Part 8

The passengers were all invited to listen to and to question a missionary from China who was of the party. The gentleman did not seem to have profited much by his travels, however; for he declared himself unable to answer some very simple inquiries. "Is the religion of the Christian missionaries tolerated by the Chinese government?" "I am not prepared to answer that question." "Are the Chinese cannibals?" "I am not prepared to answer that question." One requested that any brother would offer a suggestion as to how government might be awakened to the sinfulness of permitting Sunday mails; during the continuance of which practice there was no hope of the Sabbath being duly sanctified. No one was ready with a suggestion, but one offered a story, which every head was bent to hear. The story was of two sheep-drovers, one of whom feared God, and the other did not. The profane drover set out with his sheep for a particular destination two hours earlier than the other, and did not rest on Sunday like his pious comrade. What was the catastrophe? The Godfearing drover, though he had stood still all Sunday, arrived at his destination two hours earlier than the other. "Ah!" "Ah!" resounded through the cabin in all conceivable tones of conviction, no one asking particulars of what had happened on the road; of how and where the profane drover had been delayed. Temperance was, of course, a great topic with these divines, and they fairly provoked ridicule upon it. One passenger told me that they were so strict that they would not drink water out of the Brandywine river; and another remarked that they partook with much relish of the strong wine-sauce served with our puddings.

In addition to other discomforts, we passed the fine scenery of Little Falls in the night. I was not aware what we had missed till I traversed the Mohawk valley by a better conveyance nearly two years afterward. I have described this valley in my other work on America,[3] and must therefore restrain my pen from dwelling on its beauties here.

Footnote 3: "Society in America," vol. ii., p. 188.

The appearance of the berths in the ladies' cabin was so repulsive, that we were seriously contemplating sitting out all night, when it began to rain so as to leave us no choice. I was out early in the misty morning, however, and was presently joined by the rest of my party, all looking eagerly for signs of Utica being near.

By eight o'clock we were at the wharf. We thought Utica the most extempore place we had yet seen. The _right-up_ shops, the daubed houses, the streets running into the woods, all seemed to betoken that the place had sprung up out of some sudden need. How much more ancient and respectable did it seem after my return from the West, where I had seen towns so much newer still! We were civilly received and accommodated at Bagg's hotel, where we knew how to value cold water, spacious rooms, and retirement, after the annoyances of the boat.

Our baggage-master was fortunate in securing a neat, clean stage to take us to Trenton Falls (14 miles), where we promised each other to spend the whole day, on condition of being off by five the next morning, in order to accomplish the distance to Syracuse in the course of the day. The reason for our economy of time was not merely that it was late in the season, and every day which kept us from the Falls of Niagara, therefore, of consequence, but that our German friend, Mr. O., was obliged to be back in New-York by a certain day. We all considered a little extra haste and fatigue a small tax to pay for the privilege of his companionship.

We clapped our hands at the sight of the "Rural Retreat," the comfortable, hospitable house of entertainment at Trenton, standing in its garden on the edge of the forest, so unlike hotels on the high road.

As no other company was there, we could choose our own hours. We ordered a late dinner, and proceeded to the Falls. We had only to follow a path in the pine forest for a few paces, and we were at the edge of the ravine which encloses the cascades.

It is a pity that the Indian name is not retained. Trenton Falls are called Cayoharic by the Indians. They are occasioned by the descent of West Canada Creek through a ravine, where it makes a succession of leaps from platforms of rock, six of these falls being pretty easily accessible by travellers. Much has been said of the danger of the enterprise of ascending the ravine; but I saw no peril to persons who are neither rash nor nervous. The two accidents which have happened have, I believe, been owing, the one to extreme rashness, and the other to sudden terror.

From the edge of the ravine the black water, speckled with white foam, is seen rushing below with a swiftness which already half turns the head of the stranger. We descended five flights of wooden steps fixed against the steep face of the rock, and at the bottom found ourselves at the brink of the torrent. I never was in so dark and chill a place in the open air; yet the sun was shining on the opposite face of the rock, lighting the one scarlet maple which stood out from among the black cedars and dark green elms. We selected our footing with a care which we were quite ready to ridicule when we came back; and were not above grasping the chain which is riveted into the rock where the shelf which forms the pathway is narrowest, and where the angles are sharpest. The hollow is here so filled with the voice of many waters, that no other can be heard; and after many irreverent shouts had been attempted, we gave up all attempts to converse till we reached a quieter place. Being impatient to see the first fall, I went on before the rest, and having climbed the flight of wooden steps, so wetted with the spray of the fall as to be as slippery as ice, I stood on the platform under a covert of rock foaming with the thunder of the waters, and saw my companions, one by one, turn the angle of the path, and pause in front of the sheet of liquid amber sprinkled with snow. The path on which they stood seemed too narrow for human foot; and when, discerning me, they waved their hands, I trembled lest, disregarding their footing, they should be swept away by the furious torrent. When we found our heads turning with the rush of the dark waters, we amused ourselves with admiring the little wells in the rock, and the drip from the roots of a cedar projecting from the top of the ravine, a never-failing, glittering shower. Between the fifth and sixth fall there is a long tranquil reach of water; and here we lingered to rest our bewildered senses before entering upon the confusion of rocks through which the sixth forces its way. We seesawed upon a fallen trunk, sent autumn leaves whirling down the stream, and watched the endless dance of the balls of foam which had found their way into the tiny creeks and bays opposite, and could not get out again.

