The Falls of Niagara and Other Famous Cataracts Part 4

The crafty Hurons, the unwarlike Eries, the invincible league formed by the six aggressive and conquering tribes composing the Iroquois confederacy,--the Mohawks, the Oneidas, the Onondagas, the Cayugas, the Senecas, and the Tuscaroras,--all extinguished the torch, buried the tomahawk, and smoked the calumet when they came to the sh.o.r.es of the Niagara, and sat down within sight of its incense cloud, and listened to its perpetual anthem. In succeeding contests between the whites, on two occasions only was nature's repose here disturbed by the din of battle--first, in the running fight at Chippewa, and again at the obstinate and b.l.o.o.d.y struggle of Lundy's Lane.

During the War of 1812, in which these actions occurred, the dense forest which lay outside of the old belt of French occupation was first extensively and persistently attacked, the sunlight being let in upon comfortable log-cabins and fruitful fields. The Indian trail and corduroy "shake" were superseded by more civilized and comfortable highways. Post routes were opened and public conveyances established.

For many years, however, the two princ.i.p.al ways of access to Niagara were by the Ridge road, from the Genessee Falls--now Rochester--and the river road on the Canadian side from Buffalo to Drummondville.

Some forty years ago, and for many years thereafter, Niagara was, emphatically, a pleasant and attractive watering-place; the town was quiet; the accommodations were comfortable; the people were kind, considerate, and attentive; guides were civil, intelligent, and truthful; conveyances were good, and were in charge of careful and respectable attendants; commissions were unknown; "scalping" was left to the Indians; n.o.body was annoyed or importuned; the flowers bloomed, the birds caroled, the full-leaved trees furnished refreshing shade, and the air was balmy. Then the lowing of cows in the street, the guttural note of the swine, and the voice of the solicitor were not heard.

Elderly people came to stay for pleasant recreation and quiet enjoyment; younger people to "bill and coo" and dance. Now all that is changed. A contemporary orator once described the moral status of a famous stock-jobbing locality by saying that "ten thousand a year is the Sermon on the Mount for Wall street." The same gospel is popular at Niagara.

Whoso has seen Niagara only in summer has but half seen it. In winter its beauties are not diminished, while the accessories due to the season are numerous and varied. After two or three weeks of intensely cold weather many beautiful and fantastic scenes are presented around the Falls.

The different varieties of stalact.i.tes and stalagmites hanging from or apparently supporting the projecting rocks along the side walls of the deep chasm, the ice islands which grow on the bars and around the rocks in the river, the white caps and hoods which are formed on the rocks below, the fanciful statuary and statuesque forms which gather on and around the trees and bushes, are all curious and interesting.

Exceedingly beautiful are the white vestments of frozen spray with which everything in the immediate vicinity is robed and shielded; and beautiful, too, are the cl.u.s.ters of ice apples which tip the extremities of the branches of the evergreen trees.

There is something marvelous in the purity and whiteness of congealed spray. One might think it to be frozen sunlight. And when, by reason of an angle or a curve, it is thrown into shadow, one sees where the rainbow has been caught and frozen in. After a day of sunshine which has been sufficiently warm to fill the atmosphere with aqueous vapor, if a sharp, still, cold night succeed, and if on this there break a clear, calm morning, the scene presented is one of unique and enchanting beauty.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WINTER FOLIAGE]

The frozen spray on every boll, limb, and twig of tree and shrub, on every stiffened blade of gra.s.s, on every rigid stem and tendril of the vines, is covered over with a fine white powder, a frosty bloom, from which there springs a line of delicate frost-spines, forming a perfect fringe of ice-moss, than which nothing more fanciful nor more beautiful can be imagined.

Then, as the day advances, the increasing warmth of the sun's rays dissolves this fairy frost-work and spreads it like a delicate varnish over the solid spray, giving it a brilliant polish rivaling the l.u.s.ter of the rarest gems; the mid-morning breeze sets in motion this flashing, dazzling forest, which varies its color as the sunlight-angle varies; and finally, when the waxing warmth and growing breeze loosen the hold of the icy covering in the tree-tops, and it drops to the still solid surface in the shade beneath,--the tiny particles with a silver tinkle and the larger pieces with the sharp, rattling sound of the castanet,--the ear is charmed with a wild, dashing rataplan, while a scene of strange enchantment challenges the admiration of the spectator.

