ambitious expedition I felt no inclination to share. After he had been gone some time, I thought I perceived signs of stirring down by the inn door: I toiled up the hill to the base of the pillar to fetch him, and we proceeded down to the rest of the party. An uneasy-looking rickety cart without springs was the sole conveyance we could obtain, and into this we packed ourselves. —— brought me some beautiful roses, which he had been stealing for me, and —— gave me a glass of milk; with which restoratives I comforted myself, and we set forth. As we squeaked and creaked (I mean our vehicle) up the hill, I thought either my father's or ——'s weight quite enough to have broken the whole down; but it did not happen. My mind was eagerly dwelling on what we were going to see: that sight which —— said was the only one in the world which had not disappointed him. I felt absolutely nervous with expectation. The sound of the cataract is, they say, heard within fifteen miles when the wind sets favourably: to-day, however, there was no wind; the whole air was breathless with the heat of midsummer, and, though we stopped our waggon once or twice to listen as we approached, all was profoundest silence. There was no motion in the leaves of the trees, not a cloud sailing in the sky; every thing was as though in a bright warm death. When we were within about three miles of the Falls, just before entering the village of Niagara, —— stopped the waggon; and then we heard distinctly, though far off, the voice of the mighty cataract. Looking over the woods, which appeared to overhang the course of the river, we beheld one silver cloud rising slowly into the sky,—the everlasting incense of the waters. A perfect frenzy of impatience seized upon me: I could have set off and run the whole way; and when at length the carriage stopped at the door of the Niagara house, waiting neither for my father, D——, nor ——, I rushed through the hall, and the garden, down the steep footpath cut in the rocks. I heard steps behind me; —— was following me: down, down I sprang, and along the narrow footpath, divided only by a thicket from the tumultuous rapids. I saw through the boughs the white glimmer of that sea of foam. "Go on, go on; don't stop," shouted ——; and in another minute the thicket was passed: I stood upon Table Rock. —— seized me by the arm, and, without speaking a word, dragged me to the edge of the rapids, to the brink of the abyss. I saw Niagara.—Oh, God! who can describe that sight?
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] I do not know how it is to be accounted for, but in spite of much lighter duties, every article of dress, particularly silks, embroideries, and all French manufactures, are more expensive here than in England. The extravagance of the American women in this part of their expenditure is, considering the average fortunes of this country, quite extraordinary. They never walk in the streets but in the most showy and extreme toilet, and I have known twenty, forty, and sixty dollars paid for a bonnet to wear in a morning saunter up Broadway.
[2] These are the titles of three omnibuses which run up and down Broadway all the day long.
[3] The New Yorkers have begun to see the evil of their ways, as far as regards their carriage-road in Broadway,—which is now partly Macadamised. It is devoutly to be hoped, that the worthy authorities will soon have as much compassion on the feet of their fellow-citizens, as they have begun to have for their brutes.