Gay butterflies seemed quite at home in this ravine. They flit through the very spray of the falls. It seemed wonderful that an insect could retain its frail life in the midst of such an uproar. When the sun, in its course, suddenly shone full into the glen through a chasm in its rocky wall, how the cascade was instantly dressed in glory! crowned with a rainbow, and invested with all radiant hues! How the poor banished Indians must mourn when the lights of their Cayoharic visit their senses again in the dreams of memory or of sleep! The recollection of these poor exiles was an ever-present saddening thought in the midst of all the most beautiful scenes of the New World.

When we had surmounted the sixth fall, we saw indeed that we could go no farther. A round projection of rock, without trace of anything that I could call a foothold, barred us out from the privacy of the upper ravine. The falls there are said to be as beautiful as any that we saw, and it is to be hoped that, by blasting a pathway or by some other means, they also may be laid open to the affections of happy visiters.

They have been seen and reported of. A friend of mine has told me, since I was there, how Bryant the poet and himself behaved like two thoughtless boys in this place. Clambering about by themselves one summer day, when their wives had gone back to the house, they were irresistibly tempted to pass the barrier, and see what lay beyond. They got round the rock, I cannot conceive how, by inequalities in its surface. They met with so many difficulties and so much beauty higher up, that they forgot all about time, till they found themselves in utter darkness. They hastened to grope their way homeward through the forest, and were startled, after a while, by shouts and moving lights. Till that moment they never recollected how alarmed their wives must be. It was past ten o'clock, and the poor ladies had been in a state of uneasiness half the evening, and of mortal terror for the last two hours. They had got people from the neighbourhood to go out with torches, little expecting to see their husbands come walking home on their own feet, and with nothing the matter with them but hunger and shame. I hope the ladies were exceedingly angry when their panic was over.

The forest at the top of the ravine was a study to me, who had yet seen but little forest. Moss cushioned all the roots of the trees; hibiscus overspread the ground; among the pine stems there was a tangle of unknown shrubs; and a brilliant bird, scarlet except its black wings, hovered about as if it had no fear of us. I could learn nothing more about it than that the people call it the red robin. Before we returned the moon hung like a gem over the darkness of the ravine. I spent another happy day among these falls some months after, and was yet more impressed with their singularity and beauty.

When we had exchanged our wet clothes, an excellent dinner was served, and our host himself waited upon us, sitting down by the window when nothing was wanted. In the course of dinner Mr. H. related to me some particulars of the slave insurrection at Charleston a few years before, when upward of thirty slaves were hanged at once. Some circumstance which he told led me to observe that I should have done as the thirty did in their place. "Oh," said he, "so should I." I thanked him for his response, saying that no defence he could now make of slavery would stand against such an admission. He did not retract, but a long argument ensued, in which our host became deeply interested. He moved his chair forwarder and forwarder, till I saw him leaning over the table between two of the gentlemen to listen. Everybody had long done eating, and every dish on the table was quite cold, and the debate concluded, before our host remembered that we had not had our pudding, and started up to serve us.

We soon retired to our rooms, being in need of rest after the discomforts of the canalboat and the fatigues of the day; but it was not too late for the neighbours to offer their hospitable welcomes. Just after I was undressed, the cards of visiters were brought me, with a friendly message; but it was too late to do more than send a message in return.

We left the place at a little after five in the morning, in a dismal rain. While breakfasting at Utica, we engaged an "exclusive extra" to carry us to Buffalo for eighty dollars, the precise route being agreed upon, and the choice of times and seasons to remain with us. On going out to our carriage we found the steps of the hotel occupied by a number of persons, some from Boston, who offered me welcome to the country, and any information or assistance I might need. One gentleman put into my hand a letter of introduction to an influential friend of his at Cincinnati, as it was understood that I was going there. So from this strange place, where I had not spent above two hours, we drove off amid a variety of friendly greetings.

