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falls were in plain view about a mile off, but very distinct, and no
roar--hardly a murmur. The river tumbling green and white, far below
me; the dark high banks, the plentiful umbrage, many bronze cedars, in
shadow; and tempering and arching all the immense materiality, a clear
sky overhead, with a few white clouds, limpid, spiritual, silent. Brief,
and as quiet as brief, that picture--a remembrance always afterwards.
Such are the things, indeed, I lay away with my life's rare and blessed
bits of hours, reminiscent, past--the wild sea-storm I once saw one
winter day, off Fire island--the elder Booth in Richard, that famous
night forty years ago in the old Bowery--or Alboni in the children's
scene in Norma--or night-views, I remember, on the field, after battles
in Virginia--or the peculiar sentiment of moonlight and stars over the
great Plains, western Kansas--or scooting up New York bay, with a stiff
breeze and a good yacht, off Navesink. With these, I say, I henceforth
place that view, that afternoon, that combination complete, that five
minutes' perfect absorption of Niagara--not the great majestic gem
alone by itself, but set complete in all its varied, full, indispensable
surroundings.
JAUNTING TO CANADA
To go back a little, I left Philadelphia, 9th and Green streets, at 8
o'clock P.M., June 3, on a first-class sleeper, by the Lehigh Valley
(North Pennsylvania) route, through Bethlehem, Wilkesbarre, Waverly, and
so (by Erie) on through Corning to Hornellsville, where we arrived at 8,
morning, and had a bounteous breakfast. I must say I never put in such a
good night on any railroad track--smooth, firm, the minimum of jolting,
and all the swiftness compatible with safety. So without change to
Buffalo, and thence to Clifton, where we arrived early afternoon; then
on to London, Ontario, Canada, in four more--less than twenty-two hours
altogether. I am domiciled at the hospitable house of my friends Dr. and
Mrs. Bucke, in the ample and charming garden and lawns of the asylum.
SUNDAY WITH THE INSANE
_June 6_.--Went over to the religious services (Episcopal) main Insane
asylum, held in a lofty, good-sized hall, third story. Plain boards,
whitewash, plenty of cheap chairs, no ornament or color, yet all
scrupulously clean and sweet. Some three hundred persons present, mostly
patients. Everything, the prayers, a short sermon, the firm, orotund
voice of the minister, and most of all, beyond any portraying, or
suggesting, _that audience_, deeply impress'd me. I was furnish'd with
an arm-chair near the pulpit, and sat facing the motley, yet perfectly
well-behaved and orderly congregation. The quaint dresses and bonnets
of some of the women, several very old and gray, here and there like
the heads in old pictures. O the looks that came from those faces! There
were two or three I shall probably never forget. Nothing at all markedly
repulsive or hideous--strange enough I did not see one such. Our common
humanity, mine and yours, everywhere:
"The same old blood--the same red, running blood;"
yet behind most, an inferr'd arriere of such storms, such wrecks, such
mysteries, fires, love, wrong, greed for wealth, religious problems,
crosses--mirror'd from those crazed faces (yet now temporarily so
calm, like still waters,) all the woes and sad happenings of life and
death--now from every one the devotional element radiating--was it not,
indeed, _the peace of God that passeth all understanding_, strange as it
may sound? I can only say that I took long and searching eyesweeps as
I sat there, and it seem'd so, rousing unprecedented thoughts, problems
unanswerable. A very fair choir, and melodeon accompaniment. They sang
"Lead, kindly light," after the sermon. Many join'd in the beautiful
hymn, to which the minister read the introductory text, _In the daytime
also He led them with a cloud, and all the night with a light of fire_.
Then the words:
Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on.
The night is dark, and I am far from home;
Lead thou me on.
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me.
I was not ever thus, nor pray'd that thou
Should'st lead me on;
I lov'd to choose and see my path; but now
Lead thou me on.
I loved the garish day, and spite of fears
Pride ruled my will; remember not past years.
A couple of days after, I went to the "Refractory building," under
special charge of Dr. Beemer, and through the wards pretty thoroughly,
both the men's and women's. I have since made many other visits of the
kind through the asylum, and around among the detach'd cottages. As far
as I could see, this is among the most advanced, perfected, and kindly
and rationally carried on, of all its kind in America. It is a town in
itself, with many buildings and a thousand inhabitants.
I learn that Canada, and especially this ample and populous province,
Ontario, has the very best and plentiest benevolent institutions in all
departments.
REMINISCENCE OF ELIAS HICKS
_June 8_.--To-day a letter from Mrs. E. S. L., Detroit, accompanied in
a little post-office roll by a rare old engraved head of Elias Hicks,
(from a portrait in oil by Henry Inman, painted for J. V. S., must have
been 60 years or more ago, in New York)--among the rest the following
excerpt about E. H. in the letter:
"I have listen'd to his preaching so often when a child, and sat with
my mother at social gatherings where he was the centre, and every one
so pleas'd and stirr'd by his conversation. I hear that you contemplate
writing or speaking about him, and I wonder'd whether you had a picture
of him. As I am the owner of two, I send you one."
