The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1879-01-24
BLOOMSBURY, PA. FRIDAY JANUARY a. 1879

this. The country up river is fattish. The
river slides along quiet enough, too. M
crags. no precipices, no darksome forests /;
all is fertile and good to the eye of man
just peace and plenty. It is different, though
as the sound of the thunder ahead grows up.
on you, dull, awful, everlasting, that has
sounded on from creation, and will outlas
you and me, stranger, and thousands of gen
erations yet to come.
Where lived was, as said, but few
miles above this. Farther down the calm
flow OF the river swirls into ripples, and
whirIs and grows scared like of what's be.
fore it. Then it exercises itself for the bell
it is to pass through. 1t tastes purgatory
It's all foam and DASH and splutter and
growl, through the frothy rapids that rough
en- IL for while. Then it settles for stead,
work. 1t braces itself for endurance, and
then pluckily smooths itself to face its fate.
How grand that calm, deep food is thai
pours along without stay or hurry. But
stranger, smooth and peaceable as it looks.
it's deep enough to sstonish weak nerves or
iron ones, as know well, and you'll know
before I've done, if my tongue does its duty
Just look across the fall. You see it best
from the British side. Run your eye round
the great horseshoe near you. That curve ia
some two thousand feet broad and hundred
aud fifty feet deep. Then there is Goat Is
land, snug in the midst ofthe mighty plunge
Can you see small, fat speck OF rock not
SO many yards off its shores? No? l know
it, as you'll hear. Our American fall be
yond knuckles under little to this nearer
to us But it's mighty respectable water
shed, too. Twelve hundred feet in breadth
a hundred and fifty high. You know.al-
guess that every passing minute some seven
hundred thousand tons of good fresh river
roll over that rock into spray and foam in
the dim gulf below.
'As boy, used to see beauty as we'll a
wonder in all this Where it's not hid whit.
with foam, see what a clear sea.green the
flrod is as 1t shoots over. You can meas.
ure the force of the rush of waters, for the
curve of the shining sheet is fifty feet from
the wall of the rock it slips down.
How does it strike you? You see it,
dare say, saw it two score years ago. To
you it is terrible, but not all terror It's love
ly, 100. And to me ? well, to me it is horror
only it has been so since that day when
hung on its very brink for hours, and thought
of it as one might think in nightmare
dream of some hideous thing, inconceivsble
unutterable, that held one in its awful grasp.
But mine was no vision of the night to
laugh at when awakened Those hours
grzzled the then brown of my young head
into the iron-gray you see it now. Their
iron entered into my soul, as they say. II
has lived there ever since, night and day,
season and season. There it will stay till
the death rattle kills the memory of all this
side my coffin.
Il hunted and fished then. That's how
lived. Visitors then came pretty plentiful
70 see this wonder. l caught, whether it
was fur or flu. l had canoed it from when
could recollect anything, and pretty
venturesome, too, became, till thought ]
was strong enough and skilled enough to run
risks hereabouts that others would have
shuddered from
Il thought knew Niagara too we'll to be
in any danger from it. l was 80 familiar
with it, thought of it with none of the
scare newcomers found in it. used to
laugh at their genuine fears at the very sight
and sound Of it. knew it by night, when
the calm moonlight through the silvered
spray clouds that hung over it; by day,when
the glad sun danced rsin-bows above its
fishing foods. Then it was too old friend
of mine to be fear,i by me.
| Que day changed all this, and knew it
for the hungry monster that it is -pitiless,
craving for its human prey.
1T was on Wednesday in August. The hotels
we're full Fish was in request, IS much as
could bring Price didn't matter. Pleasure
seekers bled freely. was paid well for what
could be charged for as they liked. l had
found that the nearer the rapids got the finer
seemed what l caught, and the more freely
the bait was taken. had so often gone
where most were too timid to venture that
had come to believe could skim any
where. a..f -r...
Even now think, had my paddle beer
sound, should have come off safe.
swell, that morning was out at sunrise
and pretty successful was. steadied my
course, letting the canoe DRIFT little by LITTLE
towards the rapids that frothed and ravet
some miles below. felt at any moment
could shoot it out of the strength of the cur
rent into the smoother waters by th'
shore.
Tgot fully employed with my lines, for,a
I glided down the stream my take was rap
id, aud that Of the finest So eager was
that failed to pay that attention to th
drift of my canoe which was so needfnl.
1T was with start at last felt was ia
too much in the full, deep current of the nv
er, and that its strength would need my u,
most efforts to escape from its grasp Fo
the first time felt real dread. for the boil
ing and hiss of the seething water could a
most be heard below me. Iplied the PAD
} die strongly, and for while had hopes {
safety, though had never known the nee
of the exertion was now using to draw m.
self out of the mighty force of the food tn,
, sped onward to its fearful fall -.
Inch by inch l fought my way up streal
and towards the shore where was to sell m
, mornings takings. Every inch was won h
. strain that made the perspiration sta
t from every pore. 1t was for life fought, f
dear life. 1t was death that pulled again
/. and such death for it was as if curta
was suddenly withdrawn to show me all u
0 danger l had so long been running uuco
. sciouslv. 1t flashed into my thoughts how
had played in the very jaws of destructit
!. that now seemed to hunger for me.
AS toiled franticslly against the rushil
e | waters they were living things whose clint,