This day I first saw a loghouse, and first felt myself admitted into the sanctuary of the forest. These things made the day full of interest to me, though the rain scarcely ceased from morning till night. Well-settled farms were numerous along the road, but in the intervals were miles of forests; dark thronging trees with their soft gay summits. Till now the autumn woods had appeared at a distance too red and rusty; these, when looked into, were the melting of all harmonious colours. As for the forms, some were drooping, some towering, their tall bare stems wreathed with crimson creepers. The cleared hollows and slopes, with the forest ever advancing or receding, are as fine to the imagination as any natural language can be. I looked for an Indian or two standing on the forest verge, within a shade as dusky as himself; but for this I had to wait another day.

Just after dark we arrived at Syracuse, in time for the common supper. I was surprised at the size and style of the hotel. Land and building material being cheap, and there being no window-tax, there is little inducement to economize space in the American houses, and the new hotels have the ambitious air which is given by spaciousness. The deficiency lies in furniture, and yet more in attendance; but I really think, that if travellers will trouble themselves to learn a little of the ways of the house, so as not to run into opposition to other people's convenience, much more comfort may be enjoyed in these places than unaccommodating tourists will believe. Our chambers were quite sufficiently furnished here; and I never in any place found difficulty in obtaining as large a supply of water as I wished by simply asking for it in good time. I observed that the hotel parlours in various parts of the country were papered with the old-fashioned papers, I believe French, which represent a sort of panorama of a hunting-party, a fleet, or some such diversified scene. I saw many such a hunting-party, the ladies in scarlet riding-habits, as I remember the landlord of the inn at Bray, near Dublin, to have been proud of in his best parlour. At Schenectady, the bay of Naples, with its fishing-boats on the water and groups of lazzaroni on the shore, adorned our parlour walls. It seems to be an irresistible temptation to idle visiters, English, Irish, and American, to put speeches into the mouths of the painted personages; and such hangings are usually seen deformed with scribblings. The effect is odd, in wild places, of seeing American witticisms put into the mouths of Neapolitan fishermen, ancient English ladies of quality, or of tritons and dryads.

There is taste quite as bad as this in a matter of far more importance, the naming of places. Syracuse in the State of New-York! I often wonder whether it is yet too late to revert to the Indian names, to undo the mischief which has been done by boys fresh from their smattering of the classics, who have gone into the forest to hew out towns and villages. I heard many Americans say that the State of New-York ought to be called Ontario, and the city Manhattan. But, so far from bringing back the nomenclature to a better state, we not only find Utica, Syracuse, Manlius, and Camillus, and the village of Geneva on Seneca Lake, with Ithaca at its other extremity, but the village of Chittenango actually baptized into Sullivan; and all this in the neighbourhood of the lakes Onondago, Cayuga, and Owasco. It is as bad as the English in Van Diemen's Land, who, if I remember rightly, have got Palmyra, Richmond, and Jericho all in a line.

Some curious associations arise from a new nation using the language of the old. While speculating sometimes on what the classical conceptions can be in the minds of youths who hear every day, in the most sordid connexion, of Rome, Utica, Carthage, Athens, Palmyra, and Troy, it occurred to me that some of our commonest English writing must bear a different meaning to the Americans and to us. All that is written about cornfields, for instance, must call up pictures in their minds quite unlike any that the poets intended to create. "Waving corn" is not the true description to them; and one can scarcely bring one's tongue to explain that it means "small grain." Their poetical attachments are naturally and reasonably to their Indian corn, which is a beautiful plant, worthy of all love and celebration. But the consequence is, that we have not their sympathy about our sheaves, our harvest wain, our gleaners; for though they have wheat, their harvest, _par excellence_, is of corncobs, and their "small grain" bears about the same relation to poetry with them as turnips with us. Then, again, there is the month of May, about which we lose their sympathy. Over a great proportion of the country May is one of their worst months, damp, drizzly, with intervals of biting winds, as little fit for the climate of a poem as our windy and dusty March. Many other such particulars might be mentioned, which it would be a new employment to trace out.