Even more beautiful and fairy-like, if possible, is the garment of frozen fog with which all external objects are adorned and etherealized when the spring advances and the temperature of the water is raised. As the sharp, still night wears on, the light mists begin to rise, and when the morning breaks, the river is buried in a deep, dense bank of fog. A gentle wave of air bears it landward; its progress is stayed by everything with which it comes in contact, and as soon as its motion is arrested it freezes sufficiently to adhere to whatever it touches. So it grows upon itself, and all things are soon covered half an inch in depth with a most delicate and fragile white fringe of frozen fog. The morning sun dispels the mist, and in an hour the gay frost-work vanishes.

The ice islands are sometimes extensive. In the year 1856 the whole of the rocky bar above Goat Island was covered with ice, piled together in a rough heap, the lower end of which rested on Goat Island and the three Moss Islands lying outside of it, all of which were visited by different persons pa.s.sing over this new route.

The ice formed on the rocks below the American Fall, stretched upward, reached the edge of the precipice just north of the Little Horseshoe, continued up-stream above Chapin's Island, spread out laterally from that to Goat Island on the south, and over nearly half of the American rapids to the north. At the brow of the precipice it acc.u.mulated upward until it formed a ridge some forty feet high. About fifteen rods up-stream another ridge was formed of half the height of the first.

Every rock projecting upward bore an immense ice-cap. Around and between these mounds and caps horses were driven to sleighs, albeit the course was not favorable for quick time. The boys drew their sleds to the top of the large mound, slid down it, up-stream, and nearly to the top of the smaller hill.

On the lower or down-stream side, they would have had a clear course to the water below, at the brink of the Falls, and might have made "time"

compared with which Dexter's minimum would have seemed only a funeral march. But with all Young America's pa.s.sion for speed, he declined to try this route. The writer walked over the south end of Luna Island, above the tops of the trees.

The ice-bridge of that year filled the whole chasm from the Railway Suspension Bridge up past the American Fall. When the ice broke up in the spring, such immense quant.i.ties were carried down that a strong northerly wind across Lake Ontario caused an ice-jam at Fort Niagara.

The ice acc.u.mulated and set back until it reached the Whirlpool, and could be crossed at any point between the Whirlpool and the Fort. It was lifted up about sixty feet above the surface, and spread out over both sh.o.r.es, crushing and destroying everything with which it came in contact. Many persons from different parts of the country visited the extraordinary scene.

At Lewiston the writer, with many others, saw a most remarkable ill.u.s.tration of the terrific power of this hydrostatic press. Just below the village, on the American side, there stood, about two rods from high-water mark, a sound, thrifty, tough white-oak tree, perhaps a hundred years old, and two feet in diameter. The ice, moved by the water, struck it near the ground and pressed it outward and upward, until it was actually pulled up by the roots--or rather some of the roots were broken and others were pulled out--and landed twenty feet farther away from the chasm.

Those who watched the operation stated that, from the time the ice touched the tree until it was landed on the bank above, the motion of the ice could not be detected by the eye.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ICE BRIDGE AND FROST FREAKS]

Slowly, steadily, surely it pressed on. Suddenly there would be an explosion, sharp and loud, when a root gave way. No motion in the ice or tree could be discovered. After a lapse of two or three hours another sharp crack would give notice of another fracture. Thus the ice pressed gradually on, and in ten hours the work was done. A thousandth part of this force would pulverize a bowlder of adamant. We need not wonder, therefore, that the river Niagara keeps its channel clear.

In the ice-gorge of 1866 the ice was set back to the upper end of the Whirlpool, over which it was twenty feet deep. The Whirlpool rapid was subdued nearly to an unbroken current, which all the way below to Lake Ontario was reduced to a gentle flow of quiet waters. Never was there a sublimer contest of the great forces of nature. The frost laid its hand upon the raging torrent and it was still.

