Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1883-09-26
THE B0TT0MLEss sAGUENAY.
A Poets Goodnight Trip Down the
Unfathomless River Of DEATH
Joaquin Miller.


Joaquin Miller.
This river OF death Of Saguenay, is bottom
less. You might, if possible, drain the st
Lawrence river dry, says Mr.. LIE Nome, the
Canadian authority, and yet this dark, still
river would be able to float the Great Eastern
and all her majesty's ships Of the line. "a
bottomleSs river" sounds strangely new; in
deed, We're It not so I should not trouble you
or myself TO mention it. But this river L
thus far unfathomed. It IS full OF counter
currents, swift, peilrous in the extreme. As
the vast red moon comes shOuldering
up out Of the st. Lawrence away
above toward the sea and stood there a
glowing period to a great day, we draw back
from TadouSac, where the ancient church sits
in the tawnsy sand and scattering grass, and,
rounding q granite headland, we slowly
steamed up the silent river of death II
widened little as we went forward, but even
its mile of water looked narrow enough as we
crept up between the great naked walls of
slate and granite that shut out these dark
water from every living thing. On the right
hand great, naked and monotonous capes of
slate and topping granite. On the left
hand, granite and slate and granite, and all
Silent, all new and nude, as if just fallen half
finished from Gods hand One mile, two
miles, twenty miles, and only the weary wall
OF granite and slate; only the great massive
monotony of nude and uncompleted earth
Now the walls would seem to close in before
us and bar all possible advance. Then as we
rounded another weary and eternal cape Of
oyerhanging granite, Ill its few frightened
and torn trees, the dark way would open be.
fore us. And ten, twenty, thirty miles more
of silence, gloom, river of DEATH No sound.
No sign of life is here. Summer OF winter,
springthne or autumn, all seasons alike, nc
bird, no beast, not even the smallest insect,
save only possible housefy that may
harbor in the steamboat and SO be
brought with you, is ever seen here. This
Is literally the river Of death. l know
no spot ike it Oh the face of this earth
Our deserts with their owls norn-toads,
prairie dogs, and rattlesnakes are populous
with Life in comparison. And yet this awful
absence of all kinds of life can not be due to
the waters. They are famous for fish of the
best kind. TIE air is certainly delicious
But all this vast rivers shore is as empty of
life as when darkness was upon the face Of
the deep"
And no man has settled here. For nearly
100 miles not sign of man is seen. You
seem to be a sort of Columbus as if no man
had ever been here before you. At every
turn of great granite cape these lines
rhymed necessarily in my ears:
We were the first that ever burst
Upon that silent sea.
An hour past midnight and we neared the
central object of the journey. Cape Trinity,
granite wall of about 1000 feet, which in
places literally overhangs the ship. Our
captain laid the vessel closely against the
monolith, and for q moment rested there.
We seemed so small The great steamer was
as little toy, held ont there in the hollow of
Gods hand.
No sound anywhere No sign of life, Or
light, save the moon, that filed the canon
with her silver and lit the amber river of
death with a tender and an alluring light.
No lighthouse, no light from the habitations
of man far away Oh the mountains; only the
stars that hung above us, locked in the stony
helmets of their everlasting hills.