When I traversed New-York State at a subsequent period with another party of friends, we saw many Indians before reaching Syracuse. It was at Oneida Castle, a village on the borders of the Oneida territory, which was once fortified after the Indian fashion, whence its formidable name. We saw in such close neighbourhood as to cause many strange reflections, the Episcopalian church built for the Indians of the vicinity, who are declared to be reclaimed from idolatry and their ancient Council Grove, where they met to think their own thoughts and say their own sayings. This grove is a fine clump of twenty-seven butternut-trees. We passed through the village on the day when the Indians had all come in to receive their annual government allowance of seven dollars a head. Two men were drunk; the rest looked sober enough. The squaws were neatly dressed in blue pantaloons edged with white, and had clean blankets over their shoulders. The babies looked fat and lively. One squaw had her infant lashed to a board at her back. When we stopped to water the horses we saw several boys with bows and arrows, and Dr. F. made them understand by signs that any one who could strike a quarter dollar which he would fix on a post should have it. He made a notch in the post of a shed, and placed his coin, and forthwith the arrows flew like hail. One struck deep into a post, and we saw how easily fatal this weapon might be. An old Indian or two watched the sport, and assumed the superintendence. The coin fell, and Dr. F. was going to deliver it to the claimant, when an old Indian came forward with "No, no." He showed by signs that the coin had fallen, not from its being struck, but from the post having been shaken. The quarter dollar was put up again, and soon after struck and bent in the middle by the arrow of a youth, who looked as happy with his prize as if he had regained a tract of his native wood. The party gave us some very bright looks as we drove away.

In a hotel on this road I found a Sabbath-school history of Lady Jane Grey, compiled obviously for the purpose of prejudicing the reader's mind against the Catholics. Among other wise things in it there was an explanation that the heroine was called "Lady" because she was related to the king; and people are sometimes called so in England. A clear idea to give the American youth of our English peerage!

We left Syracuse at dawn; and this was the morning when, finding ourselves too hungry to proceed to Skaneatles without food, we were treated to that abundant breakfast, so characteristically served, which I have described in my other book.[4] No one likes to breakfast twice over in description any more than in reality; and I therefore say nothing about Elbridge here. The greater part of this day, and some of the next, was spent at Auburn in viewing the prison, walking about the town, and driving down the shores of the pretty Owasco Lake.

Footnote 4: "Society in America," vol. iii., p. 87.

The cultivation of the country now began to show the improvement which increases all the way to Buffalo. At the head of Cayuga Lake we travelled over the longest bridge I ever saw, even a mile and eight rods long. It is wooden, of course, laid upon piles, and more conspicuous for usefulness than beauty. The great ornament of this route is the village of Geneva, reared on a terrace which overhangs Seneca Lake. The Northern States abound in beautiful villages; but I know none more captivating than this. A long row of handsome white and red houses, each with its sloping garden, fronts the lake; and behind the dwellings the road is bordered with locust-trees, which seem to imbower the place. The gardens are more carefully cultivated than is at all common in America, and they well repay the trouble bestowed on them. There is a college standing on high ground above the lake, to which a natural lawn steeply descends from the open space in front of the building. Holstein, aiddecamp to Bolivar, was professor of modern languages in this college when I was first at Geneva. Before my second visit he had removed to Albany. To crown the temptations of Geneva as a place of residence, it has rather a choice society. It has been charged with not being healthy, but I believe this is not true. It seems to be well and speedily supplied with literature. I saw a placard outside a bookseller's store, "Two Old Men's Tales, price 80 cents," that is, four shillings. One of my last interests, before I left England, had been watching over the publication of this work; and now here it was selling at four shillings, in the back of the State of New-York! I remarked two things more about this village; that all the women I saw were pretty, and that a profusion of azalea grew wild in the neighbourhood.

The road to Canandaigua ascends for a considerable distance after leaving Geneva, and the last view of the place from above was exquisite, imbosomed as it lay in the autumn woods, and with its blue lake stretched behind it in the sunny atmosphere. One element in the exhilaration of such scenes in America is the universal presence of competence. The boys who gather about the stage do not come to beg, or even to sell, but to amuse themselves while eating their bread and meat, or on their way to the field. The young women all well dressed, the men all at work or amusement, the farms all held in fee-simple, the stores all inadequate to their custom; these things are indescribably cheering to behold, and a never-failing source of pleasure to the traveller from Europe. It may be a questionable comfort, but it is a comfort to think, "if these people are not happy, it is their own fault." Whether their minds are as easy as their fortunes, it may not be safe to affirm; but at least the sin and sorrow of social injustice in regard to the first necessities of life are absent.

The moon was gleaming over Canandaigua Lake when we came in sight of it, and a golden planet dropped beneath the horizon when we took the turn towards the village. We found that Blossom's hotel did not answer to the favourable description which had been given us of it. This had been a training day, and the house was so noisy with drunken soldiers, that, when we had attained the drawing-room, we locked ourselves in till the house should be cleared, which happened as early as nine o'clock; but we still found the inn less comfortable than most upon the road.

The pretty village of Canandaigua is noted for its good society. It would have given me pleasure to have been able to accept the kind invitation of some of its inhabitants to prolong my stay now, or to revisit it the next year; but we had promised Mr. O. to cause no delay in getting to Niagara; and we engaged, in return for his agreeing to stop this day, to travel all night; and I never was able to allot any future time to this place. We saw as much of it, however, as we could in one day.