[Illustration: W. H. BARTLETT.
Handsigned: Yours truly
W. H. Bartlett.]
AMERICAN SCENERY;
OR,
LAND, LAKE, AND RIVER
ILLUSTRATIONS OF TRANSATLANTIC NATURE.
FROM DRAWINGS BY W. H. BARTLETT,
ENGRAVED IN THE FIRST STYLE OF THE ART,
BY
R. WALLIS, J. COUSEN, WILLMORE, BRANDARD, ADLARD, RICHARDSON, &c.
THE LITERARY DEPARTMENT
BY N. P. WILLIS, ESQ.
AUTHOR OF “PENCILLINGS BY THE WAY,” “INKLINGS OF ADVENTURE,” ETC.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
G E O R G E V I R T U E, 26, I V Y L A N E.
MDCCCXL.
LONDON:
RICHARD CLAY, PRINTER. BREAD STREET HILL.
PREFACE.
* * * * *
Either Nature has wrought with a bolder hand in America, or the effect
of long continued cultivation on scenery, as exemplified in Europe, is
greater than is usually supposed. Certain it is that the rivers, the
forests, the unshorn mountain-sides and unbridged chasms of that vast
country, are of a character peculiar to America alone—a lavish and
large-featured sublimity, (if we may so express it,) quite dissimilar to
the picturesque of all other countries.
To compare the sublime of the Western Continent with the sublime of
Switzerland—the vales and rivers, lakes and waterfalls, of the New
World with those of the Old—to note their differences, and admire or
appreciate each by contrast with the other, was a privilege hitherto
confined to the far-wandering traveller. In the class of works, of which
this is a specimen, however, that enviable enjoyment is brought to the
fire-side of the home-keeping and secluded as well; and, sitting by the
social hearth, those whose lot is domestic and retired, can, with small
cost, lay side by side upon the evening table the wild scenery of
America, and the bold passes of the Alps—the leafy Susquehanna with its
rude raft, and the palace-gemmed Bosphorus with its slender caïque. So
great a gratification is seldom enjoyed at so little cost and pains.
In the Letter-press, it has been the Writer’s aim to assemble as much as
possible of that part of American story which history has not yet found
leisure to put into form, and which romance and poetry have not yet
appropriated—the legendary traditions and anecdotes, events of the
trying times of the Revolution, Indian history, &c. &c. It is
confidently hoped, that the attempt to assemble a mass of interesting
matter under this design, has not failed; and that, in the value of the
intellectual portion, as well as in the beauty and finish of the
embellishments, the Work will be thought worthy of the patronage of the
public.
CONTENTS AND LIST OF ENGRAVINGS
TO VOLUME I.
* * * * *
_Ch._ _Page_
PORTRAIT of Mr. Bartlett. (Autographed) 0
1 MAP of the NORTH-EASTERN Parts of the UNITED STATES 1
2 Niagara Falls, from the Ferry 4
3 View from West Point 6
4 Trenton Falls, View down the Ravine 8
5 View from Mount Holyoke 10
6 The Outlet of Niagara River 12
7 The Palisades, Hudson River 14
8 The Rapids above the Falls of Niagara 16
9 Saratoga Lake 18
10 The Colonnade of Congress Hall, Saratoga Springs 20
11 Albany 22
12 Crow’s Nest, from Bull Hill, West Point 24
13 View below Table Rock 26
14 Lake Winipiseogee 28
15 Kosciusko’s Monument 30
16 The Horseshoe Falls at Niagara, with the Tower 32
17 The Narrows, at Staten Island 34
18 View of the Capitol at Washington 36
19 View of the Ruins of Fort Ticonderoga 38
20 View from Fort Putnam 40
21 View of State Street, Boston 42
22 Niagara Falls, from Clifton House 45
23 View from Hyde Park 47
24 Village of Sing-Sing 49
25 View from Ruggle’s House, Newburgh 51
26 Descent into the Valley of Wyoming 53
27 Boston, from Dorchester Heights 55
28 View of Faneuil Hall, Boston 57
29 New York Bay, from the Telegraph Station 59
30 Peekskill Landing 61
31 Lighthouse near Caldwell Landing 63
32 Harper’s Ferry, from the Potomac side 65
33 Caldwell, Lake George 69
34 Centre Harbour, Lake Winipiseogee 71
35 Yale College, at New Haven 74
36 Willey House—White Mountains 76
37 Battle Monument, Baltimore 78
38 Forest Scene on Lake Ontario 80
39 Viaduct on the Baltimore and Washington Rail-road 82
40 The Indian Falls near Coldspring 85
41 Columbia Bridge, over the Susquehanna 87
42 The Genessee Falls, Rochester 89
43 The Ferry at Brooklyn, New York 91
44 Rail-road to Utica, Little Falls 93
45 Utica 96
46 The Landing, on the American side, Falls of Niagara 97
47 View From Mount Washington 99
48 Mount Washington, and the White Hills 101
49 The Park and City Hall, New York 103
50 The Two Lakes, and the Mountain House on the Catskills 105
51 Trenton High Falls 106
52 The Valley of the Shenandoah, from Jefferson’s Rock 108
53 Lockport, Erie Canal 110
54 The Tomb of Washington, Mount Vernon 113
55 Black Mountain, Lake George 115
56 Valley of the Connecticut, from Mount Holyoke 117
57 View on the Erie Canal, near Little Falls 119
58 Hudson Highlands, from Bull Hill 121
59 Villa on the Hudson, near Weehawken 123
60 View of Meredith, New Hampshire 125
61 Ballston Springs 128
62 The Narrows, from Fort Hamilton 130
63 The Notch House, White Mountains 132
64 Wilkesbarre, Vale of Wyoming 134
65 Squawm Lake, New Hampshire 136
66 Sabbath-Day Point, Lake George 138
[Illustration: THE NORTH EASTERN PART OF THE UNITED STATES.]
