Part 14

After obtaining our views of the Grand Rapids and the Falls from Table Rock, we put up our traps, and leaving them in charge of the courteous proprietor of the Museum, we prepared to go _under_ the great Horse Shoe Fall. Clothing ourselves in india-rubber suits, furnished by our guide, we descended the stairs near Table Rock, eighty-seven steps, and, led by a negro, we went under the great sheet of water as far as we could go to Termination Rock, and standing there for a while in that vast cave of watery darkness, holding on to the negro's hand, we felt lost in wonder and amazement, but not fear. How long we might have remained in that bewildering situation it would be impossible to say, but being gently drawn back by our sable conductor, we returned to the light and consciousness of our position. The volume of water being much greater here than at the Cave of the Winds, and the spray being all around, we could not see anything but darkness visible below, and an immense moving mass before, which we knew by feeling to be water. There is some fascination about the place, for after coming out into the daylight I went back again alone, but the guide, hurrying after me, brought me back, and held my hand until we reached the stairs to return to the Museum. On our way back our guide told us that more than "twice-told tale" of Niagara and Vesuvius. If I may be pardoned for mixing up the ridiculous with the sublime, I may as well repeat the story, for having just come from under the Falls we were prepared to believe the truth of it, if the geographical difficulty could have been overcome. An Italian visiting the Falls and going under the Horse Shoe, was asked, on coming out, what he thought of the sight. The Italian replied it was very grand and wonderful, but _nothing_ to the sight of Mount Vesuvius in a grand eruption. The guide's retort was, "I guess if you bring _your_ Vesuvius here, _our_ Niagara will soon put his fires out." I do not vouch for the truth of the story, but give it as nearly as possible as I was told. Returning to the Museum and making ourselves "as we were," and comforting ourselves with something inside after the wetting we had got out, we took up our traps, and wending our way back to the ferry, recrossed the river in much the same manner that we crossed over in the morning; and sending our "baggage" up in the cars we thought we would walk up the "long stairs," 290 steps, by the side of the railway. On nearing the top, we felt as if we must "cave in," but having trodden so far the back of a "lion," we determined to see the end of his tail, and pushing on to the top, we had the satisfaction of having accomplished the task we had set ourselves. Perhaps before abandoning the Canadian side of Niagara, I should have said something about Table Rock, which, as I have said, is on the Canadian side, and very near to the Horse Shoe Fall. It took its name from the table-like form it originally presented. It was formerly much larger than it is now, but has, from time to time, fallen away. At one time it was very extensive and projected over the precipice fifty or sixty feet, and was about 240 feet long and 100 feet thick. On the 26th of June, 1850, this tremendous mass of rock, nearly half an acre, fell into the river with a crash and a noise like the sound of an earthquake. The whole of that immense mass of rock was buried in the depths of the river, and completely hidden from sight. No one was killed, which was a miracle, for several persons had been standing on the rock just a few minutes before it fell. The vicinity is still called Table Rock, though the projecting part that gave rise to the name is gone. It is, nevertheless, the best point on the Canada side for obtaining a grand and comprehensive view of Niagara Falls.

