The next morning we were still five miles from Lake Erie, a distance which we accomplished at about ten o'clock, when we reached the little town of Cleveland. The sea-like expanse of the large Lake Erie was very striking when emerging from the wooded valleys, and the sight of it reminded me of my approaching voyage to my native country. The dark blue lake stretches to the far horizon, like the ocean; the eye is attracted by the white sails and the smoke of the steam-boats; while the finest weather and the purest atmosphere favoured the illusion.
Cleveland is a large, rapidly improving town, with several thousand inhabitants, full of life, trade, and business.[172] It is situated in Cayahoga or Cuyahoga County, and is built partly on a high ridge, partly on the river below. The outskirts are scattered, but the principal streets are regular. It contains many large buildings, several churches, a school or academy, a prison, good inns, and numerous shops and stores; the trade is very considerable in consequence of the junction of the great lakes with the Ohio and the Mississippi. Numbers of canal boats are assembled here, and also the two-masted schooners which navigate the lake. Several large, commodious steamers, generally full of passengers, come and depart daily. The Cayahoga flows through the lower part of the town; both sides of the mouth of the river are lined with wood; and on the right bank there is a long mole, with a lighthouse at the extremity. A second lighthouse is built a little to the right, upon an eminence; and in the far distance, on the right hand, the coast is lost in the misty horizon, and, on the left, disappears amid thick forests.
We met with many Germans at Cleveland, especially newly-arrived emigrants, and also an obliging young fellow-countryman, whom I had seen at Pittsburg, and who had obtained a good situation in a mercantile house in this place. Several steam-boats arrived and departed, bound to Detroit, and, at length, the Oliver Newbery came in, on its way to Buffalo. I immediately availed myself of the opportunity to visit that town, and set out from Cleveland at noon. On leaving the mouth of the Cayahoga there is an uninterrupted view of the vast expanse of Lake Erie, the splendid bluish-green waters of which, like those of all the great Canadian lakes, are exactly of the same colour as those of Switzerland. The dark brown waters of the Cayahoga are strongly contrasted {491} to a considerable distance with those of the lake.[173] We steered along the south bank, where we had a fine prospect of Cleveland, and we were favoured by the most charming weather, which showed the lake to great advantage: in a storm the waves often run very high, and prove dangerous to navigation. The southern or American shore is not much elevated; the northern forms the boundary of Canada, the English possessions in North America. The south coast has no lofty eminences, and is entirely covered with forests. The steamer touched at Fairport, Ashtabula, and Salem, where great numbers of bats were hovering over the entrance into the port. After leaving Salem our engine got into disorder; and on the following morning, the 27th, we reached Dunkirk, a small place, built in the Dutch fashion, of which there is no mention in the Ohio Gazetteer of 1833.[174] A lighthouse stands on a neighbouring point of land. At eleven o'clock we came in sight of Buffalo, lying at the end of the lake, where we saw a race between two large steam-boats. As we approached the town, where we landed at twelve o'clock, a great number of steamers presented a very animated scene. Buffalo has been rapidly improving of late, and in a few years will be a considerable and important place. It has at present about 1000 houses, and 12,000 inhabitants, and promises to become one of the chief commercial ports of the country. The Erie Canal, which connects the great lakes with the eastern seaports of the Union, commences here. In the summer months, the neighbouring Falls of Niagara attract a great number of strangers, all of whom visit Buffalo. The streets of this town are, for the most part, regular and broad, crossing each other at right angles, and contain many handsome brick buildings, large inns, nine or ten churches and chapels, and good shops and magazines of every kind. In the lower part of the town, the water of the lake and the canal has been conducted into the streets, forming small harbours, where numbers of ships lie in perfect security. The town extends along the slope, and on the ridge of a gentle eminence; and from one of the highest points there is a striking prospect of the bright mirror of Lake Erie, which vanishes in the misty distance, and on the land side, of the Niagara River, and its opposite or Canadian bank. Buffalo was burnt by the English in 1814; it is said that only one house was left standing. The town was not immediately rebuilt, and it is only since the construction of the fine Erie Canal that it has risen so rapidly. When we consider the shortness of the time, the sudden improvement of the town, which is now of so much importance, really seems incredible; and perhaps there is no other country in the world where such a sudden rise would be possible.[175] They are now laying down iron railroads, one of which is to lead to Niagara. There are at present above thirty steam-boats for the communication between Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit, and Niagara, and the number increases every year. The object, however, which most attracted me was the village of the Seneca Indians, in the vicinity of Buffalo. They possess a piece of land, which begins a mile and a half southeast of the town. Here they live in small, neat, wooden houses, which are surrounded by their fields {492} and plantations, in a wooded country, and the pretty little church is in the centre of this Indian colony. The Indians who are settled here are employed in agriculture, the breeding of cattle and horses; and, like other country people, they go to the town with their wagons. Their dress is nearly the same as that of the Whites. Both the men and women frequently wear round felt hats: the men have, in general, a red girdle under their large blue upper coat, and the women wrap themselves in blankets. I found the physiognomy of most of these people quite genuine and characteristically Indian, as well as the brown colour, and their smooth, coal-black hair; some of them do not much differ in this respect from the Missouri tribes. A good many of them speak English, but some are quite ignorant of it; and, in their communications with each other, all use the old Indian dialect. It is said that there were at first 900 Indians settled here, mostly Senecas, mixed with a few Onondagos and Cayugas; but their numbers have decreased. All these tribes spoke the same language. They received from the government 49,000 acres of very fine fertile land. They have a clergyman and a school. The inn is kept by a half-breed Indian, who, however, did not appear to value himself on his Indian descent, but rather desired to be considered a white man.[176]
