Poetry in the Table Rock albums--Poems by Colonel Porter, Willis G.
Clark, Lord Morpeth, Jose Maria Heredia, A. S. Ridgely, Mrs.
Sigourney, and J. G. C. Brainard.
Before the last fall of Table Rock, there stood upon it for many years a
comfortable summer-house, where people could take refuge from the spray,
look at the Falls, partake of luncheon, and procure guides and dresses
to go under the sheet. In the sitting-room was a large round table, on
which were placed a number of albums, as they were called. In these
visitors could write whatever thoughts or sentiments might be suggested
by the scene. With the grand reality before them but few persons
attempted anything serious, by far the greater number adopting the
facetious vein. It was emphatically light literature. One or two
collections of it have been published, furnishing the reader with only a
modicum of sense to an intolerable quantity of nonsense.
The following specimens are better than the average:
"To view Niagara Falls, one day,
A Parson and a Tailor took their way.
The Parson cried, while rapt in wonder
And list'ning to the cataract's thunder:
'Lord! how thy works amaze our eyes,
And fill our hearts with vast surprise!'
The Tailor merely made this note:
'Lord! what a place to sponge a coat!'"
"THOUGHTS ON VISITING NIAGARA.
"I wonder how long you've been a roarin'
At this infernal rate:
I wonder if all you've been a pourin'
Could be ciphered on a slate.
"I wonder how such a thund'rin' sounded
When all New York was woods;
I suppose some Indians have been drownded
When rains have raised your floods.
"I wonder if wild stags and buffaloes
Hav'nt stood where now I stand;
Well, 'spose--bein' scared at first--they stub'd their toes,
I wonder where they'd land!
"I wonder if the rainbow's been a shinin'
Since sunrise at creation;
And this waterfall been underminin'
With constant spatteration!
"That Moses never mentioned ye, I've wonder'd.
While other things describin';
My conscience! how loud you must have thunder'd
While the deluge was subsidin'!
"My thoughts are strange, magnificent, and deep
While I look down on thee.
Oh! what a splendid place for washing sheep
Niagara would be!
"And oh! what a tremendous water power
Is wasted o'er its edge!
One man might furnish all the world with flour
With a single privilege.
"I wonder how many times the lakes have all
Been emptied over here?
Why Clinton didn't feed the Grand Canal
From hence, I think is queer."
The most graceful verses on Niagara ever written by a resident are the
following by the late Colonel Porter, who was an artist both with the
pencil and the pen. They were written for a young relative in playful
explanation of a sketch he had drawn at the top of a page in her album,
representing the Falls in the distance, and an Indian chief and two
Europeans in the foreground:
"An Artist, underneath his sign (a masterpiece, of course)
Had written, to prevent mistakes, 'This represents a horse':
So ere I send my Album Sketch, lest connoisseurs should err,
I think it well my Pen should be my Art's interpreter.
"A chieftain of the Iroquois, clad in a bison's skin,
Had led two travelers through the wood, La Salle and Hennepin.
He points, and there they, standing, gaze upon the ceaseless flow
Of waters falling as they fell two hundred years ago.
"Those three are gone, and little heed our worldly gain or loss--
The Chief, the Soldier of the Sword, the Soldier of the Cross.
One died in battle, one in bed, and one by secret foe;
But the waters fall as once they fell two hundred years ago.
"Ah, me! what myriads of men, since then, have come and gone;
What states have risen and decayed, what prizes lost and won;
What varied tricks the juggler, Time, has played with all below:
But the waters fall as once they fell two hundred years ago.
"What troops of tourists have encamped upon the river's brink;
What poets shed from countless quills Niagaras of ink;
What artist armies tried to fix the evanescent bow
Of the waters falling as they fell two hundred years ago.
"And stately inns feed scores of guests from well replenished larder,
And hackmen drive their horses hard, but drive a bargain harder;
And screaming locomotives rush in anger to and fro:
But the waters fall as once they fell two hundred years ago.
"And brides of every age and clime frequent the island's bower,
And gaze from off the stone-built perch--hence called the
Bridal Tower--
And many a lunar belle goes forth to meet a lunar beau,
By the waters falling as they fell two hundred years ago.
"And bridges bind thy breast, O stream! and buzzing mill-wheels turn,
To show, like Samson, thou art forced thy daily bread to earn:
And steamers splash thy milk-white waves, exulting as they go,
But the waters fall as once they fell two hundred years ago.
"Thy banks no longer are the same that early travelers found them,
But break and crumble now and then like other banks around them;
And on their verge our life sweeps on--alternate joy and woe;
But the waters fall as once they fell two hundred years ago.
