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THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
X 
 
TRENTON FALLS, 
 
 PICTURESQUE AND DESCRIPTIVE 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 K PAKKEK WILLIS; 
 
 EMBRACING THE ORIGINAL ESSAY OF 
 
 JOHN SHERMAN, 
 
 THE FIRST PROPRIETOR AND RESIDENT. 
 fHK PRINCIPAL ILLUSTRATIONS FROM ORIGINAL DESIGNS CY 
 
 HEINE, KUMMER AND MULLER. 
 
 GEORGE P. PUTNAM, 
 
 155 BROADWAY. 
 
 1851. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851, 
 
 BY M. MOORE, 
 
 In the Clerk s Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
 Southern District of New York. 
 
 STEREOTYPED BY 
 
 RICHARD C. VALENTIN! 
 
 NBW YORK. 
 
 F. C. GUTIERREZ, Printer, 
 Corner of John and Dutch streets. 
 
H E most enjoyably 
 beautiful spot, among ** 
 the resorts of roman- j x 1 
 tic scenery in our country, is 
 the one which is the subject of 
 the present little book. To the 
 writer, as to most other lovers of 
 Nature who have visited it, the 
 remembrance of its loveliness has 
 become the bright spot to which 
 dream and revery oftenest return. It seems to be 
 curiously adapted to enjoy; being, somehow, not 
 
4 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 only the kind, but the size of a place which the 
 (after all) measurable arms of a mortal heart can 
 enfold in its embrace. Niagara is too much as a 
 roasted ox is a thing to go to look at, though one 
 retires to dine on something smaller. 
 
 Trenton Falls is the place, above all others, where 
 it is a luxury to stay which one oftenest revisits 
 which one most commends strangers to be sure to 
 see. The writer, whose name is on the title-page, 
 having written much, at different times, about it, has 
 been induced by his friend, Mr. Moore, the proprie 
 tor, to join with three admirable artists in putting 
 together what pen and pencil have recorded of its 
 beauty. The object of the book is as much to re 
 mind the public of what is within easy access and 
 worth their while to know of and frequent, as to 
 embody a convenient guide and companion in which 
 the visitor shall find directions for his feet and sym 
 pathy for his heart. 
 
 The first thing wanted, of course, is information as 
 to locality, accessibility, situation of the various points 
 of interest, and accommodation to travellers. These 
 items have been recorded in a descriptive essay by a 
 man whose memory should be cherished amid the 
 admiration given to the Falls ; for it is to his discov- 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 5 
 
 ery and appreciation of the spot, his enterprise in 
 getting possession of it, and his perseverance in draw 
 ing attention to its beauties and providing accommo 
 dation for visitors, that the public owe their enjoy 
 ment of it. We speak of JOHN SHERMAN, grandson 
 of Roger Sherman, one of the signers of the Decla 
 ration of Independence, and father of Mrs. Moore, 
 the wife of the present proprietor of the Falls, 
 
 As a matter of history, we may remark " en pas 
 sant," that the village of Trenton was formerly known 
 as OLDENBARNEVELD,* thus named by Col. Boon, 
 one of the first settlers of this part of our State, and 
 the agent of the Holland Company prior to the 
 nineteenth century. The Indian appellation, KAUY- 
 A-HOO-RA, literally " leaping water," is only remem 
 bered by few, and ere many years this beautiful and 
 descriptive name will be lost. To show the careless 
 change of nomenclature, which has for many years 
 been going on in our country, we may be pardoned 
 for giving that of the metamorphosis of Oldenbarne- 
 veld. The principal business man of the village, 
 
 * From JOHN OLDENBAKNEVELT, Grand Pensioner of the 
 State of Holland, in the 17th century, who was beheaded for 
 his being too favorable to religious toleration, and a friend to 
 peace ; and in the name is an intimation of their (the Dutch 
 gentlemen who laid it out) respect for liberty of conscience. 
 
6 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 some twenty or thirty years since, took the notion 
 that " Oldcnbarneveld" was too long an item to head 
 his letters or bills with ; so he got up a petition to 
 change it, had it signed by three or four individuals, 
 sent it on to Washington and the thing was done. 
 Thus a name was adopted already well known as 
 the capital of New Jersey, and some other twenty or 
 thirty villages and towns in the United States. The 
 consequence of course is, that even at this day, let 
 ters frequently miscarry, unless directed, " Oneida 
 County, 1ST. Y." But to return. 
 
 Mr. Sherman, after graduating at Yale College in 
 1793, settled in Mansfield, Conn., having been or 
 dained a minister of the Congregational denomina 
 tion ; he there became pastor of a large congrega 
 tion, and was universally beloved and respected ; 
 but about the year 1805, having preached doctrines 
 rather too liberal to suit the minds of a small part 
 of his flock, he resigned his charge. About this 
 time, having received an invitation from Col. Mappa 
 and Judge Vanderkemp, who with their families had 
 formed a small society of Unitarians at Oldenbarne- 
 veld, he visited that place for the first time, remain 
 ing several weeks, and preaching very acceptably to 
 them. It was during his sojourn at Oldenbarneveld, 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 7 
 
 that Mr. Sherman made his first visit to the ravine 
 of the KAUY-A-HOO-RA. 
 
 From the village to the Falls was an unbroken 
 wood ; there were two ways of approach, the one 
 where the grist and saw mills are (the village of 
 Trenton Falls now), the other at the summit level of 
 the High Falls. The latter was taken, the least 
 preferable of the two in point of view. The path 
 was what Nature had formed : the foothold, at the 
 period of Mr. Sherman s first visit, being of the most 
 precarious kind, and attended with absolute danger ; 
 but difficulty and danger were unthought of by him, 
 and the greatest treat of his life was before him. 
 Words would only be an apology for the impression 
 of the scene on his mind, he never dreaming there 
 was such an unique display of Nature so absolutely 
 unknown, and yet so near the habitation of man. 
 Again and again he revisited the wild ravine, oft re 
 marking, " that it must eventually become one of 
 the great features of our continent." Little did he 
 then imagine, that through his instrumentality it 
 would in a few years so become. 
 
 Mr. Sherman returned to his home at Mansfield, 
 and shortly after received a pressing call from the 
 Society at Oldenbarneveld to become their spiritual 
 
g TRENTON FALLS 
 
 guide. He accepted the invitation, and on the 9th 
 of March, 1806, was installed pastor of the first 
 Unitarian Church in the State of New York. It 
 was, perhaps, fortunate that such a man was the 
 apostle of what was then a new and unsatisfactory 
 doctrine to most of the inhabitants of the village and 
 its vicinity, for, from his blameless life and urbane 
 character, he outlived all prejudice. 
 
 Mr. Sherman was an eloquent and able orator and 
 sound scholar, a profound logician, and known as 
 the author of the " Philosophy of Language Illus 
 trated," and of several works on Biblical history, 
 &c. &c. 
 
 At the time he became their pastor, his church 
 was composed of fourteen members ; but in a short 
 time the congregation was so increased that the 
 present spacious church was erected, which has 
 since continued to prosper as under the auspices of 
 the first pastor, at the present time numbering by 
 hundreds what was originally less than a score. 
 
 Mr. Sherman, to provide more comfortably for a 
 largely increasing family, subsequently established 
 an Academy near Oldenbarneveld, which was soon 
 in a flourishing condition, and over which he pre 
 sided for many years with high scholarship and 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 ability; and in 1822 (still clinging to his old remi 
 niscences), caused a house to be built at the Falls, 
 for the accommodation of visitors, which he called 
 the " RURAL RESORT," 
 
 the entire receipts of which, for the first season, 
 amounted to llSYy 3 ^. In 1823 he removed thither 
 with his family, and in 1825 a large addition was 
 
10 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 made to the conveniences of the place, Philip 
 Hone, of the city of New York, his personal friend, 
 furnishing a loan for that purpose. The first visitors 
 who slept in that house were our well-known citi 
 zens Philip Hone and the late Dominick Lynch. 
 
 The remaining years of Mr. Sherman were passed 
 at the "Rural Resort," where, as the agreeable and 
 intelligent host, the scholar and friendly gentleman, 
 he charmed and pleased the intellectual traveller 
 and worshipper of the sublimest works of the Crea 
 tor. These, however, had been rendered much more 
 accessible by his efforts. The visitor of the present 
 day can scarcely imagine the almost impracticable 
 difficulty of the earlier attempt ; for from the year 
 1822 until the present time, every season has been 
 devoted to the task of improving the pathway tons 
 of rock at a time having been blasted by the suc 
 cessful efforts of the miner so, that the fortunate 
 traveller of our day can survey, in perfect security, 
 the various points of scenery. 
 