AMERICAN SCENERY.
* * * * *
It strikes the European traveller, at the first burst of the scenery of
America on his eye, that the New World of Columbus is also a new world
from the hand of the Creator. In comparison with the old countries of
Europe, the vegetation is so wondrously lavish, the outlines and minor
features struck out with so bold a freshness, and the lakes and rivers
so even in their fulness and flow, yet so vast and powerful, that he may
well imagine it an Eden newly sprung from the ocean. The Minerva-like
birth of the republic of the United States, its sudden rise to
independence, wealth, and power, and its continued and marvellous
increase in population and prosperity, strike him with the same
surprise, and leave the same impression of a new scale of existence, and
a fresher and faster law of growth and accomplishment. The interest,
with regard to both the natural and civilized features of America, has
very much increased within a few years; and travellers, who have
exhausted the unchanging countries of Europe, now turn their steps in
great numbers to the novel scenery, and ever-shifting aspects of this.
The picturesque views of the United States suggest a train of thought
directly opposite to that of similar objects of interest in other lands.
There, the soul and centre of attraction in every picture is some ruin
of the _past_. The wandering artist avoids every thing that is modern,
and selects his point of view so as to bring prominently into his
sketch, the castle, or the cathedral, which history or antiquity has
hallowed. The traveller visits each spot in the same spirit—ridding
himself, as far as possible, of common and present associations, to feed
his mind on the historical and legendary. The objects and habits of
reflection in both traveller and artist undergo in America a direct
revolution. He who journeys here, if he would not have the eternal
succession of lovely natural objects—
“Lie like a load on the weary eye,”
must feed his imagination on the _future_. The American does so. His
mind, as he tracks the broad rivers of his own country, is perpetually
reaching forward. Instead of looking through a valley, which has
presented the same aspect for hundreds of years—in which live lords and
tenants, whose hearths have been surrounded by the same names through
ages of tranquil descent, and whose fields have never changed landmark
or mode of culture since the memory of man, he sees a valley laden down
like a harvest waggon with a virgin vegetation, untrodden and luxuriant;
and his first thought is of the villages that will soon sparkle on the
hill-sides, the axes that will ring from the woodlands, and the mills,
bridges, canals, and rail-roads, that will span and border the stream
that now runs through sedge and wild-flowers. The towns he passes
through on his route are not recognizable by prints done by artists long
ago dead, with houses of low-browed architecture, and immemorial trees;
but a town which has perhaps doubled its inhabitants and dwellings since
he last saw it, and will again double them before he returns. Instead of
inquiring into its antiquity, he sits over the fire with his paper and
pencil, and calculates what the population will be in ten years, how far
they will spread, what the value of the neighbouring land will become,
and whether the stock of some canal or rail-road that seems more
visionary than Symmes’s expedition to the centre of the earth, will, in
consequence, be a good investment. He looks upon all external objects as
exponents of the future. In Europe they are only exponents of the past.
There is a field for the artist in this country (of which this
publication reaps almost the first-fruits) which surpasses every other
in richness of picturesque. The great difficulty at present is, where to
choose. Every mile upon the rivers, every hollow in the landscape, every
turn in the innumerable mountain streams, arrests the painter’s eye, and
offers him some untouched and peculiar variety of an exhaustless nature.
It is in _river scenery_, however, that America excels all other lands:
and here the artist’s labour is not, as in Europe, to embellish and
idealise the reality; he finds it difficult to come up to it. How
represent the excessive richness of the foliage! How draw the vanishing
lines which mark the swells in the forest-ground, the round heaps of the
chestnut-tops, the greener belts through the wilderness which betray the
wanderings of the water-courses! How give in so small a space the
evasive swiftness of the rapid, the terrific plunge of the precipice, or
the airy wheel of the eagle, as his diminished form shoots off from the
sharp line of the summit, and cuts a circle on the sky!
The general architecture of the United States cannot pretend, of course,
to vie with that of older countries; yet, taken in connexion with the
beautiful position of the towns, no drawing will be found deficient in
beauty, while many of the public buildings especially are, as works of
art, well worthy the draughtman’s notice. The curiosity now generally
excited with regard to this country, by its own progress, and by the
late numerous books of travels, will throw a sufficient interest around
every point that the pencil could present.
——“The green land of groves, the beautiful waste,
Nurse of full streams, and lifter up of proud
Sky-mingling mountains that o’erlook the cloud.
Erewhile, where yon gay spires their brightness rear,
Trees waved, and the brown hunter’s shouts were loud
Amid the forest; and the bounding deer
Fled at the glancing plume, and the gaunt wolf yell’d near.