"Thus phantoms of a by-gone age have melted like the spray,
And in our turn we too shall pass, the phantoms of to-day:
But the armies of the coming time shall watch the ceaseless flow
Of waters falling as they fell two hundred years ago."
On turning to the more serious poems that have been written on the
theme, the reader naturally experiences a feeling of disappointment that
a scene which has filled and charmed so many eyes should have found so
few interpreters. Only those who see Niagara know how fast the tongue
is bound when the thought struggles most for utterance. One who seems to
have experienced this feeling thus expresses it:
"I came to see;
I thought to write;
I am but----dumb."
The late Mr. Willis G. Clark thus expands the same sentiment:
"Here speaks the voice of God--let man be dumb,
Nor with his vain aspiring hither come.
That voice impels the hollow-sounding floods,
And like a Presence fills the distant woods.
These groaning rocks the Almighty's finger piled;
For ages here his painted bow has smiled,
Mocking the changes and the chance of time--
Eternal, beautiful, serene, sublime!"
The following from the Table Rock Album was written by the late Lord
Morpeth:
NIAGARA FALLS.--BY LORD MORPETH.
"There's nothing great or bright, thou glorious Fall!
Thou mayest not to the fancy's sense recall.
The thunder-riven cloud, the lightning's leap,
The stirring of the chambers of the deep;
Earth's emerald green and many tinted dyes,
The fleecy whiteness of the upper skies;
The tread of armies thickening as they come.
The boom of cannon and the beat of drum;
The brow of beauty and the form of grace,
The passion and the prowess of our race;
The song of Homer in its loftiest hour,
The unresisted sweep of human power;
Britannia's trident on the azure sea,
America's young shout of Liberty!
Oh! may the waves which madden in thy deep
_There_ spend their rage nor climb the encircling steep;
And till the conflict of thy surges cease
The nations on thy banks repose in peace."
The extracts below are from a poem written after a visit to the Falls by
Jose Maria Heredia, and translated from the Spanish by William Cullen
Bryant:
"NIAGARA.
"Tremendous torrent! for an instant hush
The terrors of thy voice, and cast aside
Those wide involving shadows, that my eyes
May see the fearful beauty of thy face!
* * * * *
"Thou flowest on in quiet, till thy waves
Grow broken 'midst the rocks; thy current then
Shoots onward like the irresistible course
Of destiny. Ah, terribly they rage,--
The hoarse and rapid whirlpools there! My brain
Grows wild, my senses wander, as I gaze
Upon the hurrying waters; and my sight
Vainly would follow, as toward the verge
Sweeps the wide torrent. Waves innumerable
Meet there and madden,--waves innumerable
Urge on and overtake the waves before,
And disappear in thunder and in foam.
"They reach, they leap the barrier,--the abyss
Swallows insatiable the sinking waves.
A thousand rainbows arch them, and woods
Are deafened with the roar. The violent shock
Shatters to vapor the descending sheets.
A cloudy whirlwind fills the gulf, and heaves
The mighty pyramid of circling mist
To heaven. * * * *
What seeks my restless eye? Why are not here,
About the jaws of this abyss, the palms,--
Ah, the delicious palms,--that on the plains
Of my own native Cuba spring and spread
Their thickly foliaged summits to the sun,
And, in the breathings of the ocean air
Wave soft beneath the heaven's unspotted blue?
"But no, Niagara,--thy forest pines
Are fitter coronal for thee. The palm,
The effeminate myrtle and pale rose may grow
In gardens and give out their fragrance there,
Unmanning him who breathes it. Thine it is
To do a nobler office. Generous minds
Behold thee, and are moved and learn to rise
Above earth's frivolous pleasures; they partake
Thy grandeur at the utterance of thy name.
* * * * *
"Dread torrent, that with wonder and with fear
Dost overwhelm the soul of him who looks
Upon thee, and dost bear it from itself,--
Whence hast thou thy beginning? Who supplies,
Age after age, thy unexhausted springs?
What power hath ordered that, when all thy weight
Descends into the deep, the swollen waves
Rise not and roll to overwhelm the earth?
"The Lord hath opened his omnipotent hand,
Covered thy face with clouds and given his voice
To thy down-rushing waters: he hath girt
Thy terrible forehead with his radiant bow.
I see thy never-resting waters run,
And I bethink me how the tide of time
Sweeps to eternity."
The lyric from which the following extracts are taken was written by Mr.
A. S. Ridgely, of Baltimore, Md.:
"Man lays his scepter on the ocean waste,
His footprints stiffen in the Alpine snows,
But only God moves visibly in thee,
O King of Floods! that with resistless fate
Down plungest in thy mighty width and depth.
* * * Amazement, terror, fill,
Impress and overcome the gazer's soul.
