NIAGARA RIVER NIBELUNGENLIED. 



227 



Ontario. The land does not gradually slope to the 

 northward to make this descent, but stretches in 

 broad plains, and descends by precipices. The last 

 and principal of these abruptdeclivities is at Lewiston, 

 eight miles from the cataract; and here must have been 

 the original site of the cataract, although we cannot 

 tell how long ago the river began to cut this vast 

 chasm, nor how long it will require to extend it to 

 lake Erie. The waters of the Niagara are usually 

 frozen over during a part of the winter, except at the 

 falls, and where the rapids are most violent. Then 

 may be seen myriads of wild ducks lighting upon 

 the foaming stream above the fells, and descending 

 on the smooth sheet of the cataract until it reaches 

 its extreme circular verge, at about half its descent; 

 then, taking wing, they wheel round to the same 

 place on the rapids, and again repeat their defiance 

 of the terrors of the cataract. 



NIAGARA RIVER, between New York and 

 Upper Canada, runs from lake Erie into lake Onta- 

 rio, and Urns connects the St Lawrence and lake 

 Ontario with the upper Jakes. Its length is thirty- 

 six miles ; its breadth is from half a mile to seven 

 miles. Several islands are embraced within it. At 

 Black Rock, two miles from lake Erie, the river is 

 three-fourths of a mile wide ; and this is its breadth 

 at the falls. It affords a great variety of fish, such 

 as sturgeon, bass, muscanunge, or muscalunga ; and 

 salmon-trout are numerous below the falls. The 

 white-fish, weighing from two to five or six pounds, 

 are taken in seines, from October till May. It is a 

 most delicious fish, and is said to be peculiar to this 

 river and the great lakes. From fort Erie, on the 

 Canada shore, at the outlet of lake Erie, to Chip- 

 pewa (eighteen miles), the bank is from four to ten 

 feet high. From Chippewa to the great fall, two 

 and a half miles along the Canada shore, there is a 

 descent of ninety-two feet, and the bank is from ten 

 to 100 feet high. The river is here so rapid that it 

 is always covered with a white foam. From the 

 cataract to Lewiston is seven miles ; and near this 

 place the bank is 310 feet high, composed of strata 

 of soft mud and sand, clay, gypsum, slate, limestone, 

 and a superstratum of earth. From Lewiston to 

 lake Ontario is seven miles, and in this distance the 

 Northern Terrace, or Mountain Ridge, crosses the 

 course of the river. The height of the bank then 

 diminishes to twenty-five or thirty feet. The whole 

 descent of the river, and thus the difference of level 

 between J,he two lakes, is 334 feet. 



NIBELUNGENLIED (i. e., song of the Nibelun- 

 geri) ; an ancient German epic, little known to English 

 readers, but ranking among the nobler works of 

 imagination. The name Nibelungenlied is derived 

 from Nibelungen, or Niflungen, an ancient and 

 powerful Burgundian tribe, the name of which, in 

 all probability, may also be founded on the ancient 

 mythical ideas of a Nebelland (land of mists), in the 

 North. Others derive the name from Nibullunan 

 (intrepid); and others still from the Ghibelines (q. v.). 

 The subject of this great epic is the dreadful fate of 

 this tribe, caused by the passion of two princely 

 pairs. The one pair is Siegfried, son of king Sigis- 

 niiiiul of Santen on the Rhine, and Chriemhihl, sister 

 to Gunther, king of Burgundy ; the other is Gunther 

 and Brunhildis, a heroine of the fabulous North. 