 Mr. Sherman died on the 2d day of August, 1828, 
 in the fifty-seventh year of his age, and was buried, 
 at his special request, on the grounds he so much 
 loved, within the sound of the loud anthem of the rag 
 ing Kauy-a-hoo-ra, and in the view of the Hostelrie 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 II 
 
 he had founded. The traveller, casting his eye to 
 the northward of the hotel, may observe, on the 
 summit of a conical hill, an inclosed space beautifully 
 shaded. There rests what remains, earthly, of JOHN 
 SHERMAN. 
 
12 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 ^ should precede Mr. Sherman s 
 account f the Falls, perhaps 
 (since it was written as far back as 1827), 
 with a brief mention of the present im 
 provements in access and accommodation. 
 Within the last year, Mr. Moore has made very 
 large additions to the building, and the hotel now 
 has a front of one hundred and thirty-six feet, a 
 piazza twelve feet wide, a dining-room sixty feet by 
 thirty ; large suites of apartments, sleeping-rooms 
 well ventilated, and, in fact, all the luxuries of a 
 first-class hotel at a " Watering Place." A plank 
 road has been laid from Utica hither, over which 
 the travel is about two hours. Mr. Moore has been 
 at great trouble and expense in building stairways, 
 and making arrangements for greater convenience 
 and security in visiting the wild chasms of the tor 
 rent ; and there is at present neither danger nor 
 over-fatigue in seeing all that the place has to show 
 of grand and beautiful. For long visits, which 
 Trenton Falls particularly invite, the hotel will be 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 13 
 
 found a delightful home ; and for these Mr. Moore 
 makes the usual accommodations. 
 
 We here present a view of the VILLAGE FALL, as 
 seen from the opposite bank of the river, a short 
 distance below the hotel, and then proceed to give 
 (as written by Mr. Sherman in 1827) the following 
 
 HIS superb scenery of Nature, to 
 V" which thousands now annually re 
 sort a scenery altogether unique 
 y-~"""" in its character, as combining at once 
 the beautiful, the romantic, and the magnifi 
 cent all that variety of rocky chasms, cata 
 racts, cascades, rapids, &c., elsewhere separately ex 
 hibited in different regions was, until within five 
 years, not accessible without extreme peril and toil, 
 and therefore not generally known. It is in latitude 
 43 23 ; 14 miles north of the flourishing city of 
 Utica, the great thoroughfare of this region, situated 
 
U TRENTON FALLS 
 
 on a gentle ascent from the bank of the Mohawk, 
 amidst a charming and most fertile country. Here 
 every facility can be had for a ride to Trenton 
 Falls, where a house of entertainment is erected, 
 near the bank of the West Canada Creek, for the 
 accommodation of visitors, and where they can 
 tarry any length of time which may suit their con 
 venience. 
 
 This creek is the main branch of the Mohawk 
 River, as the Missouri is of the Mississippi, having 
 lost its proper name because not so early explored. 
 It interlocks on the summit elevation with the Black 
 River, the distance being only three -fourths of a 
 mile, where the waters of the one may be easily 
 turned into the other. It has chosen its course 
 along the highlands, making its way on the back 
 bone of the country, and empties into the Mohawk 
 at Herkimer. 
 
 The " RURAL RESORT," or house of entertainment 
 at the Falls, which is at the end of the road, and in 
 closed on three sides by the native forest, opens sud 
 denly to view upon elevated ground, at the distance 
 of a mile in a direct line of the road. From the 
 door-yard you step at once into the forest, and, 
 walking only twenty rods, strike the bank at the 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 15 
 
 place of descent. This is about one hundred feet of 
 nearly perpendicular rock, made easy and safe by 
 five pair of stairs with railings. You land upon a 
 broad pavement, level with the water s edge, a fu 
 rious rapid being in front, that has cut down the 
 rock still deeper, and which, at one place, in times 
 of drought, does not exceed ten feet in width ; but 
 hi spring and fall floods, or after heavy rain, becomes 
 a tremendously foaming torrent, rising from fifteen 
 to twenty feet, and sweeping the lowest flight of 
 stairs. Being now on the pavement, the river at 
 your feet, perpendicular walls of solid rock on each 
 side, and the narrow zone of ethereal sky far over 
 head, your feelings are at once excited. You have 
 passed to a subterranean world. The first impres 
 sion is astonishment at the change. But recovering 
 instantly, your attention is forthwith attracted to 
 the magnificence, the grandeur, the beauty, and 
 sublimity of the scene. You stand and pause. You 
 behold the operations of incalculable ages. You 
 are thrown back to antediluvian times. The ada 
 mant rock has yielded to the flowing water, which 
 has formed the wonderful chasm. You tread on 
 petrifactions, or fossil organic remains, imbedded 
 in the four-hundredth stratum, which preserve the 
 
16 
 
 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 form, and occupy the place, of beings once animated 
 like yourselves, each stratum having been the de 
 posit of a supervening flood, that happened succes 
 sively, Eternity alone knows when. 
 
 At this station is a view of the outlet of the 
 chasm, forty-five rods below, and also of what is 
 styled the first fall, thirty-seven rods up the stream. 
 
 ^^s.- ^ ^^f: - - -" c* g^==^^ - - >:. 
 
 The parapet of this fall, visible from the foot of the 
 stairs, is, in dry time, a naked perpendicular rock 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 17 
 
 thirty-three feet high, apparently extending quite 
 across the chasm, the water retiring to the left, and 
 being hid from the eye by intervening prominences. 
 But in freshets, or after heavy rains, it pours over 
 from the one side of the chasm to the other in a 
 proud amber sheet. A pathway to this has been 
 blasted, at a considerable expense, under an over 
 hanging rock, and around an extensive projection, 
 directly beneath which rages and roars a most vio 
 lent rapid. Here some, unaccustomed to such bold 
 scenery, have been intimidated, and a few have 
 turned back. But the passage is level, with a rocky 
 wall to lean against, and rendered perfectly safe at 
 the turn of the projection by chains well riveted in 
 the side. 
 
 In the midway of this projection, five tons were 
 thrown off by a fortunate blast, affording a perfectly 
 level and broad space, where fifteen or twenty may 
 stand together and take a commanding view of the 
 whole scenery. A little to the left the rapid com 
 mences its wild career. Directly underneath, it 
 niges, foams, and roars, driving with resistless fury, 
 and forcing a tortuous passage into the expanded 
 stream on the right. In front is a projection from 
 the other side, curved to a concavity of a semicircle 
 
18 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 by the impetuous waters. The top of this opponent 
 projection has been swept away, and is entirely flat ; 
 exhibiting, from its surface downwards, the separate 
 strata as regular, as distinct, and as horizontal as the 
 mason- work in the locks of the grand canal. Here, 
 in old time, was a lofty fall, now reduced to the 
 rapid just described. 
 
 Passing hence on a level of twenty feet above the 
 stream, we witness the amazing power of the wa 
 ters in the spring and autumnal freshets. Massive 
 slabs of rock lie piled in the middle of the river, 
 thrown over the falls above, weighing from ten to 
 twenty tons. These are occasionally swept on 
 through the rapids, and floated over the five-feet 
 falls at the outlet of the chasm. Such is their mo 
 mentum, that every bound upon the bottom causes 
 a vibration at the Rural Resort, and their stifled 
 thunder, amid the agitated roar of waters, is some 
 times very distinctly heard. 
 
 A few rods above this pile of rocks we pass to the 
 left, and suddenly come in full view of the descend 
 ing cataract, which is known as the SHERMAN FALL. \/ 
 It has formed an immense excavation, having thrown 
 out thousands of tons from the parapet rock visible 
 at the stairs, and is annually forcing off slabs from 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 19 
 
 the west corner, against which it incessantly pours 
 a section of its powerful sheet. 
 
 It is difficult to give a description of the scenery 
 here. A mass of naked rock, extending up one 
 hundred and fifty feet to the summit of the bank, 
 juts forward with threatening aspect. The visitor 
 ascends by natural steps to the throat of its yawn 
 ing, and, like a son of Hercules, literally shoulders 
 the mountain above. Here he stands free from the 
 spray, in a direct line of the parapet wall, survey 
 ing at leisure the evergreens which cover in contrast 
 the opponent bank with a rich foliage of the deepest 
 verdure, and immediately at his feet the operation 
 of the cataract rushing down into the spacious ex 
 cavation it has formed. Back of this thick amber 
 sheet, the reaction of the water has worn away the 
 rock to an exact circular curve, eight or ten feet in 
 diameter, which exhibits a furiously boiling cauldron 
 of the very whitest foam. In the bosom of the ex 
 cavation a Fairy makes her appearance at a certain 
 hour of sunshine, and dances through the mist, 
 modestly retiring as the visitor changes his position, 
 and blushing all colors when she finds him gazing 
 at her irised beauties. A few rods beyond this spot 
 a thin shelf puts out from the mountain, under 
 
20 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 which it never rains, nor snows, nor shines. In 
 front the river hastens smoothly and rapidly to the 
 fall below. 
 