Man's schemes and dreams and petty littleness
Lie open and revealed. Himself far less--
Kneeling before thy great confessional--
Than are the bubbles of the passing tides.
Words may not picture thee, nor pencil paint
Thy might of waters, volumed vast and deep;
Thy many-toned and all-pervading voice;
Thy wood-crown'd Isle, fast anchor'd on the brink
Of the dread precipice; thy double stream,
Divided, yet in beauty unimpaired;
Thy wat'ry caverns and thy crystal walls;
Thy crest of sunlight and thy depths of shade,
Boiling and seething like a Phlegethon
Amid the wind-swept and convolving spray,
Steady as Faith and beautiful as Hope.
There, of beam and cloud the fair creation,
The rainbow arches its ethereal hues.
From flint and granite in compacture strong,
Not with steel thrice harden'd--but with the wave
Soft and translucent--did the new-born Time
Chisel thy altars. Here hast thou ever poured
Earth's grand libation to Eternity;
Thy misty incense rising unto God--
The God that was and is and is to be."
Mrs. Sigourney wrote the following poem, it is said, during a visit to
Table Rock:
"APOSTROPHE TO NIAGARA.
"Flow on, forever, in thy glorious robe
Of terror and of beauty. God has set
His rainbow on thy forehead, and the clouds
Mantled around thy feet. And He doth give
Thy voice of thunder power to speak of Him
Eternally, bidding the lip of man
Keep silence, and upon thy rocky altar pour
Incense of awe-struck praise.
And who can dare
To lift the insect trump of earthly hope,
Or love, or sorrow, 'mid the peal sublime
Of thy tremendous hymn! Even ocean shrinks
Back from thy brotherhood, and his wild waves
Retire abashed; for he doth sometimes seem
To sleep like a spent laborer, and recall
His wearied billows from their vieing play,
And lull them to a cradle calm: but thou,
With everlasting, undecaying tide
Dost rest not night nor day.
The morning stars,
When first they sang o'er young creation's birth,
Heard thy deep anthem; and those wrecking fires
That wait the archangel's signal, to dissolve
The solid earth, shall find Jehovah's name
Graven, as with a thousand spears,
On thine unfathomed page. Each leafy bough
That lifts itself within thy proud domain
Doth gather greenness from thy living spray,
And tremble at the baptism. Lo! yon birds
Do venture boldly near, bathing their wings
Amid thy foam and mist. 'Tis meet for them
To touch thy garment here, or lightly stir
The snowy leaflets of this vapor wreath,
Who sport unharmed on the fleecy cloud,
And listen to the echoing gate of heaven
Without reproof. But as for us, it seems
Scarce lawful with our broken tones to speak
Familiarly of thee. Methinks, to tint
Thy glorious features with our pencil's point,
Or woo thee with the tablet of a song,
Were profanation.
Thou dost make the soul
A wondering witness of thy majesty;
And while it rushes with delirious joy
To tread thy vestibule, dost chain its step,
And check its rapture, with the humbling view
Of its own nothingness, bidding it stand
In the dread presence of the Invisible,
As if to answer to its God through thee."
The following lines were written by the late John G. C. Brainard, who
never saw the Falls. They were dashed off at a single short sitting, for
the head of the literary column of the _Connecticut Mirror_, of
Hartford, which he then edited:
"THE FALLS OF NIAGARA.
"The thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain
While I look upward to thee. It would seem
As if God pour'd thee from his 'hollow hand'
And hung his bow upon thine awful front,
And spoke in that loud voice which seem'd to him
Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake,
'The sound of many waters,' and had bade
Thy flood to chronicle the ages back,
And notch his cen'tries in the eternal rocks.
"Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we
That hear the question of that voice sublime?
Oh! what are all the notes that ever rung
From War's vain trumpet by thy thundering side!
Yea, what is all the riot man can make
In his short life to thy unceasing roar!
And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to HIM
Who drown'd a world and heap'd the waters far
Above its loftiest mountains?--a light wave
That breaks and whispers of its Maker's might."
PART IV.
OTHER FAMOUS CATARACTS OF THE WORLD.
CHAPTER XIX.
Yosemite--Vernal--Nevada--Yellowstone--Shoshone--St.
Maurice--Montmorency.
For the purpose of comparison it may be interesting to note other
cataracts in the United States, and in other parts of the world, and
also some of the remarkable rapids, which may be successors to what were
once perpendicular falls. For descriptions of those in foreign countries
we are chiefly indebted to the geographical gazetteers and the journals
of Humboldt, Livingstone, Bohle, and Stanley; for information regarding
the cataracts of Norway we are indebted to Murray's "Norway, Denmark and
Sweden."
