Part 20

Now, one is awakened here by a bell, which I never can liken to any other than a dustman's, and can hardly find a spot whereto parasols and smart forage-caps intrude not.

I would even include in my denunciation the tower which is now erected upon the piece of rock that abuts upon the great fall, and standing in whose gallery you actually hang suspended over the abyss; not but that the tower is in itself rudely simple, and in good taste perhaps, but that one feels this place needs no such accessories, and, instead of deriving advantage from them, is degraded into a mere show by their presence; and, in saying this much, I feel as though the application of the term was a profanation.

I only saw three natives near the fall during my stay; but these formed a little group I would like much to have had Landseer look upon.

I was walking one morning before breakfast about a quarter of a mile below the fall, when I suddenly came upon a squaw leaning against a tree: as many of the Tuscaroras understand a few words of English, I addressed her with "Good morning, good morning!"

With a calm bend of the head she placed her fingers over her lips by way of return to my salutation, turning herself at the same time a little away as if to avoid further notice or intercourse: curiosity, however, overcame good-breeding in me, and mounting the little bank to a level with the shady tree against which she passively leaned, I immediately became aware of her object.

Coiled up, on the earth, by her feet lay an Indian, his head and shoulders wrapped close in his blanket; upon this motionless mass her eyes were calmly fixed: against the opposite side of the tree sat a very handsome lad, about eight or nine years old, who never lifted his head to look on the intruder: near the boy crouched a half-starved hound of the lurcher kind, a red-coloured, wire-haired brute, with a keen cold Indian look, and as apparently incurious as the best-taught warrior of the tribe: there was no wagging of the tail in friendly recognition, as might be expected from a kindly European dog; neither was there the warning growl and spiteful show of bristled crest and angry teeth, nor any suspicious circling round the stranger, with tail tucked close and thievish scrutiny, so common amongst low-bred white curs; this hound of the Red-man, on the contrary, deported himself in a manner creditable to his race, and to the tribe of his adoption: I do not believe his eye was ever once raised to survey me; or, if it was, the movement was so well managed that I did not detect it.

Supported against the tree stood a long rifle, over whose muzzle was hung a scarlet shoulder-belt and pouch, richly worked with an embroidery of blue and white beads; by a thong of hide was also suspended from the rifle a sheath of leather, through which protruded a couple of inches of the bright broad blade of a knife: these I readily conceived to be the appointments of the sleeping man; and the trio thus patiently watching his slumbers,--his wife, child, and dog.

I looked upon this savage group for some minutes, and no happier scene could have been found for such a rencontre:--the grassy knoll which the family occupied; the rich foliage of the butter-nut tree that shaded them; the wooded heights above, and the deep-channeled river flowing by; together with a stillness made more thrilling by the sound of the cataract, for a moment rumbling like near-coming thunder, and then dying away into a continuous moan, soft and absolutely musical, whilst afar off its light vapoury masses gently rose and fell, converted by the morning sun into clouds of silver tissue. I have often, amongst other vain wishes, sighed for the possession of the painter's power, but never more than at this moment; and as I silently looked upon the unchanging group, and called to mind the artists whom such a chance would have repaid for longer travel, I grieved to think it should have been given to one whose attempts by description to image it must prove so tame a record.

After a long pause, pointing to the coiled-up sleeper, I ventured on a second inquiry, saying, "Man,--he sick?"

The squaw fixed her fine eyes upon me, and comprehending my inquiry, nodded once or twice, articulating in a low musical voice, "Man sick,--whisky too much--make bad!"

Again her head drooped, and her eyes rested upon the motionless mass before her; the little imp and the hound meanwhile never by a sign indicating their knowledge of the presence of an intruder. I now turned back towards the hotel, which I had left to watch the sun rise on the fall from the bed of the river. My early stirring was every way fortunate, for the morning was fresh and unseasonably cool, consequently the misty abyss into which the river tumbled was bridged by beautiful rainbows in every direction; whilst, to crown all, with the exception of the group I have mentioned, no unhallowed foot broke on the holy place.

The family had not appeared on my return to the house; so seeking my little chamber, whose window commanded the rapids and the great fall, I flung myself upon my bed, and gratefully reviewed all the beauty of earth and sky which I had been so happily permitted to behold and to enjoy.

The days I passed here must always be recalled by me as days of unalloyed enjoyment; I felt an indescribable calm steal, as it were, over my spirit. Generally active, impatient, and inquiring, I have seldom found any neighbourhood which I did not compass in a few days; but from the vicinity of this spot I had no desire to stir. Finding that the dinner-hour was two o'clock, which would have destroyed the day, I requested the proprietor of the hotel, one of the most obliging persons I ever met,--an Englishman,--to give our little party dinner at five; and from breakfast to this time I believe our time was usually passed lounging dreamily about Goat Island, to reach which you cross the river below the falls to the American side, and then pass over the rapids on a bridge, which is in itself a wonder.