 Leaving this rocky shelf we pass a furious wind 
 ing rapid, w^hicb, encroaching on the path, drives 
 the visitor close under a low projecting cliff that 
 compels him to stoop, and seems to demand homage 
 as a prerequisite of admission to the splendid scenery 
 just beyond. Here all ages and sexes bow, who 
 would pass from the portico into the grand temple 
 of nature s magnificence, to witness the display of 
 her sublimer glories. 
 
 This service performed, there opens upon us, 
 when the water is low, an expansion of flat rock, 
 where we are suddenly transported with a full view 
 of the HIGH FALLS, forty rods beyond. The eye, 
 elevated at a considerable angle, beholds a perpen 
 dicular rock one hundred feet high, extending across 
 the opening in a diagonal line from the mountainous 
 walls on each side rising seventy or eighty feet still 
 higher. Over this the whole river descends, first 
 perpendicularly about forty feet, the main body 
 rushing to the left. On the right it pours down in 
 a beautiful white sheet. For a short distance in 
 the middle the rock is left entirely naked, exhibiting 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 21 
 
 a perpendicular and bold breastwork, as though 
 reared by art to divide the beautiful white sheet on 
 the one side from the overwhelming fury of the 
 waters on the other. They unite on a flat below ; 
 then, with a tumultuous foam, veer suddenly down 
 an inclination of rooky steps, whence the whole river 
 is precipitated into a wide, deep, and dark basin, 
 forty feet underneath mountainous walls rising on 
 each side of the stream nearly two hundred feet 
 tall hemlocks and bending cedars extending their 
 branches on the verge above small shrubbery va 
 riegating here and there their stupendous and naked 
 sides. On the right of the basin a charming verdure 
 entirely overspreads a smoothly rounding and ma 
 jestic prominence, which reaches half way up the 
 towering summit, and over the whole sky mingles 
 with retiring evergreens, until verging in perspective 
 to the distant angle of incidence, they are lost in the 
 ethereal expanse beyond. 
 
 Such are the HIGH FALLS, which the pen may 
 faintly describe, and of which the pencil may por 
 tray the outline, but Nature reserves to herself the 
 prerogative of giving to her visitors the rapturous 
 impression. 
 
 The view of these falls varies exceedingly, accord- 
 
22 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 ing to the plenitude or paucity of the waters. In 
 the autumnal floods, and particularly the spring 
 freshets, arising from the sudden liquefaction of 
 snow in the northern country, the river is swelled a 
 hundred-fold, and comes rushing in a vast body of 
 tumultuous foam from the summit rock into the 
 broad basin at the bottom. It is at this time tre 
 mendous indeed, and overpowers man s feeble frame 
 with the paralyzing impression of Omnipotence. 
 On these occasions the solid foundations of the earth 
 are ripped up, and enormous slabs of rock are float 
 ed off, or deposited in piles to the right or left of 
 the all-controlling current. We have in effect the 
 peerless majesty, the awful power, and the deep vol 
 leying thunder of the grand cataract of Niagara, which 
 causes the heavens to shake and the earth to trem 
 ble ; which forces the son of pride to feel himself 
 mere insignificance on the verge of annihilation ; and 
 proclaims, in his astounded ears, what is meant by 
 the existence, and what it is to stand before the 
 throne of that Infinite Supreme, who can make such 
 an appalling display upon a comparatively single 
 atom of the universe ! 
 
 Passing up at the side we mount a grand level 
 on the top, where in dry times the stream retires to 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 23 
 
 the right, and opens a wide pavement for a large 
 party to walk abreast. Here a flight of stairs leads 
 up to a house of refreshment, styled the RURAL RE 
 TREAT, twenty feet above the summit of the high 
 falls, and in a direct line with them a house thirty 
 by sixteen, with a well furnished bar) and also a 
 room for gentlemen and ladies, encircled and shaded 
 by hemlocks and cedars, from the front platform and 
 windows of which is a full view of the inverted 
 scenery of the falls, of the flat rock below, and of 
 the visitors who pass upon it to survey the exhibi 
 tion above. Here the philosopher and divine may 
 make their sage remarks and draw their grave con 
 clusions ; the weary rest from their labors, the hun 
 gry and dry recruit their exhausted spirits ; the 
 sociable of all grades and nations converse freely 
 and unknown together; the facetious display the 
 coruscations of their wit, and the cheerful in dispo 
 sition enjoy the innocent glee of hilarity. Greece, 
 embellished by immortal bards, cannot boast a spot 
 so highly romantic. 
 
 The opening of the chasm now becomes consid 
 erably enlarged, and a new style of scenery com 
 mences. Forty rods beyond this is what is usually 
 denominated the MILL-DAM FALL, fourteen feet high, 
 
24 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 stretching its broad sheet of water from the one side to 
 the other of the expanded chasm. This also is visi 
 ble through the branches of evergreens at the Rural 
 Retreat. 
 
 Ascending this fall, we are introduced to another 
 still more expanded and extensive platform of level 
 rock, fifteen rods wide at low-water, and ninety in 
 length, lined on each side with cedars, which extend 
 down to the walking level, whose branches all 
 crowd forward under their bending trunks, and whose 
 backs are as naked as the towering rocky walls, con 
 cealed in contrast a rod or two behind them. 
 
 This place may justly be denominated the ALHAM- 
 BRA of nature. At the extremity of it is one of the 
 most interesting scenes imaginable ; a scene that no 
 pen can describe to one who is not on the spot, and 
 where every landscape painter always drops his pen 
 cil. It is far too much for art to imitate, or for elo 
 quence to represent. It is the prerogative of Nature 
 alone to do this : she has done it once, and stands 
 without a rival competitor. Here I ought to drop 
 my pen. A naked rock, sixty feet high, reaches grad 
 ually forward from the mid distance its shelving top, 
 from which descends a perpetual rill that forms a 
 natural shower-bath. 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 25 
 
 On the very verge of its overhanging- summit 
 stands a tall cedar, whose fingered apex towers 
 aloft, pointing up to the skies, and whose thick 
 branches elongating gradually towards the root, 
 reach far down the projecting cliff with an impene 
 trable shade of deepest verdure. On the left is a 
 most wild cascade, where the water rushes over the 
 variously posited strata in all directions, combining 
 the gentle fall and the outrageous cataract, which 
 we term the CASCADE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 
 
 Here the expansive opening suddenly contracts, 
 and leaves a narrow aperture, through which the 
 eye beholds mountainous walls retiring in various 
 curvatures and projections. Directly opposite the 
 spectator is a large perpendicular rock on the other 
 side of the stream, at whose base the raging waters 
 become still. Annexed to this is a lofty tower, 
 rising in a vast column at its side, commanding, 
 with imposing majesty, the scenery around. At 
 your feet is a dark basin of water forty feet deep, 
 resting from its labors in the wild cascade above, 
 and relieved by collections of whitest foam, which 
 frequently assemble within an eddy at the upper 
 end, and dance to each other in fantastic forms, and, 
 capped like caliphs, pursuing the course of all hands 
 
26 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 round in an eternal circle. On the right, the whole 
 river descends gently down a charming plain, until 
 lost amidst evergreens as it passes over the falls 
 below. 
 
 Ascending this cascade, whose thwarting, raging, 
 foaming, dashing waters would seem to forbid a 
 passage at its side, you are introduced to a grand 
 amphitheatre unseen before, where is a towering 
 rock of threatening majesty with a singular support 
 ing column, from whose impending cliff have fell 
 enormous slabs of strata, sixteen or eighteen inches 
 thick. Between this deposited pile and the base it 
 would seem temerity to pass, lest you should be in 
 stantly crushed. This danger may be avoided by 
 keeping near the water s edge. Just beyond the 
 column is exhibited a natural fireplace. Here, also, 
 a rill descends, a few feet below the summit shelf. 
 A cedar extends down within reach its elongated 
 branches from the root, by which a sailor could as 
 easily ascend the bank as up the shrouds of his 
 ship ; and under this shelving summit a solemnizing 
 echo is generally heard, as of the dreadful roar of 
 overwhelming floods rushing from on high. It is 
 caused by the cascade below. 
 
 Here the strata are composed of bivalve shells, 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 27 
 
 Terebratulse and Product!, with merely a cement to 
 unite them together ; among which are Orthocera- 
 tites, vertebrae of Crinoidea, and forms resembling 
 the snake or eel in motion, which, whether testa 
 ceous or crustaceous, I have never seen exemplified 
 or described in any oryctological publication. Three 
 of these forms I once found together, radiating as- 
 terially from a depressed point of junction ; but in 
 attempting to extract the specimen it was entirely 
 ruined. 
 