[Illustration: YOSEMITE FALLS]
In the United States, after Niagara, the first to claim our attention
are the Falls of the Yosemite, so graphically and scientifically made
known to us in the second volume of Professor J. D. Whitney's Geological
Report for California.
Before describing them it is necessary to note the physical features of
the region in which they are placed. The valley of the Yosemite forms a
portion of the bed of the Merced River, which flows through it and
passes from it by a wild, deep canon into the San Joaquin. It is about
eight miles long and from half a mile to a mile wide, with a sharp bend
to the west, about two miles from its upper end. To this place the
Merced and two tributaries, called the North and South Forks, have come
through the most rugged canons, falling nearly two thousand feet in the
space of two miles.
Near the southerly end of the valley is the remarkable rock El Capitan,
an almost vertical cliff 3,600 feet high, and one of the grandest
objects in the valley. Just above this is the imposing pile called the
Cathedral Rocks, and behind these, connected with them, two slender and
beautiful granite columns called the Cathedral Spires.
Two miles above, on the opposite side, is the row of summits, rising
like steps one above another, named the Three Brothers. On the other
side, in the angle of the valley, stands Sentinel Rock, so called from
its fancied resemblance to a watch-tower. Three-fourths of a mile in a
southerly direction from this is the Sentinel Dome, more than four
thousand feet high and affording from its summit a most magnificent
view. Following up the North Fork, just at the entrance of the canon,
rises the Half Dome, the grandest and loftiest in the Yosemite Valley,
an inaccessible crest of granite, having an elevation--according to
Prof. Brewer--of 6,000 feet. On the opposite side of the same canon
stands the North Dome, another of those rounded masses of granite so
characteristic of the sierras. Appearing as a buttress to this is
Washington's Column, and below this the Royal Arches, an immense arched
cavity, formed by the giving way and sliding down of portions of the
rock, and presenting, in the upper part, a vaulted appearance.
In the angle formed by the Merced with the South Fork is the symmetrical
and beautiful North Dome. This valley is the most remarkable basin thus
far found in the world, and in view of its gigantic and impressive
scenery we cannot but marvel at its size--a mere cup or trough in the
midst of one of the sublimest of geological formations. This tiny strip
of wonder-land is, as we have seen, only eight miles long and less than
three-quarters of a mile average width.
[Illustration: BRIDAL VEIL FALL]
Beginning at the south-westerly end of the valley we first reach, in
ascending it, the Bridal Veil, formed by one of the torrents that feed
the Merced River. It is 1,000 feet in height, the body of water not
being large, but sufficient to produce the most picturesque effect. As
it is swayed backward and forward by the force of the wind, it seems to
flutter like a white veil.
Near the head of the valley, where it turns sharply toward the west, we
have before us the Yosemite Fall. "From the edge of the cliff to the
bottom of the valley the perpendicular distance is, in round numbers,
2,550 feet. The fall is not one perpendicular sheet. There is first a
vertical descent of 1,500 feet, when the water strikes on what seems to
be a projecting ledge, but which is in reality a shelf or recess about a
third of a mile back from the front of the lower portion of the cliff.
Across this shelf the water rushes downward in a foaming torrent on a
slope, equal to a perpendicular height of 626 feet, when it makes a
final plunge of about 400 feet on to a low talus of rock at the foot of
the precipice. As these various falls are in one vertical plane, the
effect of the whole from the opposite side of the valley is nearly as
grand, and perhaps even more picturesque, than it would be if the
descent was made in one sheet from the top to the bottom. The mass of
water in the 1,500 feet fall is too great to allow of its being entirely
broken up into spray, but it widens very much as it descends, and as the
sheet vibrates backward and forward with the varying pressure of the
wind, which acts with immense force on this long column of water, the
effect is indescribably grand."
The first fall in the canon of the Merced is the Vernal, "a simple
perpendicular sheet 475 feet high, the rock behind it being a perfectly
square-cut mass of granite. Ascending to the summit of the Vernal Fall
by a series of ladders, and passing a succession of rapids and cascades
of great beauty, we come to the last great fall of the Merced--the
Nevada, which has a descent of 639 feet, and near its summit has a
peculiar twist caused by the mass of water falling on a projecting ledge
which throws it off to one side, adding greatly to the picturesque
effect. It must be ranked as one of the finest cataracts in the world,
taking into consideration its height, the volume and purity of the
water, and the whole character of the scenery which surrounds it."
The fall from end to end of the valley proper is about fifty feet. "Its
smooth and brilliant color, diversified as it is with groves of trees
and carpeted with showy flowers, offers the most wonderful contrast to
the towering masses of neutral and light purple-tinted rocks by which it
is surrounded. Its elevation above the sea is estimated at 4,060 feet,
and the cliffs and domes about it from 3,000 to 5,000 feet higher." It
is a source of great satisfaction to the lover of nature that this
famous and favored territory, so studded with grandeur and fretted with
beauty, has wisely been set apart by Governmental authority to minister
to the higher needs and better instincts of man.