“And where his willing waves yon bright blue bay
Sends up, to kiss his decorated brim,
And cradles, in his soft embrace, the gay
Young group of grassy islands born of him,
And, crowding nigh, or in the distance dim,
Lifts the white throng of sails, that bear or bring
The commerce of the world;—with tawny limb,
And belt and beads in sunlight glistening,
The savage urged his skiff like wild bird on the wing.
* * * * * * * * * *
“Look now abroad—another race has fill’d
These populous borders—wide the wood recedes,
And towns shoot up, and fertile realms are till’d;
The land is full of harvests and green meads;
Streams numberless, that many a fountain feeds,
Shine, disembower’d, and give to sun and breeze
Their virgin waters; the full region leads
New colonies forth, that toward the western seas
Spread, like a rapid flame, among the autumnal trees.
* * * * * * * * * *
“But thou, my country, thou shalt never fall,
But with thy children—thy maternal care,
Thy lavish love, thy blessing shower’d on all—
These are thy fetters—seas and stormy air
Are the wide barrier of thy borders, where
Among thy gallant sons that guard thee well,
Thou laugh’st at enemies: who shall then declare
The date of thy deep-founded strength, or tell
How happy, in thy lap, the sons of men shall dwell.”—BRYANT.
[Illustration]
NIAGARA FALLS, FROM THE FERRY.
* * * * *
The best way to approach Niagara is to come up on the American shore,
and cross at the ferry. The descent of about two hundred feet by the
staircase, brings the traveller directly under the shoulder and edge of
the American fall—the most imposing scene, for a single object, that he
will ever have witnessed. The long column of sparkling water seems, as
he stands near it, to descend to an immeasurable depth, and the bright
sea-green curve above has the appearance of being let into the sky. The
tremendous power of the Fall, as well as the height, realizes here his
utmost expectations. He descends to the water’s edge, and embarks in a
ferry-boat, which tosses like an egg-shell on the heaving and convulsed
water; and in a minute or two he finds himself in the face of the vast
line of the Falls, and sees with surprise that he has expended his
fullest admiration and astonishment upon a mere thread of Niagara—the
thousandth part of its wondrous volume and grandeur. From the point
where he crosses, to Table Rock, the line of the Falls is measurable at
three quarters of a mile; and it is this immense extent which, more than
any other feature, takes the traveller by surprise. The tide at the
Ferry sets very strongly down, and the athletic men who are employed
here, keep the boat up against it with difficulty. Arrived near the
opposite landing, however, there is a slight counter-current, and the
large rocks near the shore serve as a breakwater, behind which the boat
runs smoothly to her moorings.
It may be remarked, that the well-known stanzas on the “Fall of Terni,”
in the fourth canto of “Childe Harold,” are, in many respects,
singularly and powerfully descriptive of Niagara.
“The roar of waters!—from the headlong height
Velino cleaves the wave-worn precipice;
The fall of waters! rapid as the light
The flashing mass foams shaking the abyss;
The hell of waters! where they howl and hiss,
And boil in endless torture; while the sweat
Of their great agony, wrung out from this
Their Phlegethon, curls round the rocks of jet
That gird the gulf around, in pitiless horror set,
“And mounts in spray the skies, and thence again
Returns in an unceasing shower, which round,
With its unemptied cloud of gentle rain,
Is an eternal April to the ground,
Making it all one emerald:—how profound
The gulph! and how the giant element
From rock to rock leaps with delirious bound,
Crushing the cliffs, which, downward worn and rent
With his fierce footsteps, yield in chasms a fearful vent,
“To the broad column which rolls on, and shows
More like the fountain of an infant sea
Torn from the womb of mountains by the throes
Of a new world, than only thus to be
Parent of rivers, which flow gushingly,
With many windings through the vale:—Look back
Lo! where it comes like an eternity,
As if to sweep down all things in its track,
Charming the eye with dread,—a matchless cataract,
“Horribly beautiful! but on the verge,
From side to side, beneath the glittering morn,
An Iris sits, amidst the infernal surge,
Like Hope upon a death-bed, and, unworn
Its steady dyes, while all around is torn
By the distracted waters, bears serene
Its brilliant hues with all their beams unshorn:
Resembling, ’mid the torture of the scene,
Love watching Madness with unalterable mien.”—BYRON.
[Illustration]
VIEW FROM WEST POINT.
* * * * *
Of the river scenery of America, the Hudson, at West Point, is doubtless
the boldest and most beautiful. This powerful river writhes through the
highlands in abrupt curves, reminding one, when the tide runs strongly
down, of Laocoon in the enlacing folds of the serpent. The different
spurs of mountain ranges which meet here, abut upon the river in bold
precipices from five to fifteen hundred feet from the water’s edge; the
foliage hangs to them, from base to summit, with the tenacity and bright
verdure of moss; and the stream below, deprived of the slant lights
which brighten its depths elsewhere, flows on with a sombre and dark
green shadow in its bosom, as if frowning at the narrow gorge into which
its broad-breasted waters are driven.
Back from the bluff of West Point extends a natural platform of near
half a mile square, high, level, and beautifully amphitheatred with wood
and rock. This is the site of the Military Academy, and a splendid
natural parade. When the tents of the summer camp are shining on the
field—the flag, with its blood-bright stripes, waving against the
foliage of the hills—the trumpet echoing from bluff to bluff, and the
compact batallion cutting its trim line across the greensward—there are
few more fairy spots in this working-day world.