 A few rods up the stream there is, on the oppo 
 site wall, an extraordinary interruption of the strata, 
 which has very much the appearance, as to size and 
 form, of a superannuated hemlock turned up by the 
 roots, its trunk inclining, with a considerable angle, 
 up through thirty or forty strata, and worn away to 
 its axis. Immediately above and below, and at the 
 sides of this dendriform interposition, the strata are 
 all horizontal, as is the case with the whole wall, 
 and also of the correspondent wall on this side of 
 the creek. I can give no solution of this anomaly, 
 but mention it as what may possibly be useful in the 
 annals of geological science. I cannot consider it to 
 be a petrifaction. 
 
 From this, passing a high projection, we come to 
 
28 TRENT ON FALLS 
 
 a place where this wonderful chasm is fully demon 
 strated to be the effect of the operation of the 
 stream. We see the process actually going on. 
 The curvatures here, through which the water 
 rushes for a considerable distance, are as regular as 
 if drawn by the compass, or any method of forming 
 the varieties of a curve. One of these is styled the 
 Rocky Heart, from its perfect resemblance to that 
 form on cards, which is so denominated. In a flat 
 rock at the side, there is nearly in contact a circular 
 hole, named by some the Potash Kettle, and by 
 others Jacob s Well, which is five or six feet deep, 
 and three or four in diameter. It is usually half 
 full of stones of various sizes, worn perfectly smooth, 
 and exhibiting all the varieties of curvilinear form. 
 Several similar perforations exist in different parts 
 of the chasm, from the size of a tumbler up to the 
 potash kettle. 
 
 The doctrine then is, that at first was deposited 
 in the crack of a stratum a small pebble of granite 
 or other substance, harder than the lime rock, which, 
 being agitated by the water, wore a circular indent 
 ation. In this, other pebbles subsequently lodged, 
 and, when overflowed, perforated the rock still 
 deeper, and wore the indentation still wider. So 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 29 
 
 on, larger and larger were from time to time depos 
 ited, until considerable-sized fragments of rock or 
 stones performed the same process in floods, and at 
 length opened the perforation into the current. 
 Moreover, the walls above the current being every 
 season penetrated an inch or more by moisture, and 
 this moisture frozen in winter, become annually dis 
 integrated at the sides, which combined operation 
 has produced the depth and width of the chasm as 
 it now exists. 
 
 The opening in the widest places at the top is 
 about three hundred yards. Now, on supposition 
 that the disintegration has been annually one inch 
 on each side, it will be found, by calculation, that it 
 requires between five and six thousand years of this 
 process to produce the effect ; which corresponds 
 with sufficient exactness to the Mosaic account of 
 the period in which the solid surface of the earth 
 emerged from its pre-existent state. I see nothing 
 here incompatible with the Mosaic history, but much 
 in its confirmation. It is allowed by intelligent di 
 vines, both in Europe and America, and is, in fact, 
 very plainly intimated by Moses himself, that the 
 "six days" of creation denoted merely a successive 
 operation of divine power upon the chaotic matter 
 
30 TRENT ON FALLS 
 
 of the universe, for the production of its present 
 organization or relatively arranged form. Having 
 enumerated the several items of successive produc 
 tion, indicated by the figurative representation of 
 " six days," he gives us the summary expression of 
 the case, Gen. ii. 4, saying, " These are the genera 
 tions (mark the language) of the heavens and the 
 earth, in THE DAY (singular number) in which the 
 Lord God made (i. e. formed or produced) the earth 
 and the heavens." The pre-existent state of the 
 earth he thus represents, Gen. i. 2. " And the 
 earth was without form and void, (i. e. unorganized, 
 not arranged,) and darkness was upon the face of 
 the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the 
 face of the waters." Now all this is perfectly phil 
 osophical, and stands uncontradicted by any geo 
 logical investigation or discovery which has been 
 made. 
 
 How long were these successive periods, and what 
 was the pre-existing state of things, Moses does not 
 pretend to say. They are questions of curious 
 speculation, on which geologists may innocently 
 hazard a conjecture. Mount Etna may have been 
 a volcano in the sea, while " darkness was upon the 
 face of the deep," and the stratifications of primary 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 31 
 
 and secondary rocks, with the most ancient organic 
 fossil forms, may have taken place when " the Spirit 
 of God moved upon the face of the waters." The 
 philosophy of Moses looks with pity upon all such 
 stupid cavils, and spurns the aid of an advocate to 
 plead its cause. Let, then, geologists go on and dive 
 deep into the bowels of our earth, as the immortal 
 Newton soared to the stars of heaven, and, like him, 
 return with the proof, that, as an " undevout astron 
 omer," so an irreligious geologist "is mad." His 
 must indeed be "a forlorn hope," who can view the 
 wonderful scenery of nature in this wonderful chasm 
 without correspondent emotions of reverential piety. 
 It is a scene where the God of Nature himself 
 preaches the most eloquent and impressive lectures 
 to every visitor ; but more especially to the philoso 
 pher, whose mind is called to ascend from the won 
 derful operations of nature, to nature s more won 
 derful and incomprehensible CAUSE ; for what is 
 NATURE, but the systematic course of divine operation ? 
 At the Rocky Heart it is customary to stop, see 
 ing the passage beyond is attended with some dan 
 ger, and the scenery, within the last eighty rods, is, 
 to a considerable degree, characteristic of what fol 
 lows. 
 
32 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 On your return to the Rural Resort, you ascend 
 the bank immediately behind the Rural Retreat, 
 where many picturesque glimpses of the river may 
 be had, one particularly at Carmichael s Point, a 
 view of which is annexed. Thence, carefully observ 
 ing to keep the left-hand foot-path on the summit 
 near the creek, you pass through the cool shade of 
 the forest, until you arrive with a good appetite at 
 the place where you landed from your carriage. 
 
 The usual dining hour is two o clock. Being in 
 the wilderness, at the end of the road, and without 
 any regular market, it is impossible for such an es 
 tablishment to furnish, as in cities or villages, sepa 
 rate tables and at different times. This ought not 
 to be expected nor required. Visitors, who wish to 
 dine, should notify to the barkeeper the number of 
 their party, in order that correspondent preparations 
 may be made ; and if any party does not return at 
 the appointed time, they cannot expect the same 
 fare as " while the blessing is on." The establish 
 ment is disposed to do, in all cases, what it can ; 
 and it trusts that the candid and reflecting will be 
 no less ready, on their part, to make all due allow 
 ance for peculiar circumstances. The best that can 
 be procured in this retired location is always served 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 33 
 
 up without the ceremony of apology. Our wishes 
 never yet wrought miracles, and, consequently, we 
 are not always equally well prepared. The will 
 must sometimes be taken for the deed. 
 
 Among the numerous thousands who have visited 
 these Falls, we are happy to say that very few in 
 stances have occurred of the least deviation from 
 good behavior or politeness. We record this fact 
 with pleasure, as characteristic of the dignified re 
 finement of the age. 
 
T R E J, T O N FALLS 
 
 LTHOUGH the passage beyond 
 the Rocky Heart is, at present, 
 difficult, and even dangerous, yet 
 both gentlemen and ladies have 
 frequently passed as far as Boon s Bridge* 
 where is a fall of about twenty feet, and where 
 the chasm commences. This is nearly three 
 miles from the Rural Resort. Every one who 
 would explore the whole chasm, should take 
 the full day before him, which will afford him 
 time to rest an hour or two at the village near the 
 bridge, and recruit his strength. Considerable has 
 already been done to render this passage feasible ; 
 and, in all probability, it will soon be both easy and 
 safe. 
 
 It will of course be perceived, in view of what 
 has been stated concerning the floods and rains, that 
 

 ; 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 35 
 
 the scenery must vary according as the water is 
 hi^h or low. The outlines of the chasm remain 
 
 O 
 
 indeed the same ; but the character and impression 
 of the view are vastly different. When the water 
 is very low, you have a much easier, far more spa 
 cious, and more pleasing path. At the ALHAMBRA 
 fifty may walk abreast, and hundreds may pass 
 each other on the beautiful level and dry pavement 
 of its saloon. You see much more of the rock and 
 of the manifest operation of the waters in wearing- 
 it away ; and the large party enjoy with more zest 
 their association, as they can sit together, make 
 philosophical observations, and communicate their 
 mutual impressions, or range about the shelving de 
 clivities from the path to the water s edge. For a 
 party of pleasure, especially those who have often 
 visited the Falls, some think the time of low water 
 is the most eligible season. It undoubtedly has the 
 advantages specified above. 
 
 On the other hand, when the water is so high as 
 barely to allow a passage, Indian file, the majesty 
 and imposing grandeur, the magnificence and sub 
 limity of the scene, are proportionably heightened. 
 It is quite another view. Hence it is desirable to 
 witness this scenery in all its variations. 
 
