BOSTON TO WASHINGTON 127 



the Canadian side, in a room that looked out on the great fall, 

 and where its continuous musical roar soothed me to sleep. 

 It was a hard frost, and the American falls had great ice- 

 mounds below them, and ranges of gigantic icicles near the 

 margins. At night the sound was like that of a strong, steady 

 wind at sea, but even more like the roar of the London streets 

 heard from the middle of Hyde Park. When in bed a con- 

 stant vibration was felt. I spent my whole time wandering 

 about the falls, above and below, on the Canadian and Ameri- 

 can sides, roaming over Goat Island and the Three Sisters 

 Islands far in the rapids above the Horse-shoe Fall, which are 

 almost as impressive as the fall itself. The small Luna Island 

 dividing the American falls was a lovely sight; the arbor-vitse 

 trees {Thuya Americana) , with which it is covered, young 

 and old, some torn and jagged, but all to the smallest twigs 

 coated with glistening ice from the frozen spray,, looked like 

 groves of gigantic tree corals — the most magnificent and fairy- 

 like scene I have ever beheld. All the islands are rocky and 

 picturesque, the trees draped with wild vines and Virginia 

 creepers, and afford a sample of the original American forest 

 vegetation of very great interest. During these four days 

 I was almost entirely alone, and was glad to be so. I was 

 never tired of the ever-changing aspects of this grand illustra- 

 tion of natural forces engaged in modelling the earth's surface. 

 Usually the centre of the great falls, where the depth and force 

 of the water are greatest, is hidden by the great column of 

 spray which rises to the height of four hundred or five hun- 

 dred feet; but occasionally the wind drifts it aside, and allows 

 the great central gulf of falling water to be seen nearly from 

 top to bottom — a most impressive sight. 



When I got back to Washington it was snowing hard, and 

 the whole country was more wintry-looking than at Niagara, 

 four degrees further north. I at once went to the Geological 

 Survey Library to look up recent works on Niagara, and had 

 an interesting talk with Mr. McGee about it. He told me 

 that the centre of the Horse-shoe Fall has receded about two 

 hundred feet in forty years. The Potomac falls, which are in 

 gneiss rock, have receded quite as fast. The conditions that 