On the extreme edge of the summit, overlooking the river, stands a
marble shaft, pointing like a bright finger to glory, the tomb of the
soldier and patriot Kosciusko. The military colleges and other buildings
skirt the parade on the side of the mountain; and forward, toward the
river, on the western edge, stands a spacious hotel, from the verandahs
of which the traveller gets a view through the highlands, that he
remembers till he dies. Right up before him, with the smooth curve of an
eagle’s ascent, rises the “old cro’ nest” of the culprit Fay, a bright
green mountain, that thrusts its topmost pine into the sky; the
Donderbarrak, or (if it is not sacrilege to translate so fine a name for
a mountain,) the _Thunder-chamber_, heaves its round shoulder beyond;
back from the opposite shore, as if it recoiled from these, leans the
bold cliff of Breknock; and then looking out, as if from a cavern, into
the sunlight, the eye drops beyond upon a sheet of wide-spreading water,
with an emerald island in its bosom; the white buildings of Newburgh
creeping back to the plains beyond, and in the far, far distance, the
wavy and blue line of the Kattskills, as if it were the dim-seen edge of
an outer horizon.
The passage through the highlands at West Point still bears the old name
of Wey-gat, or Wind-gate; and one of the prettiest moving dioramas
conceivable, is the working through the gorge of the myriad
sailing-craft of the river. The sloops which ply upon the Hudson, by the
way, are remarkable for their picturesque beauty, and for the enormous
quantity of sail they carry on in all weathers; and nothing is more
beautiful than the little fleets of from six to a dozen, all tacking or
scudding together, like so many white sea-birds on the wing. Up they
come, with a dashing breeze, under Anthony’s Nose, and the Sugar-Loaf,
and giving the rocky toe of West Point a wide berth, all down helm, and
round into the bay; when—just as the peak of Crow Nest slides its
shadow over the mainsail—slap comes the wind aback, and the whole fleet
is in a flutter. The channel is narrow and serpentine, the wind
baffling, and small room to beat; but the little craft are worked
merrily and well; and dodging about, as if to escape some invisible imp
in the air, they gain point after point, till at last they get the
Donderbarrak behind them, and fall once more into the regular current of
the wind.
[Illustration]
TRENTON FALLS.
(VIEW DOWN THE RAVINE.)
* * * * *
Trenton Falls (called Cayoharie by the Indians) are formed by the
descent of a considerable stream, known by the name of West Canada
Creek, through a mountainous ravine of singular formation and beauty.
The Creek, which is swollen to a tremendous torrent by rains in the
mountains, or by the spring thaws, has evidently worn through the strata
which now enclose it, and runs at present over a succession of flat
platforms, descending by leaps of forty or fifty feet from one to the
other, and forming the most lovely chain of cascades for a length of
three or four hundred miles. The walls that shut it in are either
perpendicular, or overhanging it in broad table ledges; the wild
vegetation of the forest above, leaning over the chasm with an effect
like foliage of a bright translucent green, painted on the sky.
Although but fourteen miles distant from a town containing twelve or
fourteen thousand inhabitants, Trenton Falls were unknown till within a
very few years. They were discovered by an artist in search of the
picturesque, and are now visited, like Niagara and Terni. A quiet but
excellent inn, which contrasts strongly, by its respectful service, and
its neat and secluded air, with the noisy and carelessly kept hotels of
the country, stands on the edge of the pine forest, a little back from
the brink of the chasm; and being off the business line of travel, and
requiring a little time and expense to reach, it is frequented
principally by the better class of travellers, and forms a most
agreeable loitering-place, either for the invalid, or the lover of quiet
leisure.
In company with the artist to whom the public is indebted for these
admirable drawings, I lately visited the ravine by moonlight. We had
passed the day in rambling up and down the creek, (a term, by the way,
that, differing from its use in England, describes usually in America
the finer class of streams;) and I had already made myself familiar by
many visits in former years with every turn and phase of its matchless
waters, as seen by the light of day. The moon rose about ten, and lifted
her perfect orb, without a mist or a cloud, over the shoulder of the
mountain which turns the outlet of the ravine. The fine and majestic
wood, through which winds the narrow footpath to the Falls, let in the
white light in silvery and broken masses—sometimes sliding a long
argent line down the dark body of a pine, sometimes pouring in upon the
horizontal branches of the hemlock, like an open hand sprinkled with
snow; and here and there lighting up a broad circle upon the carpet of
tassels and dead leaves, which, in contrast with the heavy shadows of
the surrounding wood, looked illuminated with the special brightness of
a fairy ring.
We descended the long ladder leading into the ravine, and were soon
below the reach of the moonlight, which came slant as yet, and only
rimmed the black wall above us with a long strip of white, which, where
the wavy line of moss and creepers ran into it, resembled the edging of
lace upon a velvet coat in a dark old Flemish picture. The water in this
part of the gulf quite fills up the chasm, and rolls, even by day-light,
in a black and sullen stream between the bare cliffs which frown over
it. The only path here is a giddy ledge, half way up the precipice,
which is passed with the aid of a chain run along the rock; and, as we
stood on this, looking over into the uncertain darkness below, with the
murmur of the far-down and invisible current ascending faintly to our
ears, and the light of heaven ceasing so far above us, it seemed to us
not an inapt image of the infernal river. We crept on till we came to
the foot of the principal Fall, and sat down on the platform below, to
wait the gradual descent of the moon.
