Science, Geology and Physics 



when no breach as yet existed. If so, where then was the outlet 1818-19 

 of lake Erie? By what channel did the waters of the great uncan 

 chain of western lakes, above Ontario, find a passage to the 

 ocean? If these lakes did not then exist, and if they and their 

 outlet were the simultaneous result of some mighty terraqueous 

 convulsion, may it not be as reasonably concluded that the whole 

 channel of the Niagara, from the present falls to Queenston, was 

 ploughed out by the same revolutionizing struggle? — and that 

 in place of being the operation of thousands of years, it may have 

 been the work of a month or perhaps of a day? Upon this sup- 

 position it is not difficult to account for the present position of the 

 falls; below them the channel is comparatively narrow and con- 

 fined, and the current must have raged, as indeed it still does, 

 with much more fury and effect than where it is less pent up. At 

 the falls it is divided by an island into two arms, each wider than 

 the channel below; and farther up it is diffused over a still more 

 ample surface, peacefully winding round islands of various sizes, 

 or smoothly expanding into a kind of bay. Within the semi- 

 circular outline also of the present falls, a kind of basin is 

 embraced, in which the water foams and whirls in great agita- 

 tion, but in which it has space to subside into smoothness before 

 breaking on the bank; and it is comparatively tranquil at a short 

 distance below. 



In a word, the assertions which have been made respecting 

 the gradual retrocession of the falls, seem to be altogether 

 gratuitous. It is possible that some partial change may take 

 place in the outline of the great fall; some piece of rock may 

 give way, as was the case in the bank below, but there seems 

 not the slightest reason to believe, either that the change has 

 hitherto been incessant and gradual, or that it will hereafter be 

 so. The earliest accounts which were given of them by European 

 writers are obviously and grossly fabulous, describing them as 

 seven or eight hundred feet high, and a mile and a half broad; 

 but the first which were at all authentic correspond remarkably, 



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