The next scenes of our photographic labours were Suspension Bridge, the Long Rapids, The Whirlpool, and Devil's Hole. These subjects, though not so grand as Niagara, are still interestingly and closely associated with the topographical history and legendary interest of the Falls. And we thought a few "impressions" of the scenes, and a visit to the various places, would amply repay us for the amount of fatigue we should have to undergo on such a trip under the scorching sun of _August in America_. Descending to the shore, and stepping on board the steamer _Maid of the Mist_, which plies up and down the river for about two miles, on the tranquil water between the Falls and the Lower Rapids, we were "cast off," and in a little time reached the landing stage, a short distance above the Long Rapids. Landing on the American side, we ascended the steep road, which has been cut out of the precipice, and arriving at Suspension Bridge, proceeded to examine that wonderful specimen of engineering skill. It was not then finished, but the lower level was complete, and foot passengers and carriages could go along. They were busy making the railway "track" overhead, so that, when finished (which it is now), it would be a bridge of two stories--the lower one for passengers on foot and carriages, the upper one for the "cars." I did not see a "snorting monster" going along that spider's-web-like structure, but can very well imagine what must be the sensations of "railway passengers" as they pass along the giddy height. The span of the bridge, from bank to bank, is 800 feet, and it is 230 feet from the river to the lower or carriage road. The estimated cost was two hundred thousand dollars, about £40,000. A boy's toy carried the first wire across the river. When the wind was blowing straight across, a wire was attached to a kite, and thus the connecting thread between the two sides was secured, and afterwards by means of a running wheel, or traveller, wire after wire was sent across until each strand was made thick enough to carry the whole weight of the bridge, railway trains, and other traffic which now pass along. We went on to the bridge, and looked down on the rapids below, for the bridge spans the river at the narrowest point, and right over the commencement of the Lower Rapids. It was more of a test to my nerves to stand at the edge of the bridge and look down on those fearful rapids than it was to go under the Falls. To us, it seemed a miracle of ingenuity and skill how, from so frail a connection, a mere wire, so stupendous a structure could have been formed; and yet, viewing it from below, or at a distance, it looked like a bridge of threads. During its erection several accidents occurred. On one occasion, when the workmen were just venturing on to the cables to lay the flooring, and before a plank was made fast, one of those sudden storms, so peculiar to America, came up and carried away all the flooring into the Rapids. Four of the men were left hanging to the wires, which were swaying backwards and forwards in the hurricane in the most frightful manner. Their cries for help could scarcely be heard, from the noise of the Rapids and the howling of the wind, but the workmen on shore, seeing the perilous condition of their comrades, sent a basket, with a man in it, down the wire to rescue them from death. Thus, one by one, they were saved. Leaving the Bridge, and proceeding to the vicinity of the Whirlpool, still keeping the American side of the river, we pitched the camera, not _over_ the precipice, as I heard of one brother photographer doing, but on it, and took a view of the Bridge and the Rapids looking up towards the Falls, but a bend in the river prevented them being seen from this point. Not very far above the angry flood we saw the _Maid of the Mist_ lying quietly at her moorings.

We next turned our attention to the great Whirlpool, which is about a mile below Suspension Bridge. Photographically considered, this is not nearly of so much interest as the Falls; but it is highly interesting, nevertheless, as a connecting link between their present and past history. It is supposed that ages ago--probably before the word went forth, "Let there _be_ light, and there _was_ light"--the Falls were as low down as the Whirlpool, a distance of over three miles below where they now are, or even lower down the river still. Geological observation almost proves this; and, that the present Whirlpool was once the great basin into which the Falls tumbled. In fact, that this was, in former ages, what the vortex at the foot of the Great Horse Shoe Fall is now. There seems to be no doubt whatever that the Falls are gradually though slowly receding, and they were just as likely to have been at the foot of the Long Rapids before the deluge, as not; especially when it is considered that the general aspect of the Falls has changed considerably, by gradual undermining of the soft shale and frequent falling and settling of the harder rocks during the last fifty years. Looking at the high and precipitous boundaries of the Long Rapids, it is difficult to come to any other conclusion than that, ages before the red man ever saw the Falls of Niagara, they rolled over a precipice between these rocky barriers in a more compact, but not less majestic body. The same vast quantity of water had to force its way through this narrower outlet, and it doubtless had a much greater distance to fall, for the precipices on each side of the river at this point are nearly 250 feet high, and the width of the gorge for a mile above and below the Whirlpool is not more than 700 feet. Considering that the Falls are now spread over an area of nearly three-quarters of a mile, and that this is the only outlet for all the superfluous waters of the great inland seas of Canada and America--Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, and Erie--and the hundreds of tributaries thereto, it may easily be conceived how great the rush of waters through so narrow a defile must necessarily be; their turbulence and impatience rather aptly reminding you of a spoilt child--not in size or form, but in behaviour. They have so long had their own way, and done as they liked on the upper river and at the Falls, they seem as if they could not brook the restraint put upon them now by the giant rocks and lofty precipices that stand erect, on either side, hurling them back defiantly in tumultuous waves, seething, and hissing, and roaring in anger, lashing themselves into foam, and swelling with rage, higher in the middle, as if they sought an unpolluted way to the lake below, where they might calm their angry and resentful passions, and lay their chafed heads on the soft and gently heaving bosom of their lovely sister Ontario. It is a remarkable circumstance that the waters of the Rapids, both above and below the Whirlpool, in this defile are actually higher in the middle, by eight or nine feet, than at the sides, as if the space afforded them by their stern sentinels on each side were not enough to allow them to pass through in order and on a level. They seem to come down the upper part of the gorge like a surging and panic-stricken multitude, until they are stopped for a time by the gigantic precipice forming the lower boundary of the Whirlpool, which throws them back, and there they remain whirling and whirling about until they get away by an under current from the vortex; and, rising again in the lower part of the gorge, which runs off at right angles to the upper, they again show their angry heads, and rush madly and tumultuously away towards Lake Ontario. The bed of these rapids must be fearfully rugged, or the surface of the waters could not possibly be in such a broken state, for the water is at least 100 feet deep, by measurement made above and below the Rapids. But nobody has ventured to "heave the lead" either in the Rapids themselves or in the Whirlpool, the depth of which is not known. There is not much picturesque beauty at this point. Indeed, the Whirlpool itself is rather of a fearful and horrible character, with little to see but the mad torrent struggling and writhing in the most furious manner, to force its way down between its rocky boundaries. I saw logs of wood and other "wreck," probably portions of canal boats that had come down the river and been swept over the Falls, whirling around but not coming to the centre. When they are seen to get to the vortex they are tipped up almost perpendicularly and then vanish from sight, at last released from their continually diminishing and circular imprisonment. It has sometimes happened that the dead bodies of people drowned in the upper part of the river have been seen whirling about in this frightful pool for many days. In 1841, three soldiers, deserters from the British army, attempting to swim across the river above these rapids, were drowned. Their bodies were carried down to the Whirlpool, where they were seen whirling about for nearly a fortnight. Leaving _this_ gloomy and soul-depressing locality we proceeded for about half a mile further down the river, and visited that frightful chasm called Devil's Hole, or Bloody Run. The former name it takes from a horrible deed of fiendish and savage ferocity that was committed there by the Indians, and the latter name from the circumstance of that deed causing a stream of human blood to run through the ravine and mingle with the fierce water of the Rapids. Exactly one hundred years ago, during the French and Canadian wars, a party of 250 officers, men, women, and children, were retreating from Fort Schlosser, on the Upper Niagara River, and, being decoyed into an ambush, were driven over into this dreadful chasm, and fell to the bottom, a distance of nearly 200 feet. Only two escaped. A drummer was caught by one of the trees growing on the side of the precipice, and the other, a soldier named Steadman, escaped during the conflict, at the commencement of the treacherous onslaught. He was mounted, and the Indians surrounding him, seized the bridle, and were attempting to drag him off his horse; but, cutting the reins, and giving his charger the "rowels deep," the animal dashed forward, and carried him back in safety to Fort Schlosser. The Indians afterwards gave him all the land he encircled in his flight, and he took up his abode among them. In after years he put the goats on Goat Island--hence its name--by dropping carefully down the middle of the upper stream in a boat. After landing the goats he returned to the mainland, pushing his boat up the stream where the Rapids divide, until he reached safe water. The events of the foregoing episode occurred in 1765, and it is to be hoped that the Indians were the chief instigators and perpetrators of the massacre of Bloody Run.

