The town of Niagara Falls, which has about seven thousand people, long had its chief source of prosperity in the influx of sight-seers, but it has recently developed into an important industrial centre through the establishment of large works utilizing the power of the falls by means of electricity. Some distance above the cataract on the American side a tunnel starts, of which the outlet is just below the American fall. This tunnel is one hundred and sixty-five feet below the river surface at the initial point, and passes about two hundred feet beneath the town, being over a mile long. Part of the waters of the Upper Rapids are diverted to the head of the tunnel, and by falling through deep shafts upon turbine wheels the water-power is utilized for dynamos, and in this way an enormous force is obtained from the electricity, which is used in various kinds of manufacturing, for trolley roads and other purposes, some of the power being conducted to Buffalo. A similar method is to be availed of on the Canadian side. It is estimated that in various ways the Niagara Falls furnish fully four hundred thousand horse-power for industrial uses, and the amount constantly increases. The largest dynamos in the world, and the most complete electrical adaptations of power are installed at these Niagara works. But the history of Niagara has not been always scenic and industrial. In 1763 occurred the horrible massacre of the "Devil's Hole," alongside the gorge of the Lower Rapids, when a band of Senecas ambushed a French commissary train with an escort, the whole force but two, who escaped, being killed, while reinforcements, hurried from Lewiston at the sound of the muskets, were nearly all caught and tomahawked in a second ambush. Many of the victims were thrown alive from the cliffs into the boiling Niagara rapids, their horses and wagons being hurled down after them. There were repeated actions near Niagara in the War of 1812. In October, 1812, the battle of Queenston Heights was fought, the Americans storming the terrace and killing General Brock, the British commander, whose monument is erected there, but being finally defeated and most of them captured. There were various contests near by in 1813, and the battle of Chippewa took place above the falls on July 5, 1814, the British being defeated. On July 25th the battle of Lundy's Lane was fought just west of the falls, between sunset and midnight of a summer night, a contest with varying success and doubtful result, the noise of the conflict commingling with the roar of the cataract, and the dead of both armies being buried on the field, so that, in the words of Lossing, "the mighty diapason of the flood was their requiem." "O'er Huron's wave the sun was low, The weary soldier watched the bow Fast fading from the cloud below The dashing of Niagara.