The turf of this island, its trees and flowers, retaining in summer the freshness of spring, the delicious purity of its atmosphere, and the brightness of its waters, render it most charming. The solitude here has no drawback; the strong currents of air by which it is encircled defy the powers of the musquito,--that bane to all thin-skinned people with pastoral inclinations, and not an insect in the least venomous or annoying is to be found here.

This Island of the Rainbow, as it has been poetically and not inappropriately named, is situated exactly between the falls; surrounded, and intersected in part, by rapids frightful to look on. Before American enterprise and ingenuity spanned these with the bridge that now connects the Iris isle with the main land, the approach to it must have been attended with great difficulty and much danger; indeed, I believe it was very rarely attempted; at present it is occupied by one or two poor families, who tend a garden now in progress, under the care of the proprietor of the place.

Within these few years, a young man of good appearance was known to have taken up his abode here; he shunned all observance, only holding communion with a poor family who procured him what necessaries he needed. After a residence of two years he died, without leaving the slightest clue to his name or country. That his condition was gentle may be inferred from his accomplishments: a flute and a guitar, on both of which he is said to have played much and well, with a drawing or two, are all that remain of the recluse, although the man who attended upon him says he sketched and wrote much.

Certainly no anchorite ever selected a pleasanter summer solitude: how he got through the severity of a five or six months' winter in a place so exposed can only be imagined, since the hermit died and "made no sign."

I visited the other lions of the place, but took little heed of them. The sulphur springs were exhibited, and the gas ignited, by a remarkably fine old man, who was full of anecdote of the late war: one or two of his stories I took good note of, and purpose availing myself of them at some future time.

On one afternoon I forced myself away to visit the Devil's Hole and the Whirlpool, situated about five miles below the falls; and a wilder scene it is impossible for imagination to conceive than the deep rocky basin into which the river is precipitated, and from which it issues at right angles from its previous course, bearing with it portions of the wrack accumulated within the black vortex of this fearful pool, into whose gulf it is impossible to look without a shudder. The drive through the forest was delightful; and, if any sight could have repaid me for leaving the neighbourhood of the falls, this fitting _pendant_ would be that sight.

The bad weather which occurred so late in the month of June, and, indeed, continued through the first days of July, had retarded the advance of visitors. At the period of our stay there were but two or three strangers here besides ourselves; and, not dining at the public table, these I never saw except at a distance. The weather during the day was warm without being oppressive, the evenings and nights deliciously cool.

I had brought my companion, Mr. H----e, thus far on a promise of returning with him in a few days, and never did I feel more urged to break faith: but knowing that he was compelled to return in a certain time, and had accompanied me out of sheer good-nature, I could not reconcile it to myself to let him journey back alone; for our companions were bound on a wide tour through the Canadas.

After a halt here of only three short days then, I finally crossed the Niagara for the American shore, and immediately took a coach for Tonnewanta, to intercept the boat on its way from Buffalo by the Erie canal, intending to journey by this route as far as Rochester.

At Tonnewanta, a pretty little village, we were detained two or three hours; and here I once more encountered my family of Tuscarora Indians. The man was at this time wide awake, but still half drunk; and, although a fine-made fellow, had that horrid brutal look which accompanies continued debauch. He was attended as I at first saw him, only that now, as he stood by the public-house door talking with a couple of negroes, the boy and the hound only were beside him. I looked about for my lady of the tribe, and perceived her squatted on her heels against the wall, about fifty paces lower down, "burd alane."

From a slight furtive glance of the urchin, I perceived that he recognised me; he spoke a couple of words to his father, who, turning his head in the direction where I stood, muttered an interjectional "Ugh!" and resumed his previous calm attitude, contrasting oddly with the _insouciant_ look and merry grimaces of his negro companions.

I next walked on to the solitary squaw, in hopes of claiming acquaintance; but she kept her eyes fixed upon a necklace she was playing with as gravely as a devotee might tell her beads, and by no sign of recognition deigned to flatter me.

Miserable and degraded race! on whose condition much care has been vainly bestowed, much generous sympathy idly wasted! I say wasted, since the aborigines of this continent are either above or below sympathy. I confess my feeling for them has been much changed by a near view of their condition and a better knowledge of their history and habits; and whatever complaints they may advance against the rapacity of the white man, he must at least be admitted a generous historian.

I shall have occasion hereafter to revert to the unpopular view of this question, which I have adopted against my inclination in obedience to my judgment, and meantime must quit my family of the Tuscaroras--what a name to adorn a tale!--for the canal boat arrived, and in a moment we were hurried to embark.

FOOTNOTE:

[12] The Indian name "Niagara" signifies Thunder-water.