[Illustration: VERNAL FALLS]
The valley of the Yellowstone east of the Rocky Mountains in the north,
like that of the Yosemite west of the sierras of the Pacific slope, is
another wonder-land, presenting a bewildering variety of land and water
formations which, in turn, awe, charm, fascinate, or amuse, but always
astonish, the beholder.
Among the most interesting objects in the Yellowstone Valley are the
upper and lower falls of the Yellowstone River. "No language," says
Professor Hayden, "can do justice to the wonderful grandeur and beauty
of these scenes, and it is only through the eye that the mind can gather
anything like an adequate conception of them. The two falls are not more
than a fourth of a mile apart. Above the upper fall the Yellowstone
flows through a grassy, meadow-like valley with a calm, steady current,
giving no warning until very near the fall that it is about to rush over
a precipice 140 feet high, and then, within a quarter of a mile, again
leap down a distance of 350 feet. After the waters roll over the upper
descent they flow with great rapidity along the upper flat, rocky bottom
which spreads out to near double the width above the falls, and
continues thus until near the fall, when the channel again contracts and
the waters seem, as it were, to gather into a compact mass and plunge
over the descent of 350 feet in detached drops of foam as white as
snow."
On the Snake or Lewis River, the largest tributary of the Columbia
River, are three falls, the greatest of which is the Shoshone in Idaho,
where the river, with a width of six hundred yards, is said to be of so
great a depth that it discharges nearly as much water as the Niagara,
over a precipice about two hundred feet high. This grand fall is
situated in the midst of magnificent scenery, and is surrounded by a
fertile country.
Another lesser Niagara is found in the north-east, in the river St.
Maurice, the largest tributary of the St. Lawrence, which falls into it
from the north below Three Rivers and about twenty-two miles above its
mouth. The fall--the Shawenegan--is the same height as Niagara, and
while the width and depth of the river are not given, the volume of
water pouring over the precipice is said to be forty thousand feet per
second, a supply sufficient to produce a grand and impressive cataract.
Eight miles below Quebec the river Montmorency discharges directly into
the St. Lawrence, over a cliff two hundred and fifty feet high, with a
width of one hundred and fifty feet. The falling foam-flecked sheet
presents a beautiful and picturesque appearance. It is unique as being
the only known instance in which a tributary falls perpendicularly into
the main stream.
CHAPTER XX.
Tequendama--Kaiteeur--Paulo
Affonso--Keel-fos--Riunkan-fos--Sarp-fos--Staubbach--Zambesi or
Victoria--Murchison--Cavery--Schaffhausen.
In South America is the remarkable fall of Tequendama, on the river
Bogota, which, at this point, is only one hundred and forty feet wide,
and is divided into numerous narrow and deep channels which finally
unite in two of nearly the same width, and make a perpendicular plunge
of six hundred and fifty feet to the plain below. "The cataract," says
Humboldt, "forms an assemblage of everything that is sublimely
picturesque in beautiful scenery. It is not one of the highest falls,
but there scarcely exists a cataract which, from so lofty a height,
precipitates so voluminous a mass of water. The body, when it first
parts from its bed, forms a broad arch of glassy appearance; a little
lower down it assumes a fleecy form, and ultimately, in its progress, it
shoots forth in millions of smaller masses, which chase each other like
sky-rockets. The attending noises are quite astounding, and dense clouds
of vapor soar upward, presenting beautiful rainbows in their ascent.
What gives a remarkable appearance to the scene is the great difference
in the vegetation surrounding different parts of it." At the summit the
traveler "finds himself surrounded, not only with begonias and the
yellow bark tree (Sandal), but with oaks, elms, and other plants, the
growth of which recall to mind the vegetation of Europe, when suddenly
he discovers, as from a terrace and at his feet, a country producing the
palm, the banana, and the sugar-cane. The cause of the difference is not
ascertained, the difference of altitude--one hundred and seventy-five
metres--not being sufficient to exert much influence on the atmosphere."
[Illustration: NEVADA FALLS]
Another and grander South American fall, of comparatively recent
discovery, is the Kaiteeur, so called, in the river Potaro, a large
affluent of the Essequibo, the largest river in British Guiana. The
volume of water is greater than that in the Bogota, and falls in a
single column of dazzling whiteness seven hundred and forty feet into a
vast basin below. The ascending cloud of spray, the solemn monotone of
the descending flood, the extreme wildness of the primitive forest, and
the luxuriant and abundant growth of tropical vines and shrubs, and
their gorgeous colors, make the scene impressive.