 Siegfried as noble a hero as ever was depicted is 

 beloved by Chriemhild. Her brother Gunther is 

 enamoured of Brunhildis of Iceland. But the fair 

 can only be won by force. A successful suitor must 

 conquer her in combat. Gunther promises Siegfried 

 his sister's hand, if he will aid him in gaining Brun- 

 hildis. Siegfried conquers the martial maid by means 

 of his magic cap, which makes him invisible, and in- 

 creases his strength twelve fold, and gives her to 



Gunther, She afterwards has a struggle with Gun- 

 ther, in which she overcomes him. Siegfried a second 

 time reduces her to submission, and takes from her 

 her girdle and ring, in which lay her power. These 

 he gives to Chriemhild, who, in a subsequent quar- 

 rel with Brunhildis, shows her those trophies of her 

 defeat. Brunhildis resolves on vengeance, and per- 

 suades Hagen of Tronege to murder Siegfried, which 

 he effects, with the privity of Gunther. Chriemhild, 

 bent, in her turn, on vengeance, marries the heathen 

 Etzel (Attila, king of the Huns, a mythological per- 

 sonage, who appears in various stories, under several 

 modifications) ; invites the Burgundians to the court 

 of Etzel; involves them in strife with the Huns, 

 and, after several bloody battles, both parties are 

 destroyed. Gunther and Hagen, the sole survivors, 

 are taken prisoners by Dietrich of Bern, and put to 

 death by Chriemhild. This poem thus becomes most 

 tragical. The closing scene of the tragedy is deline- 

 ated with unrivalled power by Peter Cornelius (q. v.), 

 in the plate which ,forms the frontispiece to his 

 engravings illustrative of the Nibelungenlied. The 

 development of character, in the progress of the 

 story, is remarkable. Chriemhild, the lovely mis- 

 tress of Siegfried, becomes, in the course of the epic, 

 altogether revengeful and implacable. Her thirst 

 for vengeance drives her even to marry a foreigner 

 and heathen, merely to obtain the means of destroy- 

 ing the race of Gunther ; and we become somewhat 

 reconciled to Hagen, the murderer of Siegfried, by 

 his inflexible devotion, on all occasions, to the will 

 of his sovereign lady Brunhildis. a devotion which 

 feudal times esteemed so highly. The time in which 

 we find the historical basis of this tragedy is about 

 430 or 440, A. D. ; the scene is on the Rhine, and 

 on the frontiers of Austria and Hungary. The poem 

 of the Nibelungen, after having been long forgotten, 

 appeared again to delight the lovers of true poetry 

 and of German antiquities. It is founded on original 

 sagas, variously interwoven with each other, which 

 have come down to us, and of which we find Scandi- 

 navian modifications in the Edda, the fFilkinasaga, 

 and the Niflungasaga. It belongs to the same heroic 

 age with the Heldenbuch (q. v.). The Nibelungen- 

 lied seems to have undergone several remodellings, 

 at different periods. These are generally considered 

 to be four. As the poet who gave it its present 

 shape has not disclosed his name, and as no informa- 

 tion exists respecting him, conjectures have been 

 divided as to who he was. From the author's geo- 

 graphical knowledge being most accurate in regard to 

 the south-eastern part of Germany, and from his 

 decided predilection for Hungary, and his dislike 

 towards Bavaria, as well as from his flattery towards 

 the house of Babenburg, A. W. Schlegel is inclined 

 to believe that Klingsohr of Hungary, or Henry of 

 Ofterdingen, both of whom were present at the 

 great poetical contest at the court of the landgrave 

 Hermann, at Wartburg (q. v.), in 1207, is the 

 author. The metrical form of this poem is the 

 strophe, of four iambic and trochaic lines, in rhymed 

 couplets, and admitting of the chief accent being put 

 in six different places; also with spondaic, anapestic, 

 and dactylic rhythm, and a female caesura in the 

 middle. That part of the poem entitled the Lament 

 (Die Klage) is undoubtedly the production of a later 

 age, and is in a different form. Besides several 

 fragments, there liave been preserved six manu- 

 scripts of the Nibelungenlied, of which that of St 

 Gall is the oldest. Muller was the first who pub- 

 lished the whole poem in his collection. Von der 

 Hagen first gave a translation of the Nibelungenlied, 

 and, in 18 10, a critical edition of the original, at Ber- 

 lin. After this, he published, in Breslau (1820), the 

 Song of the Nibelungen for the first Time in the old- 

 i' 2 



