IMPRESSIONS OF CANADA, NIAGARA, THE ST. LAWRENCE, ETC. UPON EMIGRANT
SETTLERS.
The Falls of Niagara impress travellers very differently. Most persons, having heard of this wonder of the world from their childhood, have aggrandized their imagination of its appearance in proportion with the growth of their minds, and visit Niagara, at last, with the expectation of seeing an ocean poured from the height of the clouds. A very graphic and sketchy account of past impressions at the Falls is given by a traveller, whose book is less known than it deserves; and we quote from him, quite sure that his description will be new to the reader. “I first visited these celebrated Falls,” he says, “in the month of September—a season of the year which, in America, is peculiarly pleasant. The violent heats have then considerably abated; the musquito, satiated with human blood, has given rest to his proboscis; and man, free from the irritating bite of innumerable tormenting insects, and from the scorching heat of an almost insupportable sun, enjoys an agreeable respite, and ranges through the country in quiet and comfort. Until I arrived within a mile of the Falls, the sky was perfectly clear, the sun shone with his wonted splendour, and the atmosphere was remarkably dry and uncommonly lucid. But no sooner had I approached their immediate vicinity, than a sudden and singular change took place in the whole aspect of nature. The earth, before parched and immovable, became damp and tremulous; and the sky, till then unsullied by a single cloud, assumed a frowning, dark, and portentous appearance. The atmosphere, previously dry and rarefied, now presented a dense and humid visage; and my fancy, unreined by my reason transported me into a world essentially different from that in which, a few minutes before, I ‘lived, and moved, and had my being.’
“Still, however, I pursued my course, and at length gained the summit of the craggy hills which flank this noble river. My increased elevation did not contribute to dissipate the preconceived delusion, and I still felt inclined to doubt of my own or the world’s identity. Mountains of water, belching forth the most appalling sounds—globes of foam, boiling with rage—rainbows, embracing within their numerous and splendid arches a surprising variety of newly-formed impending clouds—rocks, boldly projecting over the tumultuous abyss—and spray-covered forests, decorated with pearly drops, now rendered more brilliant than crystal by the reflected rays of the setting sun, and now blown into feathery streams by sudden gusts of the impetuous wind;—these were some of the most striking features of the gorgeous scenery by which I was surrounded. Long did I luxuriate in pleasing contemplation, admiring its peculiar grandeur; and still did I find myself lingering amidst these stupendous and matchless displays of creative excellence, until the sun, wearied with shedding his beams on the transatlantic wilds, had retired, in all his glory, ‘to rove o’r other lands, and give to other men the kindest boon of heaven.’
“For the first time of my life did I regret the shortness of a September day. But my regret soon ceased; for ere night had completely drawn her sable mantle across the objects of my admiration, over which I still lingered, a glorious moon, enshrouded in golden robes, kindly lent me the aid of her beauteous lustre, and quickly diffused through every part of the landscape new features of loveliness, giving it a character far more soft and interesting than that with which proud day had invested it. The stupendous and magnificent machinery of nature, which had recently bound me in abstraction, was now divested of many of its peculiar charms. A perfect calm succeeded. The forests appeared sunk in deep repose. The winds had subsided. The green leaves, no longer agitated by the breeze, ceased their rustling. Not a cloud floated along the face of heaven. Every thing around and above seemed to have found
‘Tir’d nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep.’
All was still, except the wakeful cataracts that roared with their wonted violence, and disturbed the basin which groaned beneath the undiminished burden. Never was there a finer contrast than that between the noise of the water and the stillness of the air; the golden effulgence of the rushing flood, and the impenetrable shades of the surrounding forests; the blackness of the frightful gulf, down which the waves, with unabating force, are precipitated in crashing confusion, and the light and cheering face of the spangled heavens, over which the crescent moon was sailing with modest pride and conscious dignity.
“Sick and insensible must be the soul that could behold with indifference an exhibition so fine, so varied, so replete with all that is calculated to please the eye, to arouse the mind, and, in a word, to raise the whole man above the vulgar level of existence, and make him sensible, that while he thus contrasts the piccuresque scenery of the earth with the inimitable grandeur of the heavens, he is standing, as it were, in the immediate presence of that Deity who ‘measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out the heavens with a span’—to whom he is indebted for all he sees, and all he feels—by whose almighty power and wisdom the rivers had their appointed sources and obtained leave to flow, and from whose hands the mountains first received their appropriate bulk and due conformation.
“I cannot convey to you any idea of the poverty of language that is felt when one attempts to describe such a combination of grand and uncommon objects, among which is found every thing essential to constitute the romantic, the terrific, the picturesque, and the sublime. All that is awfully grand here occupies a prominent station; and every part is so tastefully arranged as to make the deepest impression upon beholders, and to proclaim, in language not less loud than the ‘music of the spheres,’