The voice of the Lord is upon the waters; the voice of the glorious God; the Lord thundereth over the great waters.-[Psalm xxix. iii. Old Translation.

THERE is a power and beauty, I may say a divinity, in rushing waters, felt by all who acknowledge any sympathy with nature. The mountain stream, leaping from rock to rock, and winding, foaming, and glancing through its devious and stony channels, arrests the eye of the most careless or business-bound traveller; sings to the heart and haunts the memory of the man of taste and imagination, and holds, as by some undefinable spell, the affection of those who inhabit its borders. A waterfall, of even a few feet in height, will enliven the dullest scenery, and lend a charm to the loveliest; while a high and headlong cataract has always been ranked among the sublimest objects to be found in the compass of the globe.

It is no matter of surprise, therefore, that lovers of nature perform journies of homage to that sovereign of cataracts, that monarch of all pouring floods, the Falls of Niagara. It is no matter of surprise, that, although situated in what might have been called, a few years ago, but cannot be now, the wilds of North America, five hundred miles from the Atlantic coast, travellers from all civilized parts of the world have encountered all the difficulties and fatigues of the path, to behold this prince of waterfalls amidst its ancient solitudes, and that, more recently, the broad highways to its do

minions have been thronged. By universal consent, it has long ago been proclaimed one of the wonders of the world. It is alone in its kind.-Though a waterfall, it is not to be compared with other waterfalls. In its majesty, its supremacy, and its influence on the soul of man, its brotherhood is with the living ocean and the eternal hills.

I am humbly conscious that no words of mine can give an adequate description, or convey a satisfactory idea, of Niagara Falls. But having just returned from a visit to them, with the impression which they made upon my mind fresh and deep, I may hope to impart at least a faint image of that impression to the minds of those who have not seen them, and retouch, perhaps, some fading traces in the minds of those who have. And if I can call the attention of any to this glorious object as a work of God, and an echo of the voice of God: if by any thing which I may fitly say of it, I can quicken the devotion of one breast, I shall feel that I have not unworthily expressed my sense of obligation for having been permitted to behold it myself.

I will not begin my description with the cataract itself, but take you back to the great lake from which the Niagara flows, so that you may go down its banks as I did, and approach the magnificent scene with a knowledge regularly and accumulatively gained of its principal accessaries. For the river and the lake, nay, the whole superb chain of rivers and lakes, should be taken into view, when we would conceive as we ought of the Falls of Niagara.

As we approach the town of Buffalo, which is situated near the eastern extremity of Lake Erie, that widespread sheet of water opens to the sight. If the traveller has never seen the ocean, he may here imagine that he sees it. If he has, he will say that it is a sea view which here lies before him. As he looks to the west, the horizon only bounds the liquid expanse; and it is not till he descends to the shore, and marks the peculiar, quiet, and exact level of the even and sleeping lake, that he will find any thing to remind him that he is not on the coast of the salt and swelling sea. Four miles

The visit was made with some friends in July, 1831.

north from Buffalo we come to the village of Black Rock,* and it is here that the boundaries of the lake contract, and its waters begin to pour themselves out through the sluiceway of the Niagara river. The river is at this place about a quarter of a mile broad; and, as I gazed on its dark and deep and hurrying stream, I felt a sensation of interest stealing over me, similar to that which I have experienced in reading of the preparations of men for some momentous expedition. Opposite Black Rock, on the Canada side, is the village of Waterloo, to which we were ferried over, and from which we commenced our ride down the river, which runs north into Lake Ontario. There is also a road on the American side, from Buffalo to the Falls, a distance, either way, of about fifteen miles.

From Waterloo we pass on by a level road, immediately on the western bank of the Niagara, and observe that the river continually becomes wider, till at length it divides into two streams, which sweep round an island several miles in length. They then unite again, forming one stream as before, only that it is increased in breadth and swiftness. And now the interest thickens, and begins to grow intense. Hitherto we had been travelling on the side of a large river, it is true, but one not much distinguished otherwise, either by its motion, its shape, or the beauty of its borders. We are obliged to call on ourselves to consider where we are, and whither we are going; for Niagara itself seems unconscious of the grand associations with which it is freighted. It moves as if unmindful, or as not caring to put the traveller in mind, that its waters have come down through the whole length of Erie from the far away Huron, Michigan, Superior; that they are just about to rush over the wondrous precipice below, and then are to hasten forward into another majestic lake, and from it are to pass through the portals of a thousand islands, and the alternate rapids and lakes of a noble and romantic river, washing the feet of cities, and so to flow on into

According to Mr. Featherstonhaugh, Editor of the Monthly American Journal of Geology and Natural Science, the 'seams and patches of dark-colored chert contained in the beds of carboniferous limestone,' have furnished its name to this village.