While we were looking about the chasm to see if there were any fossil remains in the place, an unlooked-for incident occurred. I saw two men coming up from the bottom of the ravine carrying _fish_--and the oddest fish and the whitest fish I ever saw. The idea of anyone fishing in those headlong rapids had never occurred to us; but probably these men knew some _fissures_ in the rocks where the waters were quiet, and where the fish put into as a place of refuge from the stormy waters into which they had been drawn. No wonder the poor finny creatures were white, for I should think they had been frightened almost out of their lives before they were seized by their captors. I don't think I should have liked to have partaken of the meal they furnished, for they were very "shy-an'-hide" looking fishes. But soon we were obliged to give up both our geological studies and piscatorial speculations, for black clouds were gathering overhead, shutting off the light, and making the dark ravine too gloomy to induce us to prolong our stay in that fearful chasm, with its melancholy associations of dark deeds of bloodshed and wholesale murder. Before we gained the road the rain came down, the lightning flashed, and the thunder clapped, reverberating sharp and loud from the rocks above, and we hurried away from the dismal place. On reaching the landing stage, we took refuge from the storm and rain by again going on board the _Maid of the Mist_. She soon started on her last trip for the day, and we reached our hotel, glad to get out of a "positive bath," and indulge in a "toning mixture" of alcohol, sugar, and _warm_ water. We had no "_gold_" but our "paper" being _good_, we did not require any.

After a delightful sojourn of three weeks at the Falls, and visiting many other places of minor interest in their neighbourhood, I bade adieu to the kind friends I had made and met, with many pleasant recollections of their kindness, and a never-to-be-forgotten remembrance of the charms and beauties, mysteries and majesty, power and grandeur, and terror and sublimity of Niagara.--_Photographic News_, 1865.

PICTURES OF THE ST. LAWRENCE.

Taken in Autumn.