36 
 
 TREXTON FALLS 
 
 At high water, which, even in midsummer, two 
 days heavy rain will effect, the spray at the first, and 
 also at the High Falls, is like an April shower, and 
 requires the visitor to haste through its penetrating 
 mist. The rapids, on such occasions, are propor 
 tionally more interesting. 
 
 In winter, these Falls are not easily nor safely ap 
 proached, the pathway being slippery, or blocked 
 by snows ; which would require pointed steel for the 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 37 
 
 feet in the one case, and much exertion in the other. 
 Some, however, do visit them in the winter ; at 
 which time the view is superlatively splendid. 
 From the overhanging cliffs, enormous icicles, reach 
 ing down to the pathway, become transparent col 
 onnades. The descending rills, already described, 
 form an inverted tunnel, whose base is eight or ten 
 feet, the apex touching the summit of the cliff sixty 
 feet high, and the water pouring down through the 
 centre. At the High Falls, the shrubbery in its 
 environs is distended by the frozen spray, and span 
 gles and glitters in the sunbeam with inexpressible 
 lustre. The reader may easily imagine the rest. 
 
 Still different, and far more awfully solemn and 
 sublime, is the scene by moonlight. At the proper 
 season, the moon, between the hours of ten and 
 eleven, appears through the boughs and tops of 
 evergreens on the summit of the opponent bank, 
 and throws her interrupted rays upon the foot-path. 
 It is literally the descent of ^Eneas to Pluto s dreary 
 domain. You cannot imagine that you belong to 
 the upper world. You have departed hence. You 
 are walking, like ghosts, through the chambers of 
 the grave, the mausoleums of the dead, the cata 
 combs of old Time. You find yourselves in a world 
 
33 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 of spirits, where every thing around is the deep 
 shadow of an evanescent shade. You pause, your 
 feelings are solemnized ; you withhold your step. 
 At length the moon towers aloft, and displays her 
 full orb of mild and chastened lijrht, which, while it 
 
 O 7 
 
 flickers upon the raging rapids, tinging their surface 
 with burnished silver, produces a mighty contrast, 
 as at the awful moment of creation, when the firma 
 ment and the waters of the deep, the light and the 
 darkness, were separated by omnipotent command. 
 But I may not attempt to portray a scene which 
 cannot be comprehended by those who live only 
 upon the surface of our world. Suffice it to remark, 
 that there is no more danger in passing through the 
 chasm at such a season than any other. Here the 
 writer has retired at midnight for contemplation, to 
 familiarize himself with mortality ; and here his chil 
 dren have left behind the bustle and cares of day, 
 to pay their more solemn adorations to Nature s 
 almighty and all-glorious GOD. 
 
 O J O 
 
 The geological order of these rocks is pronounced 
 by Professor Eaton and Professor Renwick to be 
 transition, the first that contains fossil organic re 
 mains. Their character, in the lower part of the 
 chasm, is the compact fetid carbonate of lime. The 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 color is a very dark blue, and the rock is extremely 
 hard and brittle. It is unsuitable for mortar, unless 
 broken into small pieces previous to calcination. 
 Some strata are more or less interspersed with sili- 
 cious particles, which give, with steel, the igneous 
 spark. At the High Falls, and so on to the Rocky 
 Heart, the upper strata arc from a foot to eighteen 
 inches thick ; are composed of crystallized fragments 
 of the vertebrae of Crinoidea, and of the shells of 
 Terebratulee, which make excellent lime for plaster 
 ing. Now and then a stratum of this character is 
 found a hundred feet below the surface. There is 
 a singular instance of this at the first projection, in 
 a very thick stratum, the upper half of which is the 
 
40 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 compact blue fetid, without any seam or mark of 
 stratification between. 
 
 In general, the strata through the chasm are re 
 markably horizontal, from one to eighteen inches 
 thick. At Boon s Bridge, they dip to the south 
 fifteen or twenty degrees. At the High Falls is a 
 very irregular mass, which has no other character 
 than disorder, in the midst of which lies horizontally 
 a curious specimen of semicircular strata of the 
 usual thickness, the one within the other, and the 
 diameter of the outside about two feet. 
 
 The strata in this chasm are very distinct, the 
 whole distance up the walls being separated by a 
 fine substance which disintegrates on exposure to 
 the air and moisture. In the rocks newly blasted 
 this distinction is scarcely discernible. 
 
 From the summit to the bottom of the chasm 
 small cracks or seams extend down perpendicularly, 
 and in a perfectly straight line through the whole 
 mass across the creek. These cracks divide the 
 pavements into rhomboidal slabs, between which 
 pebbles are first inserted, gradually separating one 
 stratum from another, and thus preparing the slabs 
 to be upturned and carried off by freshets. Some 
 of the cracks separate the whole mass of rock, and 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 41 
 
 the opening widens with the depth. These are filled 
 with the calcspar, from one-tenth of an inch to two 
 inches thick. In the middle of the calcspar there is 
 a dark line, which shows that the crystallization has 
 been equally formed on each side. Calcspar is also 
 found in a horizontal sheet, separating the superin 
 cumbent from the stratum underneath. Conse 
 quently, these sheets of calcspar cut each other. 
 But whether the horizontal sheets extend through 
 the whole mass, it is impossible to ascertain. 
 
 These rocks abound in petrifactions, or what are 
 styled fossil organic remains. They are sometimes 
 cut by the cracks or seams above mentioned. These 
 cracks must, of course, have been subsequent to the 
 petrifaction of the fossil forms ; and, indeed, sub- 
 
42 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 sequent to the completion of the whole mass of 
 strata. 
 
 It would be useless to go into a detail of all the 
 different genera and species of the fossils here, see 
 ing the investigations of Oryctologists have resulted 
 in this, that the same order and character of rock 
 throughout the world contains the very same organic 
 remains. 
 
 The most interesting petrifaction in this locality 
 is the large Trilobite ; entire specimens of Avhich 
 (for their extraction entire is extremely difficult) 
 have, so far as I know, been nowhere else obtained, 
 either in Europe or America. Its generic name, 
 first given by Dr. Dekay, of New York, is the 
 " Isotelas Gigas." It is minutely described by this 
 distinguished naturalist, from specimens which I 
 exhibited to the Lyceum in that city. To his de 
 scription, published in the sixth number of the An 
 nals of the Lyceum, may be added, that seeing the 
 dorsal slips, or of the lobes, terminate at the side 
 like Indian paddles, the animal could swim ; and 
 these slips being not only movable, but crustaceous, 
 it could also crawl on the bottom of the sea. Here 
 are small Trilobites of different genus : Ortho- 
 ceratites, both large and small, of different genera 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 43 
 
 and species ; Favosites, Nautili, Terebratulce, Pro- 
 ducti, Lingula, Mitiloidea, Cornu Ammonis, Crinoi- 
 dea, Connularia Quadrisulcata, and several others, 
 both univalves and bivalves. Some Orthoceratites 
 of the simplest form (i. e. real straight horns, perfect 
 cones ; the shell, from the middle to the point, hollow 
 or vacant in all its chambers) are pyritous ; some 
 filled (in the hollow part) with calcspar and quartz 
 crystals in contact ; some of the quartz crystals con 
 taining graphite ; the crystallized spar is white, black, 
 yellow, smoky brown ; and the crystals of these dif 
 ferent colors are sometimes found in the same speci 
 men. 
 
 I have hazarded to several the novel conjecture, 
 that the Favosite (found here in the greatest abun 
 dance, from one-eighth of an inch to six inches in 
 diameter at the base, and from two to nine super 
 structures, some containing six or eight hundred 
 
44 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 thousand columns) is a miniature exemplification of 
 Columnar Basaltes at the Giant s Causeway, and 
 other places ; which, if my conjecture is correct, 
 must have been the production of a gigantic order 
 of marine antediluvian (not to say antimundane) 
 Polypi. Whether the substance which composes 
 these columnar forms is lime, silex, basalt, or other 
 substance, so exactly do they correspond to each 
 other in their prominent but very singular peculiari 
 ties, that I am unable to doubt it. There is one 
 single point only in which I have not had opportu 
 nity to make a comparison, viz. : as to the circular 
 perforations in the parities of the cell, by which the 
 mass became one connected system. I am not ad 
 vised whether any such thing has been observed in 
 Columnar Basaltes, i. e., in the prism, or space of 
 column betivecn the articulations. The hollow spe- 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 45 
 
 cimens, or the weather-worn summits, are those 
 alone where we are authorized to expect this dem 
 onstration, and where, in view of the entire corre 
 spondence in every particular, I have no doubt it 
 can and will be found. It would be a miracle in 
 nature that there should be a perfect correspondence 
 in twenty particulars, and yet a failure in the last. 
 The Basaltic columns must, of course, be mammoth 
 Favosites. 
 