The winter of 1875 was intensely cold. The singular figures represented in the ill.u.s.trations--the eagle, dog, baboon, and others--are exact reproductions of the real chance-work of the frost of that season. The long-continued prevalence of the south-west wind fastened to every object facing it a border or ap.r.o.n of dazzling whiteness, and more than five feet thick. The ice mountain below the American Fall, reaching nearly to the top of the precipice, was appropriated as a "coasting"

course, and furnished most exhilarating sport to the people who used it.

A large number of visitors came from all directions, and, on the 22d of February, fifteen hundred were a.s.sembled to see the extraordinary exhibition.

In the coldest winters, the ice-bridges cannot be less than two hundred and fifty feet thick. The ice-bridge of 1875 formed on the 6th and 7th of May, was crossed on the 8th, and broke up on the 14th--the only one ever known in the river so late in the spring.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COASTING BELOW THE AMERICAN FALL]

CHAPTER X.

Judge Porter--General Porter--Goat Island--Origin of its name--Early dates found cut in the bark of trees and in the rock--Professor Kalm's wonderful story--Bridges to the Island--Method of construction--Red Jacket--Anecdotes--Grand Island--Major Noah and the New Jerusalem--The Stone Tower--The Biddle Stairs--Sam Patch--Depth of water on the Horseshoe--Ships sent over the Falls.

In preparing this narrative, the writer has had the good fortune to listen to many recitals of facts and incidents by the late Judge Augustus Porter and the late General Peter B. Porter, whose names are intimately and honorably connected with the more recent history, not only of this particular locality but of the Empire State.

Judge Porter, after having spent several years in surveying and lotting large portions of the territory of Western New York and the Western Reserve in Ohio, came from Canandaigua to Niagara Falls with his family in June, 1806, where he continued to live until his death, nearly fifty years afterward.

General Porter settled as a lawyer at Canandaigua in 1795, removed to Black Rock in 1810, and to Niagara Falls in 1838.

In 1805, the two brothers became interested with others in the purchase from the State of New York of four lots in the Mile Strip lying both above and below the Falls.

A few years later, they purchased not only the interest of their partners in these lots, but other lands at different points along this strip. In 1814, they bought of Samuel Sherwood a paper since named a _float_--an instrument given by the State authorizing the bearer to locate two hundred acres of any of the unsold or unappropriated lands belonging to the State. This float they fortunately anch.o.r.ed on Goat Island and the islands adjacent thereto lying "immediately above and adjoining the Great Falls."

The origin of the name of Goat Island is as follows: Mr. John Stedman, who came into the country in 1760, had cleared a portion of the upper end of the island, and in the summer of 1779 he placed on it an aged and dignified male goat. The following winter was very severe, navigation to the island was impracticable, and the goat fell a victim to the intense cold. Since which the scene of his exile and death has been called Goat Island.

By the terms of the Treaty of Ghent, December 24, 1814, the boundary line between Great Britain and the United States, on the Niagara frontier, was to run through the deepest water along the river-courses and through the center of the Great Lakes. As the deepest water, at this point, is in the center of the Horseshoe Fall, the islands in the river fell to the Americans. General Porter, acting as Commissioner for the United States, proposed to call the largest one Iris Island, and it was so printed on the boundary maps. But the public adhered to the old name of Goat Island.

One of the early chronicles states that the island contained two hundred and fifty acres of land. At the present time there are in it less than seventy. A strip some ten rods wide by eighty rods long has been worn away from the southern side of it since 1818, when Judge Porter made the first road around it.

The earliest date he found on the island was 1765, carved on a beech-tree. The earliest date cut in the rock on the main-land was 1645.

Human bones and arrowheads were found on the island. The Indians went to it with their canoes, which they paddled up and down in the comparatively quiet water lying on the rocky bar which extends upward nearly a mile above the head of the island.

Notwithstanding this fact, the Swedish naturalist, Kalm, who visited the place in 1750, relates a fabulous story of two Indians who, on a hunting excursion above the Falls, drank too freely from "two bottles of French brandy" which they brought from Fort Niagara; becoming drowsy, they laid themselves down in the bottom of their canoe for a nap.