[Illustration: LOWER FALLS OF THE YELLOWSTONE]
"There is in Brazil," says Elisee Reclus, "not far from Bahia, the
wonderful cataract of San Francisco, known by the name of Paulo Affonso.
At the foot of a long slope over which it glides in rapids, the river,
one of the most considerable of the South American continent, whirls
round and round as it enters a kind of funnel-shaped cavity, roughened
with rocks, and suddenly contracting its width, dashes against three
rocky masses reared up like towers at the edge of the abyss; then
dividing into four vast columns of water, it plunges down into a gulf
two hundred and forty-six feet in depth. The principal column, being
confined in a perpendicular passage, is scarcely sixty-six feet in
width, but it must be of an enormous thickness (depth), as it forms
almost the whole body of the river. Half way up, the channel which
contains it bends to the left, and the falling mass, changing its
direction, passes under a vertical column of water, which penetrates
through it from one side to the other, and breaking it up into a chaos
of surges, converts it into a sea of foam. Sometimes the white, misty
vapor may be seen, and the thunder of the water may be heard at a
distance of more than fifteen miles." The spray and roar of Niagara are
often seen and heard at Toronto, forty miles away, across Lake Ontario.
In Norway is found the highest perpendicular fall in the world that is
constantly supplied with water. It is the Keel-fos, formed by a mountain
stream that falls two thousand feet into the Navoeens Fjord near
Gudhaven, but the water becomes a mere billowy bank of mist before it
reaches the bottom.
The Riunkan-fos is another Norwegian cataract in the outlet of Lake
Mjoesvard, which pours through a wild, rock-studded slope until it
reaches a precipice, on the brink of which it is divided by a huge mass
of rock into two channels. Thence it falls eight hundred and eighty feet
into a dark basin at its foot, from which water-rockets and sharp jets
of foam shoot up and out in all directions. The intense whiteness of the
fleecy column is indescribable.
A still more famous Norwegian cataract is the Sarp-fos in the
Stor-Elven, formed by the junction of the Lougen and Glommen, the
largest of the Norwegian rivers. Like the Riunkan-fos the stream is
greatly contracted in a rocky gorge, and at the edge of the cliff is
divided into two channels which, however, soon unite in a fall of one
hundred feet upon huge masses of rock, through and over which it rushes
tumultuously for a short distance, and then flows quietly into the sea.
The volume of water is unusually large for a purely mountain river,
being in the gorge at the top of the fall one hundred and fifty feet
wide and forty feet deep. The massive and intensely white column
contrasted with the dark green foliage of the solemn pines, and the
darker rocks about it, and the deep blue water into which it falls,
produce a vivid impression on the mind of the beholder. The Stor-Elven
here presents the curious phenomenon of a stream changing, not from a
perpendicular fall to a rapid, but the reverse, from a rapid to a
perpendicular fall. A great portion of the right bank of the river at
the fall, and for a considerable distance below, is chiefly composed of
a stiff blue clay, and the river once flowed past Sarpsborg, a mile
below, in a succession of magnificent rapids. At that time a superb
mansion with numerous out-buildings stood at the termination of the
rapids. On the 5th of February, 1702, the mansion, together with
everything in and about it, sunk into an abyss six hundred feet deep,
and was entirely buried beneath the water. The walls of the house were
of unusual strength and thickness, with several high towers, but the
whole was buried out of sight. Fourteen persons and two hundred head of
cattle were also engulfed. The catastrophe was caused by the washing
out of the blue clay, and the undermining of the bank, which then
toppled over into the watery chasm.
[Illustration: UPPER FALLS OF THE YELLOWSTONE]
In Switzerland is the Staubbach--dust-stream--a well known fall in the
canton of Berne. It has a sheer descent of nearly nine hundred feet, in
which the water is converted into spray that is easily moved by the
wind, thus giving it a singularly beautiful resemblance to a white
curtain floating in the air.
In South Africa, Livingstone has made the public acquainted with that
extraordinary hiatus in the crust of the earth in which the great river
Zambesi is swallowed up. A stream more than a thousand yards wide,
dotted with islands, flowing between fertile banks clothed with the
luxuriant and gorgeous vegetation of the tropics, without the least
preliminary break or rapid, suddenly drops into a dark chasm of unknown
depth, which, repeatedly doubling on itself, pursues its tortuous course
some forty miles through the hills before emerging again into the
sunlight. "From Kalai," says Livingstone, "after some twenty minutes'
sail we came in sight of the columns of vapor appropriately called
smoke. * * * Five columns now arose, and, bending in the direction of
the wind, they seemed placed against a low ridge covered with trees. The
tops of the columns at this distance (six miles) appeared to mingle with
the clouds. The whole scene was extremely beautiful." At the brink of
the chasm he found the river divided into two channels of unequal width
by a large island called the "Garden," on account of its rich
vegetation. "Creeping with awe to the verge I peered down into a large
rent which had been made from bank to bank of the broad Zambesi, and
saw that a stream a thousand yards broad leaped down a hundred feet and
then became suddenly compressed into a space of fifteen or twenty yards.