 The most pleasant time of the day to visit these 
 Falls is after dinner, about four o clock, when the 
 bank on the left casts its shade over the path, and 
 shields from the sun s scorching rays. But this 
 time can be taken only by those who do not leave 
 the place the same day ; and the remark does not 
 apply when it is cloudy weather. 
 
 There is quite a variety of flowers and botanical 
 specimens upon the bank ; and the rock in the 
 chasm, all along up the High Falls, abounds with the 
 beautiful blue hare-bell of Scotland. 
 
 Trout were formerly very abundant in this creek, 
 but have now become exceedingly scarce ; so that 
 there is very little encouragement for the fishing 
 party. Eels, in the forepart of the season, are still 
 abundant. The ocean does not produce better. 
 
40 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 They often weigh from two to four pounds, and 
 more delicious were never served up at the table of 
 an epicure. 
 
 Game, also, is scarce. In some seasons, however, 
 partridges, snipes, wild ducks, the large gray and 
 black squirrel, the woodcock, and the rabbit may be 
 taken. 
 
 No venomous snakes haunt this neighborhood, 
 nor any beasts of prey. The deer sometimes come 
 from the north to visit these Falls, and occasionally 
 the moose ; but neither bears, nor wolves, nor cata 
 mounts ever make their appearance. 
 
 Ladies should, by all means, come furnished with 
 calf-skin shoes or bootees. Let them not 
 forget this. They not only owe it to 
 their health, but the best pair of cloth 
 shoes will be ruined by a single 
 tramp over these rocks. 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 47 
 
 
 N a story called " EDITH LINS^.Y," 
 written soon after the author left Col 
 lege, occurs the following description 
 of Trenton Falls : 
 
 Trenton Falls is rather a misnomer. I 
 scarcely know what you would call it ; but 
 the wonder of nature which bears the name is a tre 
 mendous torrent, whose bed, for several miles, is 
 sunk fathoms deep into the earth a roaring and 
 dashing stream, so far below the surface of the for 
 est in which it is lost, that you would think, as you 
 come suddenly upon the edge of its long precipice, 
 that it was a river in some inner world, (coiled 
 within ours, as we in the outer circle of the firma 
 ment,) and laid open by some Titanic throe that had 
 cracked clear asunder the crust of this " shallow 
 
48 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 earth." The idea is rather assisted if you happen 
 to see below you, on its abysmal shore, a party of 
 adventurous travellers ; for, at that vast depth, and 
 in contrast with the gigantic trees and rocks, the 
 same number of well-shaped pismires, dressed in the 
 last fashions, and philandering upon your parlor 
 floor, would be about of their apparent size and 
 distinctness. 
 
 They showed me at Eleusis the well by which 
 Proserpine ascends to the regions of day on her an 
 nual visit to the plains of Thessaly but with the 
 genius loci at my elbow in the shape of a Greek girl 
 as lovely as Phryne, my memory reverted to the 
 bared axle of the earth in the bed of this American 
 river, and I was persuaded, (looking the while at 
 the feroni&re of gold sequins on the Phidian fore 
 head of my Katinka,) that supposing Hades in the 
 centre of the earth, you are nearer to it, by some 
 fathoms, at Trenton. I confess I have had, since 
 my first descent into those depths, an uncomforta 
 ble doubt of the solidity of the globe how the 
 deuse it can hold together with such a crack in its 
 bottom ! 
 
 It was a night to play Endymion, or do any Tom 
 foolery that could be laid to the charge of the moon, 
 
; 
 
 ILLUSTRATED. 49 
 
 for a more omnipresent and radiant atmosphere of 
 moonlight never sprinkled the wilderness with sil 
 ver. It was a night in which to wish it might never 
 be day again a night to be enamored of the stars, 
 and bid God bless them like human creatures on 
 their bright journey a night to love in, to dissolve 
 in to do every thing but what night is made for 
 sleep ! Oh heaven ! when I think how precious is 
 life in such moments ; how the aroma the celestial 
 bloom and flower of the soul the yearning and 
 fast-perishing enthusiasm of youth waste them 
 selves in the solitude of such nights on the senseless 
 and imanswering air ; when I wander alone, unlov 
 ing and unloved, beneath influences that could in 
 spire me with the elevation of a seraph, were I at 
 the ear of a human creature that could summon 
 forth and measure my limitless capacity of devotion 
 when I think this, and feel this, and so waste my 
 existence in vain yearnings I could extinguish the 
 divine spark within me like a lamp on an unvisited 
 shrine, and thank Heaven for an assimilation to the 
 animals I walk among ! And that is the substance 
 of a speech I made to Job as a sequitur of a well- 
 meant remark of his own, that " it was a pity Edith 
 Linsey was not there." He took the clause about 
 
 4 
 

 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 the " animals" to himself, and I made an apology 
 for the same a year after. We sometimes give our 
 friends, quite innocently, such terrible knocks in our 
 rhapsodies ! 
 
 Most people talk of the sublimity of Trenton, but 
 I have haunted it by the week together for its mere 
 loveliness. The river, in the heart of that fearful 
 chasm, is the most varied and beautiful assemblage 
 of the thousand forms and shapes of running water 
 that I know in the world. The soil and the deep- 
 striking roots of the forest terminate far above you, 
 looking like a black rim on the enclosing precipices ; 
 the bed of the river and its sky-sustaining walls are 
 of solid rock, and, with the tremendous descent of 
 the stream forming for miles one continuous suc 
 cession of falls and rapids the channel is worn into 
 curves and cavities which throw the clear waters 
 into forms of inconceivable brilliancy and variety. 
 It is a sort of half twilight below, with here and 
 there a long beam of sunshine reaching down to kiss 
 the lip of an eddy, or form a rainbow over a fall, 
 and the reverbeiating and changing echoes, 
 
 "Like a ring of bells whose sound the wind still alters," 
 maintain a constant and most soothing music, vary- 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 51 
 
 ing at every step with the varying phase of the cur 
 rent. Cascades of from twenty to thirty feet, over 
 which the river flies with a single and hurrying leap, 
 (not a drop missing from the glassy and bending 
 sheet,) occur frequently as you ascend ; and it is 
 from these that the place takes its name. But the 
 Falls, though beautiful, are only peculiar from the 
 dazzling and unequalled rapidity with which the wa 
 ters come to the leap. If it were not for the leaf 
 which drops wavering down into the abysm from 
 trees apparently painted on the sky, and which is 
 caught away by the flashing current as if the light 
 ning had suddenly crossed it, you would think the 
 vault of the steadfast heavens a flying element as 
 soon. The spot in that long gulf of beauty that I 
 best remember is a smooth descent of some hundred 
 yards, where the river in full and undivided volume 
 skims over a plane as polished as a table of scaglio- 
 la, looking, in its invisible speed, like one mirror of 
 gleaming but motionless crystal. Just above, there 
 is a sudden turn in the glen, which sends the water 
 like a catapult against the opposite angle of the rock, 
 and, in the action of years, it has worn out a cavern 
 of unknown depth, into which the whole mass of 
 the river plunges with the abandonment of a flying 
 
52 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 fiend into hell, and reappearing like the angel that 
 has pursued him. glides swiftly, but with divine se 
 renity, on its way. (I am indebted for that last figure 
 to Job, who travelled with a Milton in his pocket, 
 and had a natural redolence of " Paradise Lost" in 
 his conversation.) 
 
 Much as I detest water in small quantities, (to 
 drink,) I have a hydromania in the way of lakes, 
 rivers, and waterfalls. It is, by much, the belle in 
 the family of the elements. Earth is never tolera 
 ble unless disguised in green. Air is so thin as only 
 to be visible when she borrows drapery of water ; 
 and Fire is so staringly bright as to be unpleasant 
 to the eyesight ; but water ! soft, pure, graceful 
 water ! there is no shape into which you can throw 
 her that she does not seem lovelier than before. 
 She can borrow nothing of her sisters. Earth has 
 no jewels in her lap so brilliant as her own spray- 
 pearls and emeralds ; Fire has no rubies like what 
 she steals from the sunset ; Air has no robes like 
 the grace of her fine-woven and ever-changing dra 
 pery of silver. A health (in wine !) to WATER ! 
 
 Who is there that did not love some stream in his 
 youth ? Who is there in whose vision of the past 
 there does not sparkle up, from every picture of 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 53 
 
 childhood, a spring or a rivulet woven through the 
 darkened and torn woof of first affections like a 
 thread of unchanged silver ? How do you interpret 
 the instinctive yearning with which you search for 
 the river-side or the fountain in every scene of na 
 ture the clinging unaware to the river s course 
 when a truant in the fields in 
 June the dull void you find in 
 every landscape of which it is 
 not the ornament and the cen 
 tre ? For myself, I hold with 
 the Greek : " Water is the first 
 principle of all things : we were 
 made from it, and we shall be 
 resolved into it." 
 