GRAND NATIVE GROWTH
In a few days I go to lake Huron, and may have something to say of
that region and people. From what I already see, I should say the young
native population of Canada was growing up, forming a hardy, democratic,
intelligent, radically sound, and just as American, good-natured and
_individualistic_ race, as the average range of best specimens among
us. As among us, too, I please myself by considering that this element,
though it may not be the majority, promises to be the leaven which must
eventually leaven the whole lump.
A ZOLLVEREIN BETWEEN THE U.S. AND CANADA
Some of the more liberal of the presses here are discussing the question
of a zollverein between the United States and Canada. It is proposed to
form a union for commercial purposes--to altogether abolish the frontier
tariff line, with its double sets of custom house officials now existing
between the two countries, and to agree upon one tariff for both, the
proceeds of this tariff to be divided between the two governments on the
basis of population. It is said that a large proportion of the merchants
of Canada are in favor of this step, as they believe it would materially
add to the business of the country, by removing the restrictions that
now exist on trade between Canada and the States. Those persons who
are opposed to the measure believe that it would increase the material
welfare or the country, but it would loosen the bonds between Canada
and England; and this sentiment overrides the desire for commercial
prosperity. Whether the sentiment can continue to bear the strain
put upon it is a question. It is thought by many that commercial
considerations must in the end prevail. It seems also to be generally
agreed that such a zollverein, or common customs union, would bring
practically more benefits to the Canadian provinces than to the United
States. (It seems to me a certainty of time, sooner or later, that
Canada shall form two or three grand States, equal and independent, with
the rest of the American Union. The St. Lawrence and lakes are not for a
frontier line, but a grand interior or mid-channel.)
THE ST. LAWRENCE LINE
_August 20_.--Premising that my three or four months in Canada were
intended, among the rest, as an exploration of the line of the St.
Lawrence, from lake Superior to the sea, (the engineers here insist upon
considering it as one stream, over 2000 miles long, including lakes and
Niagara and all)--that I have only partially carried out my programme;
but for the seven or eight hundred miles so far fulfill'd, I find that
the _Canada question_ is absolutely control'd by this vast water line,
with its first-class features and points of trade, humanity, and
many more--here I am writing this nearly a thousand miles north of my
Philadelphia starting-point (by way of Montreal and Quebec) in the midst
of regions that go to a further extreme of grimness, wildness of
beauty, and a sort of still and pagan _scaredness_, while yet Christian,
inhabitable, and partially fertile, than perhaps any other on earth. The
weather remains perfect; some might call it a little cool, but I wear my
old gray overcoat and find it just right. The days are full of sunbeams
and oxygen. Most of the forenoons and afternoons I am on the forward
deck of the steamer.
THE SAVAGE SAGUENAY
Up these black waters, over a hundred miles--always strong, deep,
(hundreds of feet, sometimes thousands,) ever with high, rocky hills for
banks, green and gray--at times a little like some parts of the Hudson,
but much more pronounc'd and defiant. The hills rise higher--keep their
ranks more unbroken. The river is straighter and of more resolute flow,
and its hue, though dark as ink, exquisitely polish'd and sheeny
under the August sun. Different, indeed, this Saguenay from all other
rivers--different effects--a bolder, more vehement play of lights
and shades. Of a rare charm of singleness and simplicity. (Like the
organ-chant at midnight from the old Spanish convent, in "Favorita"--one
strain only, simple and monotonous and unornamented--but indescribably
penetrating and grand and masterful.) Great place for echoes: while
our steamer was tied at the wharf at Tadousac (taj-oo-sac) waiting, the
escape-pipe letting off steam, I was sure I heard a band at the hotel up
in the rocks--could even make out some of the tunes. Only when our pipe
stopp'd, I knew what caused it. Then at cape Eternity and Trinity rock,
the pilot with his whistle producing similar marvellous results, echoes
indescribably weird, as we lay off in the still bay under their shadows.
CAPES ETERNITY AND TRINITY
But the great, haughty, silent capes themselves; I doubt if any crack
points, or hills, or historic places of note, or anything of the kind
elsewhere in the world, outvies these objects--(I write while I am
before them face to face.) They are very simple, they do not startle--at
least they did not me--but they linger in one's memory forever. They are
placed very near each other, side by side, each a mountain rising flush
out of the Saguenay. A good thrower could throw a stone on each in
passing--at least it seems so. Then they are as distinct in form as a
perfect physical man or a perfect physical woman. Cape Eternity is bare,
rising, as just said, sheer out of the water, rugged and grim (yet with
an indescribable beauty) nearly two thousand feet high. Trinity rock,
even a little higher, also rising flush, top-rounded like a great head
with close-cut verdure of hair. I consider myself well repaid for coming
my thousand miles to get the sight and memory of the unrivall'd duo.
They have stirr'd me more profoundly than anything of the kind I have
yet seen. If Europe or Asia had them, we should certainly hear of them
in all sorts of sent-back poems, rhapsodies, &c., a dozen times a year
through our papers and magazines.
CHICOUTIMI AND HA-HA BAY
No indeed--life and travel and memory have offer'd and will preserve to
me no deeper-cut incidents, panorama, or sights to cheer my soul, than