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NIAGARA.
AFTER wandering on some of our great lakes for many months, I
bent my course towards the celebrated Falls of Niagara, being desirous
of taking a sketch of them. This was not my first visit to them, and I
hoped it should not be the last.
Artists (I know not if I can be called one) too often imagine that
what they produce must be excellent, and with that foolish idea go on
spoiling much paper and canvas, when their time might have been better
employed in a different manner. But digressions aside,—I directed my
steps towards the Falls of Niagara, with the view of representing them
on paper, for the amusement of my family.
Returning as I then was from a tedious journey, and possessing little
more than some drawings of rare birds and plants, I reached the tavern
at Niagara Falls in such plight, as might have deterred many an individual
from obtruding himself upon a circle of well-clad and perhaps wellbred
society. Months had passed since the last of my linen had been
taken from my body, and used to clean that useful companion, my gun.
I was in fact covered just like one of the poorer class of Indians, and
was rendered even more disagreeable to the eye of civilized man, by not
having, like them, plucked my beard, or trimmed my hair in any way.
Had HOGARTH been living, and there when I arrived, he could not have
found a fitter subject for a ROBINSON CRUSOE. My beard covered my
neck in front, my hair fell much lower at my back, the leather dress
which I wore had for months stood in need of repair, a large knife hung
at my side, a rusty tin-box containing my drawings and colours, and,
wrapped up in a worn-out blanket that had served me for a bed, was
buckled to my shoulders. To every one I must have seemed immersed
in the depths of poverty, perhaps of despair. Nevertheless, as I cared
little about my appearance during those happy rambles, I pushed into
the sitting-room, unstrapped my little burden, and asked how soon breakfast
would be ready.
In America, no person is ever refused entrance to the inns, at least
far from cities. We know too well how many poor creatures are forced
to make their way from other countries in search of employment or to
seek uncultivated land, and we are ever ready to let them have what
they may call for. No one knew who I was, and the landlord looking at
NIAGARA. 363
me with an eye of close scrutiny, answered that breakfast would be on
the table as soon as the company should come down from their rooms.
I approached this important personage, told him of my avocations, and
convinced him that he might feel safe as to remuneration. From this
moment, I was, with him at least, on equal footing with every other person
in his house. He talked a good deal of the many artists who had
visited the Falls that season, from different parts, and offered to assist me,
by giving such accommodations as I might require to finish the drawings
I had in contemplation. He left me, and as I looked about the
room, I saw several views of the Falls, by which I was so disgusted, that
I suddenly came to my better senses. " What I" thought I, " have I
come here to mimic nature in her grandest enterprise, and add my caricature
of one of the wonders of the world to those which I here see ? No.
—I give up the vain attempt. I shall look on these mighty cataracts
and imprint them, where alone they can be represented,—on my mind !''
Had I taken a view, I might as well have given you what might be
termed a regular account of the form, the height, the tremendous roar of
these Falls; might have spoken of people perilling their fives by going
between the rock and the sheet of water, calculated the density of the atmosphere
in that strange position, related wondrous tales of Indians and
their canoes having been precipitated the whole depth;—might have told
of the narrow, rapid, and rockbound river that leads the waters of the
Erie into those of Ontario, remarking en passant the Devil's Hole and
sundry other places or objects ;—but supposing you had been there, my
description would prove useless, and quite as puny as my intended view
would have been for my family; and should you not have seen them,
and are fond of contemplating the more magnificent of the Creator's
works, go to Niagara, reader, for all the pictures you may see, all the descriptions
you may read, of these mighty Falls, can only produce in your
mind the faint glimmer of a glow-worm compared with the overpowering
glory of the meridian sun.
I breakfasted amid a crowd of strangers, who gazed and laughed at
me, paid my bill, rambled about and admired the Falls for a while, saw
several young gentlemen sketching' on cards the mighty mass of foaming
waters, and walked to Buffalo, where I purchased new apparel and sheared
my beard. I then enjoyed civilized life as much as, a month before, I
had enjoyed the wildest solitudes and the darkest recesses of mountain
and forest.