TRENTON FALLS 
 
 scription : 
 
 F subsequent visits to this loveliest 
 of spots, years after, the following 
 extracts from letters addressed to 
 the author s partner in the editor 
 ship of the Home Journal, give de- 
 
 IN the long cor 
 ridor of travel be 
 tween New York and Niaga 
 ra, this place, as you know, is a sort 
 of alcove aside a side-scene out of earshot of the 
 crowd a recess in a window whither you draw a 
 friend by the button for the sake of chit-chat at ease. 
 It is fifteen miles off at right angles from the gen 
 eral procession, and must be done in vehicle hired 
 at Utica for the purpose ; so that, costing more time 
 and money than a hundred miles in any other direc 
 tion, it is voted a " don t-pay" by promiscuous trav 
 ellers, and its frequentation sifted accordingly. In 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 55 
 
 gossiping with you about Trenton, therefore, I shall 
 do it with cozy pen, the crowd out of the way, and 
 we two snug and confidential. And as poets and 
 " literary men" are never poetical and literary for 
 their own amusement, you will expect no " fine- wri 
 ting," and none but a spontaneous mention of the 
 moon. 
 
 For the heavy price of two subscribers and a half 
 (explained by the editor to mean five dollars) I was 
 not driven fast enough hither to clear the dust, met 
 aphorically nor otherwise. I should recommend to 
 you, or to any who come after, to include in the 
 bargain for a conveyance, the time in which the 
 distance is to be done. It is a ride of no particular 
 interest. With no intimation whatever of the neigh 
 borhood of the Falls, we were driven up to the edge 
 of a wood, after fifteen miles of dust and rough jolt 
 ing, and landed at a house built for one man s wants 
 and belongings a house which the original forest 
 still cloaks and umbrellas, leaving only its front por 
 tico, like a shirt- ruffle, open to the day, and which I 
 pray, with all its homely inconveniences, may never 
 be supplanted by a hotel of the class entitled to 
 keep a gong. Oh, those chalky universes in rural 
 places ! What miles around, of green trees and 
 
56 
 
 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 tender grass, do they 
 blaze out of all recogni 
 tion with their unes- 
 capable white-paint aggravations of 
 ^ sunshine, and their stretch of unmiti 
 
 gated colonnade ! You may as well look at a star 
 with a blazing candle in your eye, as enjoy a land 
 scape in which one of these mountains of illuminated 
 clapboard sits a-glare. It is the only happy allevia 
 tion of hotels of this degree, that they usually em 
 ploy a band during the summer ; and, for a slight 
 consideration, you can hire the use of the long trum 
 pet during the day, and, through it, look at some 
 parts of the surrounding scenery with the house 
 shut out of the prospect. Is it not a partial legis 
 lation (apropos) that distinguishes between nose and 
 eye protecting the first against any offending nui 
 sance in public places, and leaving the latter and 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 5*7 
 
 more delicate organ to all the dangers of ophthalmia 
 by excessive white house ? At Sharon, for exam 
 ple, any man may start without precaution to take 
 a walk ; but a man who should turn to come back 
 without a pair of green goggles to shield his eyes 
 from the glare of the hotel as he approaches it from 
 any distance within three miles, must have let in 
 less rubbish than I at those two complaining gate 
 ways of the brain, and have less dread of being left 
 to the mercy of that merest of all beggars, the ear, 
 that can help itself to nothing. There are satirists 
 on the look-out for a national foible, and philanthro 
 pists on the look-out for a hobby will not some one 
 of these two classes entitle himself to the gratitude 
 of scholars, by writing or preaching down (or in 
 some way "doing brown") the American propensity 
 for white paint the excessive use of which, partic 
 ularly in this climate of intense sunshine, is an eye 
 sore to taste as well as to overworked optics ? 
 
 Mr. Moore, the landlord at Trenton, is proposing 
 to build a larger house for the accommodation of 
 the public, but this sermon upon our Mont Blanc 
 Hotels, with their Dover Cliff porticoes, is not aimed 
 at him. On subjects of taste he requires no coun 
 sel. The engravings a man hangs up in his parlors 
 
58 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 are a sufficient key to the degree of his refinement ; 
 and those which are visible through the soft demi- 
 jour of the apartments in this shaded retreat, might 
 all belong to a connoisseur in art, and are a fair ex 
 ponent of the proprietor s perception of the beauti 
 ful. In more than one way he is the right kind of 
 man for the Keeper of this loveliest of Nature s 
 bailiwicks of scenery. On the night of our arrival 
 I was lying awake, somewhere towards midnight, 
 and watching from my window the sifting of moon 
 light through the woods with the stirring of the 
 night air, when the low undertone of the Falls was 
 suddenly varied with a strain of exquisite music. It 
 seemed scarcely a tune, but, with the richest fulness 
 of volume, one lingering and dreamy note melted 
 into another, as if it were the voluntary of a player 
 who unconsciously touched the keys as an accompa 
 niment to his melancholy. What with the place 
 and time, and my ignorance that there was an in 
 strument of this character in the house, I was a 
 good deal surprised ; but before making up my 
 mind as to what it could be, I was " helped over 
 the stile" into dreamland, and made no inquiry till 
 the next morning at breakfast. The player was our 
 landlord, Mr. Moore, who, thus, when his guests are 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 59 
 
 gone to bed, steals an hour of leisure from the 
 night, and, upon a fine organ which stands in one 
 of the inner parlors of his house, plays with admira 
 ble taste and execution. 
 
 In an introduction of Mr. Moore to you as " mine 
 host," however, mention must needs be made of his 
 skill in an art meaner than music, yet far more es 
 sential the art of pie-making and pudding-ry. No 
 where (short of Felix s in the Passage Panorama at 
 Paris) will you eat such delicate and curious varie 
 ties of pastry as at the hostelry of romantic Trenton. 
 Those fingers that wander over the keys of the sol 
 emn organ with such poetical dreaminess, and turn 
 over a zoophyte or trilobite with appreciative cogni 
 zance, (for he is a mineralogist, too, and has col 
 lected a curious cabinet of specimens from the 
 gorges of the Falls,) are daily employed in prepar 
 ing, for the promiscuous " sweet tooth" of the pub 
 lic, pies worthy of being confined to Heliogabalus 
 and the ladies. The truth is, that, were human 
 allotments as nicely apportioned, and placed in as 
 respective an each-other-age as the ingredients of 
 Mr. Moore s pies, Mr. Moore would never have 
 learned the trade of a baker. Happy they, notwith 
 standing, to whom the world says, " Friend, go up 
 
60 
 
 c t 
 
 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 higher !" though in this case it would 
 be only in intellectual gradation, 
 as the calling of hotel-keeper is, in 
 our country, half a magistracy, from 
 the importance and responsibility of 
 its duties, and one which (by pub- 
 .?, lie consent daily strength 
 ening) demands and befits 
 a gentleman. Mr. Moore 
 (to finish 
 his biog- 
 Lg*. ,. raphy,) 
 
 came here twenty years ago, to enjoy the scenery 
 of which he had heard so much ; and, getting a se 
 vere fall in climbing the rocks, was for some time 
 confined to his bed at the hotel, then kept by Mr. 
 Sherman, of trout-fishing memory. The kind care 
 with which he was treated resulted in an attachment 
 for one of the daughters of the family, his present 
 wife ; he came back, wedded his fair nurse and 
 Trenton for the remainder of his life, and is now the 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 61 
 
 owner and host of the very loveliest scenery-haunt 
 in all our picturesque country. . 
 
 Of course you are impatient for me and my pen 
 to get to the Falls but that deep-down autopsy of 
 Nature, with its disembowellings of strata laid down 
 before the time of Adam, (according to Professor 
 Agassiz,) is a solemn place and topic, and I must 
 talk of such trifles as modern men and their abiding- 
 places, while my theme dates from this side of the 
 Deluge. I am not so sure that I shall say any 
 thing about the Falls in this letter. Let me see, 
 first, what else I have to tell you of the manner of 
 life at the Hotel. 
 
 As I said before, the company of strangers at 
 Trenton is made somewhat select, by the expense 
 and difficulty of access. Most, who come, stay two 
 or three days, but there are usually boarders here 
 for a longer time ; and, at present, three or four 
 families of most cultivated and charming people, 
 who form a nucleus of agreeable society to which 
 any attractive transient visitor easily attaches an 
 acquaintance. Nothing could well be more agreea 
 ble than the footing upon which these chance-met 
 residents and their daily accessions of new comers 
 pass their evenings and take strolls up the ravine 
 
62 
 
 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 together ; and, for those ^^ .-, 
 who love country air and 
 romantic rambles without 
 " dressing for dinner," or 
 waltzing by a band, this is 
 a "place to stay." These 
 are not the most numerous fre 
 quenters of Trenton, however. It 
 is a very popular place of 
 4 resort from ev- . 
 
