Niagara Falls 



1851 Over that bridge how slowly you will walk, and how silently, 



CurtIS gazing in awe at the tempestuous sweep of the rapids, and 



glancing with wonder at the faint cloud of spray over the Ameri- 

 can Fall. As the sense of grandeur and beauty subdues your 

 mind, you will still move quietly onward, pausing a moment, 

 leaning a moment on the railing, closing your eyes to hear only 

 Niagara, and ever, as a child says its prayers in a time of danger, 

 slowly, and with strange slowness, repeating to yourself, 

 "Niagara! Niagara!" 



For although you have not yet seen the Cataract, you feel that 

 nothing else can be the crisis of this excitement. Were you 

 suddenly placed blindfolded where you stand, and your eyes 

 were unbandaged, and you were asked, " What shall be the 

 result of all this? " the answer would accompany the question, 

 " Niagara! " 



Yet marvellous calmness still waits upon intense feeling. " It 

 was odd," wrote Sterling to a friend, " to be curiously studying 

 the figures on the doctor's waistcoat, while my life, as I thought, 

 was bleeding from my lips." We must still sport Math our 

 emotions. Some philosopher will die, his last breath sparkling 

 from his lips in a pun. Some fair and fated Lady Jane Grey 

 will span her slight neck with her delicate fingers, and smile to 

 the headsman that his task is easy. And we, with kindred feel- 

 ing, turn aside into the shop of Indian curiosities and play with 

 Niagara, treating it as a jester, as a Bayadere, to await our 

 pleasure. 



Then, through the woods on Goat Island — solemn and 

 stately woods — how slowly you will walk, again, and how 

 silently ! Ten years ago, your friend carved his name upon some 

 tree there, and Niagara must now wait until he finds it, swollen 

 and shapeless with time. You saunter on. It is not a sunny 

 day. It is cloudy, but the light is moist and rich, and when you 

 emerge upon the quiet green path that skirts the English Rapids, 

 the sense of life in the waters — the water as a symbol of life 

 and human passion — fills your mind. Certainly no other water 

 in the world is watched with such anxiety, with such sympathy. 



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