Mr. Fergusson in his notes made during a Visit to the United States and Canada in 1831, says: after breakfast I took leave of my friend, and walked on for the Falls, leaving the stage, in which I had secured a place, to follow. The day was delightful, and as I ascended the steep hill from Queenston, I overtook a soldier of the 79th in charge of the baggage wagons, leaning on his musket, and wrapt in admiration of the surrounding scenery, "It's mair like Scotland, sir, than ony thing I've seen sin' I left it," was the poor fellow's remark, and truly it was far from misapplied, making due allowance for difference of scale. The country from Queenston to the Falls is well settled, and finely diversified by farms, orchards and open forest. The soil is perhaps light, but in some places of a stronger description, and all apparently fertile, desirable land. A very beautiful property, originally laid out by the ill-fated Duke of Richmond, and subsequently possessed by Sir Peregrine Maitland, adjoins the Road. The house, which is in the cottage style, of wood, seems large and commodious. This estate is in a very favourable situation, and has been lately sold for 2,000l.; it contains about 450 acres of good, useful land. The distance from Queenston to Niagara is about seven miles, and I sauntered on the whole way, the coach not overtaking me. About four miles from the Falls, the sound came upon my ear like the murmur of Old Ocean on a rugged strand. In certain states of the atmosphere and the wind this is heard at a much greater distance. The noise gradually increased, and by and by the spray was seen rising in columns above the trees. A splendid and extensive establishment was soon after recognised as Forsyth's hotel, and, under feelings far more intense than common curiosity, I hurried forward to a point, where Niagara in all its glory came in view. From the increasing facility of migrating now-a-days even from one end of the world to another, Niagara has lost somewhat of that mysterious halo with which it was wont to be enveloped; but still it must ever be Niagara. The most eloquent descriptions, I should think, must prove inadequate to convey a just conception of the scene. Nor can the pencil, I imagine, ever do it justice. A cataract may be said, as regards the painter's art, to differ from all other objects in nature. The human face and figure, the rich and varied landscape, the animal and vegetable world, may with sufficient propriety be delineated at rest, but quiescence forms no feature here. The ceaseless roar, the spray mounting like clouds of smoke from the giant limekiln, and the enormous sheet of water which rolls into the abyss, can only be felt and understood by repeated visits to the scene. My attention was for a time distracted by the rapids which are extremely interesting, and with any other neighbour than the Falls would excite the highest admiration and wonder. After some time spent in contemplation, I proceeded to my friends, where a kind and comfortable home awaited me. Mr. C. possesses a residence which is certainly one of the most romantic domiciles in the world. The house stands on a small lawn upon a point overhanging the rapids, and about half a mile above the Horse-Shoe Fall. The garden is behind, washed by a fine branch of the river, which encircles a wild and thickly wooded island, and on every side new and interesting prospects appear. The river is a mile across, and of great depth, and, for the same distance above the Falls, is one sheet of foam. We sauntered down in the evening to the river side, and the rapids lost nothing by a closer inspection. My bedroom looked directly upon them; I could watch the smoke of the Fall, as I lay on my pillow; and with the wild roar of the cataract sounding in my ears, I closed my first day at Niagara. The following morning proved fine, and we devoted the forenoon, of course, to the Falls. Lake Erie had just broken up, and the icebergs came crushing down the rapids, in a way highly interesting. My friends being quite at home in all the mazes of the river side, conducted me by a wild and rugged route to the edge of the Table-rock, when, upon emerging from a tangled brake, I beheld the Horse-shoe or great British Fall, pouring down its volume of ice and water, at the distance of a few feet from where we stood. The rock felt to me as though it vibrated, and a large mass did in fact lately give way, soon after a party had retired from the precarious stance. It is limestone, full of ugly fissures and rents. A narrow wooden staircase conducts adventurous travellers to the bottom of the Fall, where a sort of entrance is generally effected to a short distance under the sheet, and for which performance a certificate in due form is served out. The stair was at this time under repair, and the accumulation of ice below perfectly reconciled me to wave pretensions to such slippery honours. At some distance below the Fall, and opposite to the American staircase, there is a ferry, to which a safe and most romantic carriage-road has been lately formed, out of the solid rock, at no small labour and expense. When a similar accommodation shall have been provided upon the American side, it is expected to prove a lucrative concern, but at the present foot-passengers only can be landed in the States. The little skiff had just put off, with a party from the Canada shores, and got involved in streams of ice, in a way somewhat hazardous, and which rendered it impossible for the boatmen to return. The scene from the ferry is indeed magnificent, the Horseshoe, the American Fall, and Goat Island being all in view, with the great pool or basin eddying in fearful and endless turmoil. In the evening I walked up the river side towards the village of Chippeway, to visit a natural curiosity upon Mr. C.'s estate. A spring surcharged with sulphuretted hydrogen gas rises within a few paces of the river. A small building is erected over it, and when a candle is applied to a tube in a barrel, which encloses the spring, a brilliant and powerful light is evolved. Close adjoining are the remains of extensive mills burnt by the Americans during last war. The water privilege is great, and machinery to any extent might be kept in play.—Quart. Journ. of Agriculture.
THE GATHERER.
Dramatis Personae.—The stages and theatres of the Greeks and Romans were so immense, that the actors, to be heard, were obliged to have recourse to metallic masks, contrived with tremendous mouths, in order to augment the natural sound of the voice. This mask was called by the Latins persona, from personare (to sound through); and delineations of such masks as were used in each piece were generally prefixed to it,(as we now prefix the names of the characters in our modern plays), as appears from the Vatican Terence. Hence dramatis personae (masks of the drama); which words, after masks ceased to be used, were understood to mean persons of the drama.
J.E.J.
Punctuality.—The late hospitable Colonel Bosville had his dinner on the table exactly two minutes before five o'clock, and no guest was admitted after that hour; for he was such a determined observer of punctuality, that when the clock struck five, his porter locked the street-door, and laid the key at the head of the dinner-table. The time kept by the clock in the kitchen, the parlour, and the drawing-room, and the watch of the master, were minutely the same. That the dinner was ready, was not announced to the guests in the usual way; but when the clock struck, this superlative time-keeper himself declared to his guests, "Dinner waits." Boileau, the French satirist, has a shrewd observation on this subject: "I have always been punctual at the hour of dinner," says the bard, "for I knew that all those whom I kept waiting at that provoking interval would employ those unpleasant moments to sum up all my faults."