Photographs of the River St. Lawrence conveying an adequate idea of its extent and varied aspects, could not be taken in a week, a month, or a year. It is only possible in this sketch to call attention to the most novel and striking features of this great and interesting river, passing them hurriedly, as I did, in the "express boat," by which I sailed from the Niagara River to Montreal. Lake Ontario being the great head waters of the St. Lawrence, and the natural connection between that river and Niagara, I shall endeavour to illustrate, with pen and pencil, my sail down the Niagara River, Lake Ontario, and the St. Lawrence. Stepping on board the steamer lying at Lewiston, seven miles below Niagara, and bound for Montreal, I went to the "clerk's office," paid seven and a half dollars--about thirty shillings sterling--and secured my bed, board, and passage for the trip, the above small sum being all that is charged for a first-class passage on board those magnificent steamers. I don't remember the name of "our boat," but that is of very little consequence, though I dare say it was the _Fulton_, that being in steamboat nomenclature what "Washington" is to men, cities, and towns, and even territory, in America. But she was a splendid vessel, nevertheless, with a handsome dining saloon, a fine upper saloon running the whole length of the upper deck, about two hundred feet, an elegant "ladies' saloon," a stateroom cabin as well, and a powerful "walking engine." "All aboard," and "let go;" splash went the paddle-wheels, and we moved off majestically, going slowly down the river until we passed Fort Niagara on the American side, and Fort George on the British, at the foot of the river, and near the entrance to the Lake. On Fort Niagara the "Star Spangled Banner" was floating, its bright blue field blending with the clear blue sky of an autumn afternoon, its starry representatives of each State shining like stars in the deep blue vault of heaven, its red and white bars, thirteen in number, as pure in colour as the white clouds and crimson streaks of the west. The mingled crosses of St. Andrew and St. George were waving proudly over the fort opposite. Brave old flag, long may you wave! These forts played their respective parts amidst the din of battle during the wars of 1812 and 1813; but with these we have neither time nor inclination to deal; we, like the waters of the Niagara, are in a hurry to reach the bosom of Lake Ontario. Passing the forts, we were soon on the expanse of waters, and being fairly "at sea," we began to settle ourselves and "take stock," as it were, of our fellow travellers. It is useless to describe the aspect of the Lake; I might as well describe the German Ocean, for I could not see much difference between that and Lake Ontario, except that I could not sniff the iodine from the weeds drying in the sun while we "hugged the shore," or taste salt air after we were out in mid ocean--"the land is no longer in view."

To be at sea is to be at sea, no matter whether it is on a fresh water ocean or a salt one. The sights, the sensations, and consequences are much the same. There, a ship or two in full sail; here, a passenger or two, of both sexes, with the "wind taken out of their sails." The "old salts" or "old freshes" behave themselves much as usual, and so do the "green" ones of both atmospheres--the latter by preparing for a "bath" of perspiration and throwing everything down the "sink," or into the sea; and the former by picking out companions for the voyage. Being myself an "old salt," and tumbling in with one or two of a "fellow feeling wondrous kind," we were soon on as good terms as if we had known each other for years. After "supper," a sumptuous repast at 6 p.m., we went on to the "hurricane deck" to enjoy the calm and pleasant evening outside. There was a "gentle swell" on the Lake--not much, but enough to upset a few. After dark, we went into the "ladies' cabin"--an elegant saloon, beautifully furnished, and not without a grand piano, where the "old freshes" of the softer sex--young and pretty ones too--were amusing themselves with playing and singing. An impromptu concert was soon formed, and a few very good pieces of music well played and sung. All went off very well while nothing but English, or, I should more properly say, American and Canadian, were sung, but one young lady, unfortunately, essayed one of the sweetest and most plaintive of Scotch songs--"Annie Laurie." Now fancy the love-sick "callant" for the sake of Annie Laurie lying down to _die_; just fancy Annie Laurie without the Scotch; only fancy Annie Laurie in a sort of mixture of Canadianisms and Americanisms; fancy "toddy" without the whisky, and you have some idea of "Annie Laurie" as sung on board the _Fulton_ while splashing away on Lake Ontario, somewhere between America and Canada. There being little more to induce us to remain there, and by the ship's regulations it was getting near the time for "all lights out" in the cabins, we took an early "turn in," with the view of making an early "turn-out," so as to be alive and about when we should enter the St. Lawrence, which we did at 6 o'clock a.m., on a fine bright morning, the sun just rising to light up and "heighten" all the glorious tints of the trees on the Thousand and One Islands, among which we were now sailing.