Science, Geology and Physics 



the commencement of the volume of water. You cannot arrive 1834 

 there otherwise than perfectly drenched, and the entire novelty 1C er 

 of the scene, incomparable with any thing you have ever per- 

 ceived in your life before, and the difficulty of breathing, as you 

 inhale a quantity of water, would induce most people to give up 

 the idea of penetrating to the end, had not long experience shown 

 that, with proper precaution, there is no real danger. Even most 

 ladies who visit Niagara, go behind this sheet. 



When I had arrived at the extremity of the path, and looked 

 over into the gulf — the deafening roar, the gusts of water, the 

 sight of the rebellious streams driving in all directions, and of 

 the watery volley shot up from below, the rolling sea above, 

 water on all sides, and the air nauseously impregnated with heavy 

 moisture; the eyes deprived of half their vision, by the water 

 which is driven into them by the violent blasts; and the piercing 

 whistling of the latter round the edges and sharp points of the 

 rocks; the uncertainty of the colour of the waters, white, grey, 

 green, continually changing, and the greenish dim light reaching 

 you through the furious waters above ; the enraged froth beneath, 

 boiling in madness, that it must break against the rocks, peaks, 

 and points, when all that which I slowly enumerate, burst in one 

 moment upon me, my first thought or feeling was, '* Oh Dante, 

 why couldst thou not see it! " 



• • • • 



The colour of Niagara, when not changed by heavy rains, is a 

 peculiarly beautiful green, differing from sea-green, as it seems 

 to me to have more of an emerald hue in it; I can only compare 

 it to the dye of the Neckar, yet the Niagara is much more 

 beautiful. I have already spoken of the salient angle in the line 

 of the Crescent Fall, and the comparatively straight line to the 

 west of it. I send you a croquis of the currents and eddies above 

 and below the Falls; I have taken and verified it from the little 

 wooden house above Table Rock, from the turret, from the 

 spot where the road along the Canada shore bends down to the 



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