ERIE CANAL.

PACKET-BOAT.--HEAT.--CEDAR SWAMP, LONG SWAMP, AND MUSQUITO SWAMP.--UTICA.

This day, up to the meridian, had been temperately warm, but not in the least sultry or unbearable. The boat was exceedingly clean, not over-crowded; and I sat down within its neat cabin, anticipating a couple of days' quiet travel, which, if a little monotonous, would be at least unattended by the fatigue and dust of a stage journey between this and Utica.

The boat for a few hours went on merrily; the eternal forest closed about us, and the sound of our horses' feet alone broke upon its silence. Towards evening the heat became great, and after sunset the southern sky began to give forth continuous sheets of flame, along whose pale surface would occasionally dart lines of red forked lightning, whilst the breeze gradually died away. My first idea was, that we were about to be favoured with a refreshing storm of rain and thunder; but vain were my hopes: I watched and listened, but no drop fell, no sound was heard.

Meantime, the heat increased as the night closed in: the little cots, however, were duly hung one below another along the sides of the cabin. I had procured an upper berth, with a window by my side; and having exhausted my patience, and wearied my sight watching the fiery sky, I at last ventured to creep below. Although a hotter atmosphere can hardly be imagined, I slept tolerably sound; but, on waking, found myself anything but refreshed. The sun was not yet above the horizon when I crept forth on to the deck: it was that hour of morning which, of all others, one expects to be invigorating and cool, as indeed it usually is in all climates; but here, enclosed within the banks of the canal, and surrounded by swamp and forest, there was no morning air for us. My mind was made up to leave the boat at the first place where a stage might be procured.

All this day the air absolutely stood still. At our places of halt we were joined by men who had left the stages in consequence of those vehicles not being able to travel. Our pace was reduced considerably; and the cattle, although in excellent condition, were terribly distressed. At Lockport we found business nearly at a stand-still; the thermometer was at 110 degrees of Fahrenheit. We passed several horses dead upon the banks of the canal, and were compelled to leave one or two of our own in a dying state. Here more persons joined than we could well accommodate, and I found positively that all movement by the stage route was at an end, forty horses having fallen on the line the day previous. To attempt abiding in any of the places along the canal, I was assured would be an exchange for the worse; so the only course was to endure the "ills we had," and certainly these did not become the lighter through practice. Towards the second night our progress became tediously slow, for it appeared to grow hot in proportion as the evening advanced.

The south-western sky was again banked up by black clouds, from which the sheet lightning never ceased to burst. Under other circumstances the scene would have been viewed as one of infinite grandeur; but, at present, every consideration became absorbed by our sufferings, for to this the affair really amounted.

This night I found it impossible to look in upon the cabin; I therefore made a request to the captain that I might be permitted to have a mattress on deck: but this, he told me, could not be; there was an existing regulation which positively forbade sleeping upon the deck of a canal packet; indeed, he assured me that this could only be done at the peril of life, with the certainty of catching fever and ague. I appeared to submit to his well-meant arguments; but inwardly resolved, _coûte qui coûte_, not to sleep within the den below, which exhibited a scene of suffocation and its consequences that defies description.

I got my cloak up, filled my hat with cigars, and, planting myself about the centre of the deck, here resolved, _malgré_ dews and musquitoes, to weather it through the night.

"What is this name of the country we are now passing?" I inquired of one of the boatmen who joined me about the first hour of morning.

"Why sir, this is called the Cedar Swamp," answered the man, to whom I handed a cigar, in order to retain his society and create more smoke, weak as was the defence against the hungry swarms surrounding us on all sides.

"We have not much more of this Cedar Swamp to get through, I hope?" inquired I, seeking for some consolatory information.

"About fifty miles more, I guess," was the reply of my companion, accompanying each word with a sharp slap on the back of his hand, or on his cheek or forehead.

"Thank Heaven!" I involuntarily exclaimed, drawing my cloak closer about me, although the heat was killing; "we shall after that escape in some sort, I hope, from these legions of musquitoes?"

"I guess not quite," replied the man; "they are as thick, if not thicker, in the Long Swamp."

"The Long Swamp!" I repeated: "what a horrible name for a country! Does the canal run far through it?"

"No, not so very far, only about eighty miles."

"We've then done with swamps, I hope, my friend?" I inquired, as he kept puffing and slapping on with unwearied constancy.

"Why, yes, there's not a heap more swamp, that is to say, not close to the line, till we come to within about forty miles of Utica."

"And is that one as much infested with these infernal insects as are the Cedar and Long Swamps."

"I guess _that_ is _the_ place above all for musquitoes," replied the man grinning. "Thim's the real gallinippers, emigrating north for the summer all the way from the Balize and Red River. Let a man go to sleep with his head in a cast-iron kettle among thim chaps, and if their bills don't make a watering-pot of it before morning, I'm d----d. They're strong enough to lift the boat out of the canal, if they could only get underneath her."