† Montreal and Quebec are both on the St. Lawrence.

the all-receiving sea. We are obliged to remember this, I say; for the unpretending waters, though pressing forward continually and intently, have thus far told us nothing, themselves, of their long pilgrimage behind, or the yet more eventful journeys before them. But here, as they are meeting round Grand Island, they break their silence and speak, and the whole scene becomes full of spirit and meaning. Here, about three miles from the Falls, you see the white crested rapids tossing in the distance before you. Here, even in the most unfavorable state of the weather, you hear the voice of the cataract, pervading the air with its low, monotonous, continuous roar. And here you see a column of mist rising up, like a smoke in distant woods, and designating the sublime scene over which it is immediately hanging. I know not that I was afterward more strongly affected, even by the Falls themselves, than I was by the sight of this ever changing and yet never absent guide, this cloudy pillar, this floating, evanescent, and yet eternal testimony, which pointed out to me the exact spot which had been for so many years as a shrine to thousands; which I had heard of and read of so long, and which I had myself so often visited, though not in person, yet with my reverential wishes, with my mind, and with my heart. Childhood came back to me, with its indistinct, but highly wrought and passionate images, maps were unrolled, books were opened; paintings were spread; measurements were recalled; all the efforts which the art of man had made, all the tributes which his spirit had offered, at the call of the great cataract; all these associations, with other dream-like thoughts of the wilderness, the lake, and the stream, rose up unbidden and with power within me, as I steadfastly regarded that significant, far off inist, and knew that I, too, was soon to stand on the consecrated spot, and see, and feel.

A mile or two is soon passed, and now we turn a little from the road to the right, in order to have a new view of the rapids. These occupy the whole breadth of the river, from shore to shore, and extend half a mile back from the Falls, and are formed by the rush of the entire body of waters down a rough bed, the descent of which in the course of this half mile is fifty feet. Here all is tumult and impetuous haste. The view is something

like that of the sea in a violent gale.-Thousands of waves dash eagerly forward, and indicate the interruptions which they meet with from the hidden rocks, by ridges and streaks of foam. Terminating this angry picture, you distinguish the crescent run of the British Fall, over which the torrent pours and disappears. The wilderness and the solitude of the scene are strikingly impressive. Nothing that lives is to be seen in its whole extent. Nothing that values its life, ever dares venture it there. The waters refuse the burden of man, and of man's works. Of this they give fair and audible warning, of which all take heed. They have one engrossing object before them, and they go to its accomplishment alone.

Returning to the road, we ride the last half mile, ascending gradually, till we come to the public house. A footpath through the garden at the back of the house, and down a steep and thickly wooded bank, brings us upon Table Rock, a flat ledge of limestone, forming the brink of the precipice, the upper stratum of which is a jagged shelf, no more than about a foot in thickness, jutting out over the gulf below. Here the whole scene breaks upon us. Looking up the river, we face the grand crescent, called the British or Horseshoe Fall. Opposite to us is Goat Island, which divides the Falls, and lower down to the left, is the American Fall. And what is the first impression made upon the beholder? Decidedly, I should say that of beauty; of sovereign, majestic beauty, it is true, but still that of beauty, soulfilling beauty, rather than of awful sublimity. Every thing is on so large a scale; the height of the cataract is so much exceeded by its breadth, and so much concealed by the volumes of mist which wrap and shroud its feet; you stand so directly on the same level with the falling waters; you see so large a portion of them at a considerable distance from you; and their roar comes up so moderated from the deep abyss, that the loveliness of the scene, at first sight, is permitted to take precedence of its grandeur. Its coloring alone is of the most exquisite kind. The deep sea-green of the centre of the crescent, where it is probable the greatest The height of the Horseshoe Fall is 150 feet; its breadth 2376 feet.