Atlantic Coast (U.S.) -- Description and travel -- Fiction
One seems in less personal peril on the Canadian side, and has more
the feeling of a spectator and less that of a participant in the wild
uproar. Perhaps there is more sense of force, but the majesty of the
scene is relieved by a hundred shifting effects of light and color.
In the afternoon, under a broken sky, the rapids above the Horseshoe
reminded one of the seashore on a very stormy day. Impeded by the rocks,
the flood hesitated and even ran back, as if reluctant to take the final
plunge! The sienna color of the water on the table contrasted sharply
with the emerald at the break of the fall. A rainbow springing out of
the centre of the caldron arched clear over the American cataract, and
was one moment bright and the next dimly seen through the mist, which
boiled up out of the foam of waters and swayed in the wind. Through this
veil darted adventurous birds, flashing their wings in the prismatic
colors, and circling about as if fascinated by the awful rush and
thunder. With the shifting wind and the passing clouds the scene was in
perpetual change; now the American Fall was creamy white, and the mist
below dark, and again the heavy mass was gray and sullen, and the mist
like silver spray. Perhaps nowhere else in the world is the force of
nature so overpowering to the mind, and as the eye wanders from the
chaos of the fall to the far horizon, where the vast rivers of rapids
are poured out of the sky, one feels that this force is inexhaustible
and eternal.
If our travelers expected to escape the impression they were under by
driving down to the rapids and whirlpool below, they were mistaken.
Nowhere is the river so terrible as where it rushes, as if maddened
by its narrow bondage, through the canon. Flung down the precipice and
forced into this contracted space, it fumes and tosses and rages with
vindictive fury, driving on in a passion that has almost a human quality
in it. Restrained by the walls of stone from being destructive, it seems
to rave at its own impotence, and when it reaches the whirlpool it is
like a hungry animal, returning and licking the shore for the prey it
has missed. But it has not always wanted a prey. Now and again it has a
wreck or a dead body to toss and fling about. Although it does not need
the human element of disaster to make this canon grewsome, the keepers
of the show places make the most of the late Captain Webb. So vivid
were their narratives that our sympathetic party felt his presence
continually, saw the strong swimmer tossed like a chip, saw him throw up
his hands, saw the agony in his face at the spot where he was last
seen. There are several places where he disappeared, each vouched for
by credible witnesses, so that the horror of the scene is multiplied for
the tourist. The late afternoon had turned gray and cold, and dashes of
rain fell as our party descended to the whirlpool. As they looked over
the heaped-up and foaming waters in this eddy they almost expected to
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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