In looking down into this fissure on the right of the island one sees
nothing but a dense, white cloud. From this cloud rushed up a great jet
of vapor exactly like steam, and it mounted two hundred or three hundred
feet high; then, condensing, it changed its hue into that of dark smoke,
and came back in a constant shower. This shower fell chiefly on the
opposite side of the fissure, and a few yards back from the top there
stands a straight hedge of evergreen trees, whose leaves are always wet.
From their roots a number of little rills run back into the gulf, but as
they flow down the steep wall the column of vapor in its ascent licks
them up clean off the rock, and away they mount again. They are
constantly running down, but never reach the bottom."
[Illustration: THE STAUBBACH, SWITZERLAND]
In Northern Africa the Murchison Falls in the White Nile, between lakes
Victoria N'yanzi and Albert N'yanzi, were discovered by Sir Samuel
Baker, and are described by him. "Upon rounding the corner a magnificent
sight burst suddenly upon us. On either side of the river were
beautifully wooded cliffs rising abruptly to a height of about three
hundred feet; rocks were jutting out from the intensely green foliage,
and, rushing through a gap that cleft the river exactly before us, the
river itself, contracted from a grand stream, was pent up in a narrow
gorge scarcely fifty yards in width; roaring furiously through the
rock-bound pass, it plunged in one leap of about one hundred and twenty
feet perpendicularly into a dark abyss below. The fall of water was
snow-white, which had a superb effect, as it contrasted with the dark
cliffs that walled the river, while graceful palms of the tropics and
wild plantains perfected the beauty of the view."
A writer in Hamilton's "East Indian Gazetteer" gives us an account of
the cataract of Gungani Chuki in the northern branch of the river
Cavery. "Much the larger stream is broken by projecting masses of rock
into one cataract of prodigious volume and three or four smaller
torrents. The first plunges into the river below from a height variously
estimated at from one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet, while the
others, impeded in their course by intervening rocks, work their way
with many fantastic evolutions to a distance about two hundred feet from
the base of the precipice, where they all unite to make a single final
plunge, while the other branch of the river precipitates itself in two
columns from a cliff of the same height, and standing nearly at right
angles with the main fall. The surrounding scenery is wild in the
extreme, and the whole presents a very imposing spectacle.
"A second cataract is formed by the southern arm of the Cavery about a
mile below. The channel here spreads out into a magnificent expanse,
which is divided into no less than ten distinct torrents, which fall
with infinite variety of configuration over a precipice of more than one
hundred feet, but presenting no single body equal to the Gungani Chuki,
but the whole forming an amphitheatre of cataracts, meeting the eye in
every direction along a sweep of perhaps 90 deg., and combined with scenery
of such sequestered wildness that for picturesque effect it is perhaps
without parallel in the world." This branch of the stream is used to
irrigate the province of Tanjore, and the coming of its floods is
celebrated by the natives with special festivities, as they consider the
river to be one of their most beneficent deities.
The beautiful and picturesque fall of the Rhine below Schaffhausen,
where the water falls sixty-five feet in a single column, is the
admiration of all travelers.
[Illustration: VICTORIA FALLS, ZAMBESI]
CHAPTER XXI.
Famous Rapids and
Cascades--Niagara--Amazon--Orinoco--Parana--Nile--Livingstone.
In all its features and characteristics the great water-course,
including the great lakes, which feeds the Niagara, is peculiar and
interesting. It is more than two thousand miles long; its utmost
surface-sources are scarcely six hundred feet above tide-water; its
bottom, at its greater depth, is more than four hundred feet below
tide-water. In all its course it receives less than two score of
affluents, and only two of these, the St. Maurice and the Saugeen, bring
to it any considerable quantity of water, and no flood in any of them
discolors its emerald surface from shore to shore. Only fierce gales of
wind bring up from its own depths the sediment that can discolor its
whole face. Far the greater portion of its water-supply is drawn from
countless hidden springs, lying deep in the bosom of the earth. In all
the elements of beautiful, picturesque, and enchanting scenery it is
unrivaled.
The rapids of the Niagara just above the Falls, from the Leaping Rock
down through the Witches' Caldron to the edge of the precipice, are
nearly a mile in width, and discharge ten million cubic feet of water
each minute. But for a combination of grandeur and beauty, and for
imparting a sense of almost infinite power, nothing can surpass the
Whirlpool Rapids below the Falls, where the ten million cubic feet of
water are compressed into a tortuous, tumultuous channel, less than four
hundred feet wide.