I found these swamps endless as Banquo's line: would they had been shadows only; but alas! they were yet to be encountered, horrible realities not to be evaded. I closed my eyes in absolute fear, and forbore further inquiry.

Here I remained throughout the whole night, dozing a little between whiles, but never foregoing my cigar for a minute. Towards daylight the dew descended like rain, but brought with it no coolness to earth or man: it felt exactly as though it had been boiled the day before, and had not been left long enough to get cool.

During this day many of our men frequently threw themselves overboard, clothes and all on, that is, in shirt and trousers, these being all of habiliment that could be worn; I really feared that some of them who had been a little too free in their cold applications, that is, of iced water and brandy, would have gone mad.

This blessing of ice we were seldom many hours without, the poorest hovel on the canal being commonly provided with it in sufficient abundance to give us a supply. The inhabitants, I found, were suffering from the unusual continuance of heat as much as strangers: at night they built huge fires of pine before their doors, so that the thick smoke might penetrate the dwelling, and scour the infernal musquitoes out of it. At these fires we would find the poor women sitting in the smoke at the risk of suffocation; pale, haggard, with their hair neglected and dishevelled, looking like worn-out ghosts rather than living beings. The oldest inhabitants on the line of the canal assured us they never remembered any heat of three days' continuance which could compare to this; and I believe them, since no man could long endure such a visitation.

This evening our condition was in no way improved, except that we heard the sound and felt the presence of a strong current of northerly wind; but it blew as though issuing from a furnace, and afforded no present relief. The sky continued to show "fiery off," and the musquitoes of that ilk did credit to the genealogy my informant ascribed to them: but there is a period beyond which even suffering ceases; this happy insensibility I had attained; and when after midnight we were landed at Utica, I felt as though I could have slept soundly and well even beneath the heated deck of our canal packet.

I got an excellent bed at the hotel, however; and at daylight awoke to feel once more the delightful sensation of coolness. In the night heavy rain had fallen; a light but pleasant breeze was blowing; and the past was already a subject for merriment, although it was such matter for jest as I never willingly will undertake to collect again.

LITTLE FALLS.

SARATOGA.--BALLSTON.--ALBANY.--MOUNTAIN-HOUSE.--CATSKILL.--HYDE PARK.--LYNN.

The early hour of six A.M. saw us once more in motion for Schnectady, by way of Little Falls. We pursued what is termed the ridge road, running along the valley of the Mohawk.

The day was bright, and not over-warm. The sun's rays being tempered by a delicious north-east breeze, the condition of the atmosphere completely re-invigorated the almost prostrate body, whilst the loveliness of the prospect delighted and cheered the mind. No valley in the world can present charms more varied or more beautiful; even making every allowance for the happy change from musquitoes, swamps, close confinement, and suffocation, to freedom, exercise, and healthful breezes, with the satisfaction consequent upon the re-enjoyment of all these.

We frequently ran along the line of cuttings for the railroad now in progress between Utica and Schnectady. The rocky nature of the ridge whose line they pursue, offers formidable impediments; but the work was proceeding with great rapidity notwithstanding. This railway, when complete, together with the canal by whose side it runs, will afford a facility of communication between New York and Utica, which, for speed and convenience, can have no rival.

We breakfasted at Little Falls, a small town built on what was, at some period or other, the very bed of a torrent, amidst the huge piles of rock riven from the mountains in its course. Although overshadowed by the steep heights that wall the ravine in which it lies, it is kept cool and healthful by the constant current of air following the rapid fall of the river, which is here precipitated over a series of rocky ledges in a wild and hurried course, giving to the ravine and town the name of Little Falls. A more picturesque, romantic site no painter could desire. I felt vexed to be compelled to leave it after about an hour's halt; and should yet more regret this, did I not hope to revisit it.

Arriving at Schnectady, we found the railroad train about to start for Saratoga springs; and, taking our places, we arrived at this Malvern of America about ten at night, after a delightful day's ride.

Next morning I got up early, and took a lounge about Saratoga. The nominal attraction to this place is its water, which is much in vogue, and may be procured all over the States, being bottled and sold under the name of Congress water; as in all such places however, pleasure, not health, is the end pursued by the majority of visitors.

The day was again close and hot: the street was a foot deep in light dust, so that every carriage moved in a cloud, and not a breath of air could rise without bearing this nuisance on its wing. I could not but think, considering the abundance of water, that there was a lack of charity in thus withholding a sprinkling from the road, especially as the resident invalids would, I am sure, have as much benefited by this mode of application as by any other; since to breathe for any length of time an atmosphere constantly impregnated with impalpable powder, must be anything but salutary.