The canoe swung off sh.o.r.e and floated down-stream. Nearing the rapids, the noise awakened one of them, who had apparently been more fortunate in learning the English language from the French than most of his tribe, for, seeing their perilous situation, he exclaimed: "We are gone!" But the two plied their paddles with such aboriginal vigor that they succeeded in landing on Goat Island. From the sequel it would seem that they must have destroyed or lost their canoe. Finding no houses of refreshment, nor cairns of stores left by former explorers, and most naturally getting hungry, they concluded it would be desirable to get back to the fort--a wish more easily expressed than accomplished.

But it was necessary for them to "do or die." So, as the story runs, they stripped the bark from the ba.s.swood trees, and with it made a ladder long enough to reach from a tree standing on the edge of the precipice at the foot of the island down to the water below.

After dropping their ladder they followed it downward. Reaching the water, and being good swimmers, they plunged in with great glee, expecting to be able to swim across to the opposite sh.o.r.e, which they could easily climb. But the counter current forced them back to the island.

After being a good deal bruised on the rocks, they were compelled to abandon the attempt to cross, and then returned up their ladder to the island. There, after much whooping, they attracted the notice of other Indians on the sh.o.r.e. These reported the situation at the fort, and the commandant sent up a party of whites and Indians to rescue them. They brought with them four light pike-poles. Going to a point opposite the head of the island, they exchanged salutations with the new Crusoes, and began preparations for their rescue. Two Indians volunteered to undertake the task. "They took leave of all their friends as if they were going to their death." Each Indian rescuer, according to the wondrous fable, took two pike-poles and _waded_ across the channel to the island, gave each of the Crusoes a pike-pole, and then the four waded back to the main-land, where they were joyfully received by their anxious, waiting friends, after having been "nine days on the island."

Remembering that the water in mid-channel is twelve feet deep, with a twelve-mile current, we must concede this to be the most marvelous of all aquatic achievements.

In 1817 Judge Porter built the first bridge to Goat Island, about forty rods above the present bridge. In the following spring the large cakes of ice from the river above, not being sufficiently broken up by the short stretch of rapids over which they pa.s.sed, struck the bridge with terrific force, and carried away the greater part of it. With the courage and enterprise of a New-Englander, the next season he constructed another bridge farther down, on the present site, rightly judging that the ice would be so much broken up before reaching it as to be harmless.

That bridge, with constant repairs and one almost entire renewal, stood firm in its place until the year 1856, when it was removed to make room for the present iron bridge. The old piers were much enlarged and strengthened, and also raised about three feet higher to receive the new bridge. As nearly every stranger inquires how the first bridge was carried over the turbulent waters, a brief description of the process may be acceptable. First, a strong bulkhead was built in the shallow water next to the sh.o.r.e; a solid backing was put in behind this, and the upper surface properly graded and well floored with plank. Strong rollers were placed parallel with the stream and fastened to the floor.

In the old forest then standing near by were many n.o.ble oaks, of different sizes and great length. A number of these were felled and hewed "tapering," as it was termed, so that, when finished, they were about eighteen inches square at the b.u.t.t, fifteen at the top, and eighty feet long. Through the small ends were bored large auger-holes. These sticks were placed, as required, on the rollers, at right angles to the stream, the small ends over the water, and the sh.o.r.e ends heavily weighted down.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SECOND MOSS ISLAND BRIDGE]

The first stick being properly placed, levers were applied to the rollers and the stick was run out until the small end reached an eddy in the water. Then another similar stick was run out in like manner, parallel to the first, and about six feet from it. A few light, strong planks were placed across and made fast. Two men were provided each with strong, iron-pointed pike-staffs, each staff having in its upper end a hole, through which was drawn some ten feet of new rope. Thus provided, they walked out on the timbers, drove their iron pikes down among the stones, and tied them fast to the timbers. Thus the whole problem was solved. Around these pike-staffs the first pier was built and filled with stone. Then other timbers were run out, all were planked over, and the first span was completed. The other spans were laid in the same way.