Anthology and Bibliography of Niagara Falls, Volume 1 |
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Common terms and phrases
American Fall American side appear bank basin beautiful Blondin boat bottom bridge brink Buffalo Canada Canadian side cascade cataract channel Charlevoix cliff cloud deep depth descending distance edge erosion Falls of Niagara foam foot formed Fort Niagara Fort Schlosser geological glacial Goat Island gorge grandeur heard height Hennepin Horseshoe Fall hundred feet immense impression Indians jour journal Kalm ladder Lake Erie Lake Huron Lake Ontario land leagues Lewiston limestone Lond look mass miles mist nature Niagara Falls Niagara gorge Niagara river noise North observed passed perpendicular precipice present Queenston rainbow rapids rate of recession rep'ts rise roar rushing scene scenery seems seen sheet shore sketch Spencer spray stone stream sublime surface Table Rock thunder tion Travels trees upper visited the Falls walk whirlpool whole wind wonder woods yards
Popular passages
Page 227 - I think in every quiet season now, Still do those waters roll and leap, and roar and tumble, all day long ; still are the rainbows spanning them a hundred feet below ; still, when the sun is on them, do they shine and glow like molten gold ; still, when the day is gloomy, do they fall like snow...
Page 227 - ... daily life receded from my view, and lessened in the distance, during the ten memorable days we passed on that Enchanted Ground ! What voices spoke from out the thundering water; what faces, faded from the earth, looked out upon me from its gleaming depths ; what Heavenly promise glistened in those angels...
Page 345 - ... them, do they shine and glow like molten gold. Still, when the day is gloomy, do they fall like snow, or seem to crumble away like the front of a great chalk cliff, or roll down the rock like dense white smoke. But always does the mighty stream appear to die as it comes down, and always from its unfathomable grave arises that tremendous ghost of spray and mist which is never laid : which has haunted this place with the same dread solemnity since Darkness brooded on the deep, and that first flood...
Page 226 - Then, when I felt how near to my Creator I was standing, the first effect, and the enduring one — instant and lasting — of the tremendous spectacle, was Peace. Peace of Mind, tranquillity, calm recollections of the Dead, great thoughts of Eternal Rest and Happiness : nothing of gloom or terror. Niagara was at once stamped upon my heart, an Image of Beauty ; to remain there, changeless and indelible, until its pulses cease to beat, for ever.
Page 188 - ... finding the effort vain, a wretched sense of disappointment weighed me down. I climbed the precipice, and threw myself on the earth, feeling that I was unworthy to look at the Great Falls, and careless about beholding them again. . . . All that night, as there has been and will be for ages past and to come, a rushing sound was heard, as if a great tempest were sweeping through the air. It mingled with my dreams, and made them full of storm and whirlwind.
Page 187 - ... distinguish a mass of water far above the falls, to follow it to their verge, and go down with it, in fancy, to the abyss of clouds and storm. Casting my eyes across the river, and every side, I took in the whole scene at a glance, and tried to comprehend it in one vast idea. After an hour thus spent, I left the bridge, and, by a staircase, winding almost interminably round a post, descended to the base of the precipice. From that point my path lay over slippery stones, and among great fragments...
Page 150 - The Table Rock, from which the Falls of Niagara may be contemplated in all their grandeur, lies on an exact level with the edge of the cataract on the Canada side, and indeed forms a part of the precipice over which the water gushes. It derives its name from the circumstance of its projecting beyond the cliffs that support it like the leaf of a table. To gain this position, it is necessary to descend a steep bank, and to follow a path that winds among shrubbery and trees, which entirely conceal from...
Page 150 - The body of water which composes the middle part of the Great Fall is so immense, that it descends nearly two-thirds of the space without being ruffled or broken, and the solemn calmness with which it rolls over the edge of the precipice is finely contrasted with the perturbed appearance it assumes after having reached the gulf below. But the water towards each side of the Fall is shattered the moment it drops over the...
Page 503 - Some drill and bore The solid earth, and from the strata there Extract a register, by which we learn That He who made it and revealed its date To Moses, was mistaken in its age.
Page 294 - Looking at it even here, in the expanse which forms itself over the greater fall, one feels sure that no strongest swimmer could have a chance of saving himself, if fate had cast him in even among those petty whirlpools. The waters, though so broken in their descent, are deliciously green. This...