The mist over the Fall began to show like a film of gauze waving in the
air; the sharp angles and crevices in the precipice caught the light one
by one, and soon the whole upper ravine was illuminated, while through
the gorge below the stream still made its way darkly and solemnly to the
outlet.
No pencil, no language, can describe the splendour with which the moon
drew her light across the face of the Fall. The other objects in the
ravine drank her beams soberly, and gave back only their own calm
outlines to the eye; but, from this wall of waters, every spray-drop
gave back a diamond—every column of the descending element, a pillar of
silver. If there were gates to fairy-land opening from this world of
ours, and times when they are visible and recognizable by the chance
passing eye of man, I should have believed that we had fallen on the
hour, and that some inner and slowly opening portal was letting the
brightness of a fairy world through these curtains of crystal.
[Illustration]
VIEW FROM MOUNT HOLYOKE.
* * * * *
Probably the richest view in America, in point of cultivation and
fertile beauty, is that from Mount Holyoke. The bald face of this
mountain, which is turned towards Northampton, is about one thousand one
hundred feet above the level of the Connecticut river, (or Quonnecticut,
as pronounced by the Indians,) and commands a radius of about sixty
miles. The ascent at the side is easy; and it is a fashionable climb for
tourists, whose patronage of ginger-beer and sunrises maintains a shanty
and a hermit on the top, and keeps in repair a series of scrambling but
convenient ladders at the difficult points of the enterprise. The view
immediately below presents a singular phase of the scenery of the river,
which seems here to possess a soul for beauty, and loiters, enamoured
and unwilling to flow on, in the bosom of a meadow which has no parallel
in New England for loveliness and fertility. Four times the amorous
stream turns to the west, and thrice to the east, threading its silver
tide through the tender verdure as capriciously as a vein in the neck of
beauty, and cheating twelve miles of direct course into twenty-four of
coil and current. The meadow is almost entirely unfenced, and the river
is fringed in all its windings with weeping elms, wild flowers and
shrubs, while up toward the town the fields rise in slightly swelling
terraces—forming a foreground to one of the most sunny and cheerful
villages in Massachusetts.
The more extended view embraces a great variety of mountain
range—Monadhoe in the north-east, Saddle Mountain in the north-west,
Mount Tom (between which and Mount Holyoke the Connecticut seems to have
broken with the outlet waters of an immense lake) close on the
south-west, and spurs of the Green Mountains advancing and receding in
the course of the Connecticut in the north. Geologists speculate
extensively on the lakes that once existed in the bosoms formed by these
mountains—but we have not time to go back to the deluge.
There is a small hamlet at the foot of Mount Holyoke, on the eastern
side of the river, called by the Indian name _Hoccanum_, and another at
the foot of Mount Tom, on the western side, called _Pascommuc_, both of
which were burnt by the savages in the early settlement of the country,
and the inhabitants killed or taken captive. The early history of all
these towns on the Connecticut river is filled with events of Indian
warfare. Northampton, by its rich alluvial land allured the first
settlers of Massachusetts long before most of the country between it and
the sea-coast possessed an inhabitant. These adventurous pilgrims seated
themselves in the midst of an unprotected wilderness, and surrounded by
populous Indian tribes; and, first purchasing the land at the Indians’
valuation, they defended themselves afterwards as they might from the
aggressions of these and others. The township of Northampton (called
Nonotuc by the aborigines) was first bought in 1653. It was conveyed to
John Pyncheon for the planters by Wawdillowa, Nenessahalant,
Nassicochee, and four others (one of whom was a married woman), who were
styled the “chief and proper owners.” The price was “one hundred fathom
of wampum by tale, and ten coats,” to which was added an agreement to
plough for the Indians, in the ensuing summer, sixteen acres of land on
the east side of Quonnecticut River. These “all bargained for
themselves, or the other owners by their consent.” All the aborigines of
this country, observes a correct writer on this subject, are owners of
the lands on which they dwell—men and women alike. This property in
lands, held by the Indian women, is a singular fact in the history of
the savage nations.
Three years after, a rich interval near Northampton, called Capawanke,
and containing eight or nine hundred acres, was sold to these same
planters by an Indian, named Lampancho, for fifty shillings, at two
payments, “to his entire satisfaction.”
These two purchases give a very fair idea of the Indian purchases made
by our forefathers. In the former, ninety square miles were sold for a
hundred fathom of wampum and ten coats! Within this tract were near five
thousand acres of interval land, worth at the present time perhaps eight
or nine hundred thousand dollars. Unjust as the transaction seems,
however, the price was ample to the Indian, who could not have got so
much by keeping it, and for whom there was no other purchaser.
The settlers of Nonotuc lived in comparative harmony with the tribe
about them; but in the subsequent Indian wars they lived in perpetual
fear and agitation. The town was surrounded with palisades, “the
meeting-house” was fortified, as were most of the private houses, and
several forts were built within the town. Still their dwellings were
often burnt, their women and children carried into captivity, and their
time was divided between war and agriculture.
[Illustration]
OUTLET OF NIAGARA RIVER.