The Senecas are one of the six nations who, in former times, were the enemies of the French in Canada, and, with the exception of the Oneidas, assisted the English, in the war of 1775, against the Americans. The works of Charlevoix, Lahontan, and Colden, give information respecting the history of these once powerful, warlike people, who dwelt on the borders of the great lakes. The six allied nations were the Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagos, Tuscaroras, Oneidas, and Mohawks; the latter came from the south, and were admitted at a later period into the union of the five tribes.[177]
We visited some of these families, who showed us their bibles and prayer books in the Indian language; we bought specimens of their work, adorned with porcupine and other dyed quills, and likewise bows and arrows, which they still esteem. Deeply regretting the destruction of the remarkable aboriginal inhabitants of the east of North America, I returned in the evening to Buffalo, where our baggage and the live animals were embarked under the superintendence of Dreidoppel, on board an Erie Canal boat, for Albany, a distance of 363 miles. I myself took a place in the stage for Niagara, and we left Buffalo on the 28th of June. The road lies along the Erie Canal, which is here parallel with the River Niagara, passes through the village of Blackrock, and, near the hamlet of Tonawanta, crosses the creek of that name, which falls, at no great distance, into the river.[178]
The River Niagara issues from the east end of Lake Erie, forming the channel which connects it with Lake Ontario, the level of which is lower. The length of the course of the Niagara, from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, is 36½ miles, and its fall in this distance amounts to 322 feet. It is the frontier between Canada and the United States, and forms, between the two great lakes, the celebrated waterfall. Its surface is adorned with several islands, the largest of which, called {493} Grand Island, was sold in 1815, by the Seneca Indians, to the state of New York, for 1000 dollars, and an annuity of 500 dollars. This island is said to be twelve miles long, and from two to seven broad: it is in the vicinity of Lake Erie, and the river is afterwards pretty free from islands till you come near the falls, where there are several small ones. The water of the Niagara has the splendid green colour of the Swiss lakes, and is nearly twice as broad as the Rhine; on the opposite bank is the village of Chippeway, where, on the 5th of July, 1814, there was an action, in which the English were defeated.[179]
There is a considerable population along the road from Tonawanta to the falls of Niagara, which are twenty-two miles from Buffalo. Towards noon we came to the village of Niagara, which we entered at the side furthest from the river, and put up at a very good inn. It is a small village close to the falls, forming two irregular unpaved streets, but containing some good houses.[180] The banks present a very picturesque diversity, with pines and other trees, bearing a general resemblance to the scenery of Switzerland. Opposite to our inn was the house of a man named Hooker, who acts as guide to travellers visiting the falls, and has a small collection of natural curiosities, and specimens of Indian manufacture.
The grand, sublime scene, which we now visited, has been described by a vast number of travellers—Larochefaucault-Liancourt, Weld, Volney,[181] and many others since their time;[182] so that all accounts must be in some measure mere repetitions; but, as the diversity of such descriptions can but tend to give a more correct view of the subject, a few remarks may not be considered irrelevant here.
At a short distance from the village of Niagara, the river, which, according to Volney, is 1200 feet in breadth, begins to flow in an uneven rocky bed, with a rapid descent, and its whole surface is, in many places, in violent commotion, covered with white foam, and, as it were, boiling, in consequence of its breaking in high waves against the masses of rock. Portions of these rocks, the larger of which deserve the name of islands, are covered with pines, some green, others in a decayed state: of these rocky islets there are fifteen above the falls. The pines being frequently broken and snapped, and here and there piled up in the water, greatly contribute to heighten the effect of the savage grandeur and sublimity of the scene. The roaring of the cataract is heard at a considerable distance,[183] and lofty columns of mist and vapour ascend into the air. The stranger is conducted from the village to the above-mentioned rapid, and then proceeds, by a long, strongly-built wooden bridge over the end of the rapid, to Bath Island, where there are warm and cold baths (a, in the subjoined woodcut).[184] A considerable paper-mill has {494} been erected here, and a toll for passing the bridge is paid, once for all, for the whole time you may remain here. The toll-keeper sells refreshments and various curiosities of the country, minerals, Indian rarities, and the like.
A second bridge leads from Bath Island to Goat Island,[185] which is about seventy acres in extent, entirely covered with a beautiful forest of sugar maples, beeches, hornbeams, elms, birches, &c., beneath which the asarabaca, may-apple, and various other plants, are growing; none of them were, however, in flower. The shores of this island are shaded by old pines and very large white cedars, such as we should in vain look for in Europe, and many fine shrubs grow on the banks. There were formerly a great number of Virginian deer in this beautiful forest, but they grew so familiar, and became so troublesome by running after strangers, that they were removed. The blueheaded jay and the Hudson's Bay squirrel are numerous. From the bridge which leads to Goat Island there is a convenient path, on the right hand, which goes along the shore through the wood; and, after proceeding a short distance, the stranger suddenly finds himself on the rather steep declivity, immediately above the fall of the right or southern arm of the river, which is called the American branch. The sight is striking, and much grander than all the descriptions I had read of it led me to conceive. The broad expanse of bright green water falls perpendicularly 144 to 150 feet into the abyss below, which is entirely concealed by the vapour, the whole torrent of falling water being completely dissolved into foam and mist in the midway of its descent. Below the fall, and before its surface is quite calm, it recovers its green colour, which is, of course, totally lost in the rapidity of its descent. To make my description more clear, I subjoin a little plan of the cataracts drawn by Mr. George Catlin,[186] and published in Featherstonehaugh's "Essay on the Ancient Drainage of North America, and the Origin of the Cataract of Niagara," in the Monthly American Journal of Geology, Vol. I., July, 1831.