Pierre weekly free press. (Pierre, S.D.) 1889-19??, 1905-06-22
VICTORIA CATARACT
IT is CNE or THE NOTABLE WON
DERS OF THE WORLD.

sibility OF Comparison Between 1t
! and Our Own NiaSarn.
1t was Oh the 22d of November, 1866.
that the friendly natives with whom he
was travelling brought DR.; David Liv-
| lngstone for the first time within sight
and sound of the wonderful cataract
On the Zaplbezi river, now known as
the Victoria falls Before finding it,
the good missionary had journeyed Tor
nearly two years, and from his point
Of departure at KurumaI, in Cape Col
ony, had trayersed quite 1000 miles of
hitherto unknown country.
Today one takes the train at Cape
Town on Wednesday, passes through
Kimberley on Thursday, reaches Bulu-
wayo on Saturday, and late in the aft
ernoon of Sunday begins to see in. tho
distance the rising pillar of mist from
the great cataract
The natives call it ''Mosi-oa -tuni,'
meaning the roaring smoke" Twenty
miles away the spray thrown back
from the depths of the tremendous cav
ern into Which the river tumbles ap-
pears like column of smoke rising
|
last mile OF the railway journey the
roar Of the failing water becomes no
ticeable. Finally, when the edge Of
the chaSm Is reached if the river is in
flood, the eye and ear are assailed by
a combination Of phenomena that prob
ably cannot be duplicated as marvels
anywhere else on the planet.
The first question that is asked Of an
American who has seen this African
wonder generally Is s,S"How does it COM
pare with Niagara?" There is no pos
sibility of comparison The two are as
different as day and night Niagara Is
a perfect picture in lovely natural
framework. Every point and line and
curve of motionless rock, trembling
yerdure and gliding water is a touch Of
majestic beauty. Victoria is simply a
phenomenon, u terrific gas. in the floor
Of an apparently unending plain, which
as one gaZes simply swallows river
in a manner that produces almost q
thrill of horror.
The Iambezi valley for hundred
miles or more in every direction from
the cataract is rough and broken
plateau covered with low brush and
stunted trees, with here and there an
outcrop of somber basaltic rock, all
thoroughly uninteresting. The herbaga
is but family green and the tropical
sky only family blue. 1t Is hazy
half tone landscape, wanting in clear
cut lines in every direction and lacking,
above everything else, that element
we always unconsciously seek in a
nature picture-life The absence OF
this produces in the mind a feeling of
loneliness and often of fear. Across
this solemn scene appears river that
in hood time is perhaps half a mile
wide. If deaf man were following
down one OF its banks he would notice
little but the quiet water and the odd
looking column Of smoke ahead. AS
this column was approached he would
expect to see the river banks bending
and the water flowing away to one
side of the conhagration and nigh
glance to the right and left to note tn,
direction taken. But the panoram;
changes as he gaZes. The river Is NJ
a more, and there, where it should be
"a is only the brown plain, as lonely
u brush coyered and monotonous as ever
- One must go twenty miles farther be
fore the vanished water and the sur
face Of the land again commingle, be
fore it will be possible to walk alonI
the bank in company with the river
l9 So sudden is the transformation
Meantime the pillar of smoke has re
$. solved itself into dense mist force
upward in terrible pJffs from q yawn
ng cash stretching directly across tn
. Jed OF the river. This fearful abyss
every second swallowing thousands Q
Qrs Of green and white water an
f.chng up blasts of mist that ris
.;.nl,reCls Of feet into the air and hurr
way with the wilris as if reioicin
t their escape from the inferno b.
ow. And somewhere, nearly 400 fec
below, the el.rapYe% river is 1ightin
a. It's way between sheer walls of blac
Oc eek toward u narrow cleft in I'll
Oc eastern wall. whence it escapes, foan
sc iag and boiling, through the zigZa.
and curves Of Il deep gorge leading o
oc 10 the eastward. One goes to an ed
~ of this delivering chasm and lool
- town upon the tossing waters, eve
I0c pressed from behind by other floot
IOc struggling out of the narrow blae
gateway. and perhaps the most pror
aent mental sensation is that Of than
fuiness that even in such a grim III
:yhastly way nature has provided
means by which the fearful slit of
throat above that has swallowed Il
- stream can disgorge it again witho
causing All Overwhelming eatastroph
The Victoria cataract should be Wis
ed at least twice before one is comp
* tent to pass an opinion upon it. VIII
u the river is in flood duly the scene
" simply terrible. One sees nothing b
" an enormous sheet of water disappes
ing into the bowels Of the earth wi
a noise as of mountains falling up
u, one another. while from the awful ga
E comes back in fierce gusts and swil
the foaming breath of the tortured e
ment below But in December, VIII