* * * * *
This view is taken from the American side, and presents the _debouchure_
of the waters of Niagara into Lake Ontario, from a point of great
advantage. The vastness of the lake beyond, the tremendous agony which
the still foaming waters have just escaped at Niagara, and the remoter
journey of three thousand miles by which they have sought the sea from
their fountains in the west, form a back-ground of imagination to this
view, which, realised on the spot, give it a very thrilling interest. It
is in itself, however, a landscape of unusually bold character; and the
lofty and curving banks of the river are in keeping with its powerful
flow, and the immense volume it pours into the lake.
Fort Niagara, on the opposite side, was erected by the French so late as
1751, and was looked upon by them as the key to all these inland seas.
They had possession of it about eight years. In the beginning of July,
1759, General Prideaux, with his troops, reinforced by the Indian
auxiliaries under Sir William Johnson, advanced to Niagara without the
least hinderance—the enemy here not being in sufficient force to throw
any impediments in the way. About the middle of July he commenced the
siege, which he carried on with great vigour till the twentieth, when he
was killed in the trenches. Sir William Johnson, who succeeded him,
pressed the siege with great vigour. The enemy, alarmed with the
apprehension of losing a place of such importance, resolved to make a
last effort for its relief. For this purpose, they assembled about
twelve hundred men, drawn from Venango, Presque Isle, and Detroit; and
these, with some Indian auxiliaries, were detached, under the command of
M. d’Aubry, on an attempt to reinforce the garrison. Sir William Johnson
having received intelligence of their design, made a disposition to
intercept them in their march. He accordingly detached a considerable
body of troops for this service, who, falling in with the enemy very
near the lines of the besiegers, a battle was fought, which resulted in
the entire defeat of the French, with the capture of their commander,
and most of his officers. This battle happened the twenty-fourth of
July, and was fought in sight of the French garrison at Niagara. Sir
William Johnson immediately after sent Major Harvey to the commandant of
the fort, with an order, exhorting him to surrender, which being
complied with, the garrison, consisting of about six hundred men,
surrendered prisoners of war.”
The following letter from Sir William Johnson, reporting his victory, is
preserved in the Historical Journal kept by Captain Knox, and printed at
the time:—
“I have the honour to acquaint you, by Lieutenant Moncrief, that Niagara
surrendered to his Majesty’s arms, on the twenty-fifth instant. A
detachment of twelve hundred men, with a number of Indians, under the
command of Messieurs Aubry and Signery, collected from Detroit, Venango,
and Presqu’Isle, made an attempt to reinforce the garrison, the
twenty-fourth in the morning; but as I had intelligence of them, I made
a disposition to intercept them. The evening before, I ordered the light
infantry and piquets to take post on the road upon our left, leading
from Niagara Falls to the fort; in the morning, I reinforced these with
two companies of grenadiers, and part of the forty-sixth regiment. The
action began about half an hour after nine; but they were so well
received by the troops in front, and the Indians on their flank, that,
in an hour’s time, the whole was completely ruined, and all their
officers made prisoners, among whom are M. d’Aubry, de Signery, Marin,
Repentini, to the number of seventeen. I cannot ascertain the number
killed, they are so dispersed among the woods; but their loss is great.
As this happened under the eyes of the garrison, I thought proper to
send my last summons to the commanding officer, for his surrendering,
which he listened to. I inclose you the capitulation: M. Moncrief will
inform you of the state of our ammunition and provisions; I hope care
will be taken to forward an immediate supply of both to Oswego. As the
troops that were defeated yesterday were drawn from those posts which
lie in General Stanwig’s route, I am in hopes it will be of the utmost
consequence to the success of his expedition. The public stores of the
garrison, that can be saved from the Indians, I shall order the
Assistant Quarter-Master General, and the Clerk of the stores, to take
an account of, as soon as possible. As all my attention at present is
taken up with the Indians, that the capitulation I have agreed to may be
observed, your Excellency will excuse my not being more particular.
Permit me to assure you, in the whole progress of the siege, which was
severe and painful, the officers and men behaved with the utmost
cheerfulness and bravery. I have only to regret the loss of General
Prideaux and Colonel Johnson; I endeavoured to pursue the late General’s
vigorous measures, the good effects of which he deserved to enjoy.”
[Illustration]
THE PALISADES—HUDSON RIVER.
* * * * *
The first feature of the celebrated banks of the Hudson, which arrests
the eye of the traveller after leaving New York, is this singular wall
of rock, extending as far onward as he can see, and forming a bold
barricade against the river on the side of New Jersey. This singular
precipice varies in height from fifty to two hundred feet, and presents
a naked front of columnar strata, which gives it its descriptive name.
The small sloops which lie along under the shore, loading with building
stone from its base, and an occasional shed, diminished to the size of a
dog-kennel, across the breadth of the river, are the only marks of life
and habitation it presents to the traveller’s eye.
With most persons, to mention the Palisades is to recall only the
confusion of a steamer’s deck, just off from the wharf, with a freight
of seven or eight hundred souls hoping to “take tea” in Albany. The
scene is one of inextricable confusion, and it is not till the twenty
miles of the Palisades are well passed, that the bewildered passenger
knows rightly whether his wife, child, or baggage, whichever may be his
tender care, is not being left behind at the rate of fifteen miles in
the hour.