There are many lesser rapids in the St. Lawrence, from the Thousand
Islands to Montreal, the passage of which in the large lake steamers is
an exciting voyage. The constant changes of scenery at every turn and in
every rood of progress is almost bewildering. Then the alternation of
rapids and broad expanses of river, the bird-like motion as the steamer
sinks and sails down through the rapids, and the sense of relief when it
seems to rise and glide over the smooth river, vary and increase the
excitement. There is developed in one of those expanses a peculiar
geological feature called the Split Rock. The name is strictly accurate.
The descending steamer finds but one narrow channel, a little more than
its own width, through which it can pass in a stream more than half a
mile wide. It lies between the sharp corners of a broad, wedge-shaped
cleavage in an immense rock which, by some convulsion of nature--not by
any abrading process of the elements--has been literally split downward
more than eighty feet. The last crooked and turbulent rapid passed just
before reaching Montreal is the terror of the river pilots, and they
never attempt its passage except by daylight. From Montreal to the Gulf
of St. Lawrence the constantly deepening channel flows with an unbroken
current.
It is a notable fact that the great river of rivers, which drains a
larger territory than any other on the globe, the Amazon proper, has a
fall of only two hundred and ten feet in a course of three thousand
miles, and while it has a deep channel and a uniform current of three
miles an hour for its whole length, it has no broken rapids. But in its
many great affluents rapids are numerous, though not so famous as those
found in other South American rivers.
The river Orinoco, more remarkable in some respects than the Amazon,
receives the waters of four hundred and thirty-six rivers, besides two
thousand smaller streams. It is one thousand five hundred miles long, is
navigable for seven hundred and eighty miles, and at Bolivar, two
hundred and fifty miles from its mouth, it is four miles wide and three
hundred and ninety feet deep. Its famous rapids of the Apure and Maypure
were visited by Humboldt. At the latter, the river is two thousand eight
hundred and forty yards wide, and plunges down an inclined plane about
three miles long, making a fall equal to forty feet in vertical height.
It is dotted with innumerable islands which furnish a striking contrast
to the vast sheet of white water, presenting the singular appearance of
an eruption of shrub-crowned rocks in a sea of foam. These islands, and
its great width, constitute the peculiar characteristics of this chute.
In the grandest of the South American rapids, those of the river Parana,
a vast volume of water from a channel nearly two and a half miles in
width is compressed into a gorge only sixty-six yards wide, through
which the flood dashes down a slope of sixty degrees inclination and
fifty-six feet perpendicular fall. Its roar--a perpetual monotone--is
heard thirty miles away.
Hardly less remarkable than the rapids of the South American rivers are
those of the two great African rivers, the Nile and the Congo, or, as
Mr. Stanley has re-christened the latter, the Livingstone. The Nile may
be compared to a vast tree with its huge delta-roots in the
Mediterranean, its boll extending up through a rainless desert nearly
one thousand five hundred miles to meet its numerous branches which
stretch up into the mountains of Abyssinia, and the vast basin south of
the equator that contains the great lakes of Victoria N'yanzi and Albert
N'yanzi. From these branches in each year, at a fixed season, are poured
down the sediment-charged waters which irrigate and fertilize an immense
valley that would otherwise be only a parched and desert waste.
Without specifying the data for his calculations, Mr. Stanley, who saw
them both, states that the volume of the Livingstone is ten times
greater than that of the Nile. Its course is interrupted by two series
of cataracts, or rather a combination of cascades and rapids. The first
series, seven in number, occurs within four hundred miles of its source,
and consists of the Stanley Falls, occupying different points in a
channel sixty-two miles long. Its banks are of moderate elevation above
its bed, and in the long, bright, equatorial days the leaping,
sparkling, foaming waters present a scene of dazzling brilliancy. In the
second series, named by Mr. Stanley the Livingstone Falls, there are
thirty-two cascades, more extensive and imposing than those of the
first. The river, after a gentle descent of nearly one thousand miles,
and after receiving many large affluents, reaches the first of these
impetuous torrents where all its waters are compressed into a narrow
gorge only four hundred and fifty feet wide, and at a single point near
the right bank where a sounding was possible, Mr. Stanley found a depth
of one hundred and thirty-eight feet.
The remaining thirty-one cascades are distributed along a channel one
hundred and fifty-five miles in length, between banks from fifty to six
hundred feet high, and having a fall of one thousand one hundred feet.
The dimensions here given indicate that these rapids are second, in
power and impressiveness, only to those above the Whirlpool of Niagara.
Hazell, Watson, and Viney, Printers, London and Aylesbury.