I have often, when travelling alone, (for “reflection with folded arms”
consorts only with the childless and baggageless bachelor), I have often
flung my valise into a corner, and sure that the whole of my person and
personal effects was under way, watched the maniform embarrassments and
troubles that beset the uninitiated voyager on the Hudson. Fifteen
minutes before the starting of the boat, there is not a passenger on
board; “time is moving,” and the American counting it as part of the
expense, determines to pay only “on demand.” He arrives on the narrow
pier at the same instant with seven hundred men, ladies, and children,
besides lapdogs, crammed baskets, uncut novels, and baggage for the
whole. No commissioner in the world would guarantee to get all this
freight on board in the given time, and yet it is done, to the daily
astonishment of newspaper hawkers, orange-women, and penny-a-liners
watching for dreadful accidents. The plank is drawn in, the wheels begin
to paw like foaming steeds impatient to be off, the bell rings as if it
was letting down the steps of the last hackney-coach, and away darts the
boat, like half a town suddenly slipping off and taking a walk on the
water. The “hands,” (who follow their nomenclature literally, and have
neither eyes nor bowels) trip up all the little children and astonished
maids, in coiling up the hawser; the black head-waiter rings a hand-bell
as if he were crazy, exhorting “them passengers as hasn’t settled to
step to the Cap’n’s office, _and_ settle,” and angry people who have
lost sight of their portmanteaus, and selfish people who _will not_ get
up to let the young gentleman see if his penny trumpet is not under
them, play in a real-life farce better than Keeley or Liston. A painted
notice and a very fat black woman in the door-way, inform the gentleman
who has not seen his wife since the boat started, and is not at all sure
that she is on board, that “no gentleman is permitted to enter the
ladies’ cabin,” and spite of his dreadful uncertainty, he is obliged to
trust to this dark Hebe to find her, among three hundred ladies, by
description, and amuses all the listeners with his inventory of her
dress, features, and general appearance. The negress disappears, is
called twenty ways in twenty seconds, and an hour after, the patient
husband sees the faithless messenger pass with a glass of lemonade,
having utterly forgotten him and the lady in the black bonnet and grey
eyes, who may be, for ought he knows to the contrary, wringing her hands
at that moment on the wharf at New York. By this time, the young ladies
are tired of looking at the Palisades, and have taken out their novels,
the old gentlemen are poring over their damp newspapers, and the captain
has received his fourteen hundred or two thousand dollars, locked up his
office, and gone up to smoke with the black funnel and the engineer. The
broad waters of the Tappan Sea open before the flying cut-water; those
who have never been up the river before, think of poor André as they
pass Tappan and Parrytown, and those who love gentle worth and true
genius begin to look out for Sleepy Hollow, and the house of Washington
Irving. It is a quiet little spot, buried in trees, and marked with an
old Dutch vane. May his latter days, when they shall come, find there
the reverence and repose which are his due!
[Illustration]
THE RAPIDS ABOVE THE FALLS OF NIAGARA.
* * * * *
During the last Canadian war, General Putnam, the famous partisan
soldier, made the first descent upon Goat Island. A wager had been laid,
that no man in the army would dare to cross the Rapids from the American
side; and with the personal daring for which he was remarkable, above
all the men of that trying period, he undertook the feat. Selecting the
four stoutest and most resolute men in his corps, he embarked in a
batteau just above the island, and with a rope attached to the
ring-bolt, which was held by as many muscular fellows on the shore, he
succeeded by desperate rowing in reaching his mark. He most easily towed
back, and the feat has since been rendered unnecessary by the
construction of the bridge from which the accompanying view is taken.
Many years since, a Tonemanta chief, after a violent quarrel with his
squaw, lay down to sleep in his canoe. The little bark was moored just
out of the tide of Niagara river, at the inlet to the creek which takes
its name from his tribe, and the half-drunken chief, with his bottle of
rum in his bosom, was soon fast asleep among the sedges. The enraged
squaw, finding, after several attempts, that she could not get
possession of the bottle without waking him, unmoored the canoe, and
swimming out of the creek, pushed it before her into the swift tide of
the river. She then turned its head toward the Falls and regained the
shore. The canoe floated down very tranquilly till it struck the first
ridge of the rapids. Nearly upset by the shock, she was flung from side
to side by the contending waters, and the chief started from his
slumbers. The first glance convinced him that effort would be vain; and
keeping the canoe upright with instinctive skill, he drew his bottle
from his bosom, and put it to his lips. The draught lasted him till he
reached the turn of the cataract; and, as the canoe shot over the glassy
curve, he was seen sitting upright, with his head thrown back, and both
hands pressed to the bottle.
Not long ago it was advertised that, on a certain day, a large vessel,
freighted with two or three menageries of wild beasts, and some domestic
animals, would be sent down the Rapids. The announcement drew together
an immense concourse of people from every part of the country, and, at
the time specified, the vessel was towed into the stream and abandoned,
with the animals loose on her deck. She kept her way very gallantly till
she got to the Rapids, when, after a tremendous pitching for a few
minutes, she stuck fast in the cleft of a rock. The bears and monkeys
were seen in the rigging, but the other animals, not being climbers,
were invisible from the shore. To the great disappointment of many
thousands, she went over the Falls in the night, and of her whole crew
the sole survivor was a goose, who was picked up the next day with no
damage but a broken wing, and has since been exhibited as a curiosity.
The Rapids are far from being the least interesting feature of Niagara.
There is a violence and a power in their foaming career, which is seen
in no other phenomenon of the same class. Standing on the bridge which
connects Goat Island with the Main, and looking up towards Lake Erie,
the leaping crests of the rapids form the horizon, and it seems like a
battle-charge of tempestuous waves, animated and infuriated, against the
sky. No one who has not seen this spectacle of turbulent grandeur can
conceive with what force the swift and overwhelming waters are flung
upwards. The rocks, whose soaring points show above the surface, seem
tormented with some supernatural agony, and fling off the wild and
hurried waters, as if with the force of a giant’s arm. Nearer the plunge
of the Fall, the Rapids become still more agitated; and it is almost
impossible for the spectator to rid himself of the idea, that they are
conscious of the abyss to which they are hurrying, and struggle back in
the very extremity of horror. This propensity to invest Niagara with a
soul and human feelings is a common effect upon the minds of visitors,
in every part of its wonderful phenomena. The torture of the Rapids, the
clinging curves with which they embrace the small rocky islands that
live amid the surge, the sudden calmness at the brow of the cataract,
and the infernal writhe and whiteness with which they reappear,
powerless from the depths of the abyss, all seem, to the excited
imagination of the gazer, like the natural effects of impending ruin,
desperate resolution, and fearful agony, on the minds and frames of
mortals.
[Illustration]
SARATOGA LAKE.
* * * * *
A singular feature of American scenery is the great number and beauty of
its small fresh-water lakes, from one mile to twenty in circumference,
fed universally by subjacent and living springs, with outlet rivers
which carry off all that is superfluous, and with shores always richly
fringed with foliage, and oftenest hilly and picturesque. They lie in
the midst of the wild forests, like silver mirrors, tranquil and lovely,
mingling a refinement and an elegance with the bold character of the
scenery, which contrasts, like Una, with the couchant Lion. Most of them
are feeders to the great lakes and rivers. There are counted fifteen
which send their waters into Lake Ontario, from the side of New York
alone,—a fact which gives a fair idea of their numbers, while it shows
the resources, so difficult to conceive, of those vast plains of water.
Saratoga Lake must depend for celebrity on the campaigns of General
Burgoyne, and its fish dinners. Of the first, the history has been
written and read. Of the last, the traditions are oral; but while
appetite returns, and trout venture to the angler’s hook, the memory
will be renewed. The Springs are distant only three miles; and hither
drive the more luxurious visitors of Saratoga, to dine in
parties,—those coming early who prefer sympathy with the catastrophe of
the fish, and broiling themselves, during the morning, in a
flat-bottomed boat among the trout-catchers.
There was a gay party on this lake some six or eight years since,
fishing and airing their wit, under the auspices of a belle of some fame
and authority. The boat had been pulled into water of five or six feet
depth, on the eastern side, and the ladies sat at the ends of their
rods, about forty yards from the shore, watching their floats, which lay
on the surface of the glassy water like sleeping flies, but, as the old
fisherman in the bow could have told them, laughing loud enough to
fright even the eels from their appetites. After several hours’ bobbing,
without bite or nibble, the belle above mentioned discovered that her
hook was caught at the bottom. She rose in the stern, to draw it up more
easily, and, all the party leaning over at the same time, she lost her
balance, and, in falling overboard, upset the boat. For the first minute
it was a scene of some terror. The gentlemen were very near drowning the
ladies, and the ladies the gentlemen; but the old fisherman, a tall
fellow who knew the ground, and was just within his depth, quietly
walked about, picking them up one by one, and giving them a hold of the
inverted gunwale, and so pushed them safely to shore, suspended round
the boat, like herrings on a hoop. Nobody caught cold; other people had
caught fish; they dined merrily, and the principal actor in the scene
has since been known by the sobriquet of the _diving belle_.
There is an Indian superstition attached to this lake, which probably
had its source in its remarkable loneliness and tranquillity. The
Mohawks believed that its stillness was sacred to the Great Spirit, and
that, if a human voice uttered a sound upon its waters, the canoe of the
offender would instantly sink. A story is told of an Englishwoman, in
the early days of the first settlers, who had occasion to cross this
lake with a party of Indians, who, before embarking, warned her most
impressively of the spell. It was a silent, breathless day, and the
canoe shot over the smooth surface of the lake like a shadow. About a
mile from the shore, near the centre of the lake, the woman, willing to
convince the savages of the weakness of their superstition, uttered a
loud cry. The countenances of the Indians fell instantly to the deepest
gloom. After a moment’s pause, however, they redoubled their exertions,
and, in frowning silence, drove the light bark like an arrow over the
waters. They reached the shore in safety, and drew up the canoe, and the
woman rallied the chief on his credulity. “The Great Spirit is
merciful,” answered the scornful Mohawk; “He knows that a white woman
cannot hold her tongue.”
Saratoga Lake is eight miles in length, and a little over two miles
broad. It is about eight miles west of Hudson River, which receives its
outlet waters under the name of Fish Creek. The same stream, before its
entrance into the lake, is called by the sesquipedalian title of
Kayaderosseras River. With its pretty maiden name it loses its beauty,
and flows forth from its union with the lake, in a dull and murky
stream, and so drops sluggishly into the Hudson. Ah! many an edifying
homily has been read from a blinder text.
[Illustration]
THE COLONNADE OF CONGRESS HALL.
(SARATOGA SPRINGS.)
* * * * *