 
 
 ery village within thirty miles ; and from ten in 
 the morning till four in the afternoon, there is gay 
 work with the country-girls and their beaux swing 
 ing under the trees, strolling about in the woods 
 near the house, bowling, singing, and dancing at 
 all of which (owing, perhaps, to a certain gipsy-ish 
 promiscuosity of my nature that I never could aris- 
 tocrify by the keeping of better company) I am 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 63 
 
 delighted to be at least a looker-on. The average 
 number of these visitors from the neighborhood is 
 forty or fifty a day, so that breakfast and tea are the 
 nearest approach to "dress meals" the dinner, 
 though profuse and dainty in its fare, being eaten in 
 what is commonly thought to be rather " mixed so 
 ciety." I am inclined to think that, from French 
 intermixture, or some other cause, the inhabitants 
 of this region are a little peculiar in their manners. 
 There is an unconsciousness or carelessness of others 
 observation and presence, that I have, hitherto, only 
 seen abroad. We have had songs, duetts, and cho 
 ruses sung here by village girls, within the last few 
 days, in a style that drew all in the house to listen 
 very admiringly ; and even the ladies all agree that 
 there have been extremely pretty girls, day after 
 day, among them. I find they are Fourierites to 
 the extent of common hair-brush and other personal 
 furniture walking into anybody s room in the house 
 for the temporary repairs which belles require on 
 their travels, and availing themselves of whatever 
 was therein, with a simplicity perhaps a little trans 
 cendental. I had obtained the extra privilege, for 
 myself, of a small dressing-room apart, in which I 
 presumed the various trowsers and other merely 
 
64 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 masculine belongings would be protective scarecrow 
 sufficient to keep out these daily female invaders ; 
 but, walking in yesterday, I found my combs and 
 brushes in active employ, and two very tidy-looking 
 girls making themselves at home without shutting 
 the door, and no more disturbed by my entree than 
 if I had been a large male fly. As friends were 
 waiting, I apologized for intruding long enough to 
 take a pair of boots from under their protection, but 
 my presence was evidently no interruption. One of 
 the girls (a tall figure, like a woman in two sylla 
 bles connected by a hyphen at the waist) continued 
 to look at the back of her dress in the (/lass, a la 
 Venus Callipige, and the other went on threading 
 her most prodigal chevelure with my doubtless very 
 embarrassed though unresisting hair-brush, and so 
 I abandoned the field, as I was of course expected 
 to do. As they did not shut the door after my re 
 treat, I presume that, by the code of morals and 
 manners hereabouts, a man s preoccupancy of a 
 room simply entitles him to come and go at pleas 
 ure the unoccupied portions and conveniences of 
 the apartment open, meantime, to feminine avail- 
 ment and partaking. I do not know that they 
 would go the length of " fraternizing" one s tooth- 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 65 
 
 brush, but, with the exception of locking up that 
 rather confidential article, I give in to the customs 
 of the country, and have ever since left open door 
 to the ladies which "severe trial" please mention, 
 if convenient, in my biography. 
 
 If you have ever " sung in the choir," my dear 
 General, you know how difficult it is to stop before 
 the organ leaves off, and, with the sound of running 
 water, which is the eternal accompaniment here, I 
 find one keeps doing whatever one is about drink 
 ing tea or drizzling ink with pertinacious contin 
 uance. Hence this very long letter. The atmo 
 sphere seems otherwise favorable to writing, how 
 ever, for the front of the house is covered with 
 inscriptions of wit and sentiment and with one spe 
 cimen of each I will make an effort to taper off into 
 an adieu. In a neat hand, one gentleman writes, 
 alongside of the front door 
 
 " Here we are, as you discover, 
 And now we part forever and ever." 
 
 Farther off to the left, between two blinds, a man 
 records the arrival of himself " and servant" below 
 which is the following inscription : 
 
 " G. Squires, wife, and two babies. No servant, 
 owing to the hardness of the times." 
 
66 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 And under this, again : 
 
 " G. W. Douglas and servant. No wife and ba 
 bies, owing to the hardness of the times." 
 
 With this instructive example of selective econo 
 my, I call your admiring attention to the forbear- 
 ingly practical character of this letter, written at 
 Trenton and in the full of the moon, and remain, my 
 dear Morris, 
 
 Yours, &c. 
 
 NE of the most embarrassing of di 
 lemmas, my dear Morris, in address- 
 ino- either talk or letter to a man, is 
 
 & 
 
 not to know the amount of his infor 
 mation on the subject in hand. I 
 am to write to you from Trenton a 
 place of romantic scenery and gay 
 resort, and easy enough to gossip 
 about, if that were all. But it is, 
 besides, the spot where prostrate Mother Earth has 
 been cleft open, to the spine, more neatly than any- 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 67 
 
 where else, and where the 
 "^ deposits on the edges of 
 her ribs show what she 
 had to digest, for centuries before 
 the creation of man. Here I am, 
 therefore, in this shirt-sleeve sum 
 mer noon as full of wonder and of 
 impressions of beauty as my poor brain- 
 jug can any way hold without spilling but, q very 
 before I pour out : how much knowledge of the 
 spot have you drank already, and do you want the 
 dregs at the bottom, or only the bubble at the brim ? 
 At what definite point of time (within a century or 
 so) shall we take up the news of this watering- 
 place, whose book of arrivals (legible at this mo 
 ment by the geologist) extends back to, certainly, 
 long before the planting of the forbidden tree, and, 
 possibly, to a date anterior to the fall of Lucifer ? 
 America (Agassiz and other men of science now 
 agree) was stocked and planted long before the 
 emergence of Europe and Asia from the bed of the 
 
68 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 ocean. It was an old continent when Eden first 
 came to light ; and if Adam s early education had 
 not been neglected, he would probably have made 
 the tour of the United States, (then "the old coun 
 try,") and taken Trenton in his way. Now, my 
 Morris, where shall we strike in, to the long line of 
 customers at this pleasant place ? Shall I talk to 
 you of the trilobites and zoophytes who came here 
 a quarter of an eternity ago, or of the French baron 
 and the son of an English statesman, who arrived 
 here to-day, Aug. 10, 1848 ? Will you have Tren 
 ton shown up in Adam and Eve s time, or in the 
 time of Baron de Trobriand and Mr. Stanley ? Of 
 this long-established theatre of Nature, shall I para 
 graph the " stock company" or the " stars ?" the 
 fossil remains of time out of mind, or the belles and 
 beaux who, at this particular moment of forever and 
 ever, arc flirting away the noon upon the portico ? 
 If we could " vote in" our own fossil representatives, 
 by the way choose the specimens of our race, I 
 mean, who are to be dug out and admired in future 
 ages there is a bride among the company below, 
 whose election would, I think, be unanimous, and 
 whose form (if petrified in marble without a flaw, 
 and brought to light a thousand years hence as a 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 69 
 
 zoolite of the eighteenth century) would assuredly 
 make those unborn geologists sigh not to have lived 
 
 in our days of woman. She is indeed a ch 
 
 but for further particulars see postscript. 
 
 I was here twenty years ago, but the fairest things 
 slip easiest out of the memory, and I had half for 
 gotten Trenton. To tell the truth, I was a little 
 ashamed to compare the faded and shabby picture 
 of it in my mind with the reality before me ; and if 
 the waters of the Falls had been, by any likelihood, 
 the same that flowed over when I was here be 
 fore, I should have looked them in the face, I think, 
 with something of the embarrassment with which 
 one meets, half-rememberingly, after years of sepa 
 ration, the ladies one has vowed to love forever. 
 How is it with you, my dear Morris? Have you, 
 as a general thing, been constant to waterfalls, <fec., 
 <fec., &c. ? 
 
 The peculiarity of Trenton Falls, I fancy, consists 
 a good deal in the space in which you are compelled 
 to see them. You walk a few steps from the hotel, 
 through the wood, and come to a descending stair 
 case of a hundred steps, the different bends of which 
 are so overgrown with wild shrubbery, that you 
 cannot see the ravine till you are fairly down upon 
 
70 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 its rocky floor. Your path hence, up to the first 
 Fall, is along a ledge cut out of the base of the cliff 
 that overhangs the torrent ; and when you get to 
 the foot of the descending sheet, you find yourself 
 in very close quarters with a cataract rocky walls 
 all round you and the appreciation of power and 
 magnitude, perhaps, somewhat heightened by the 
 confinement of the place as a man would have a 
 much more realizing sense of a live lion, shut up 
 with him in a basement parlor, than he would of the 
 same object seen from an elevated and distant point 
 of view. 
 
 The usual walk (through this deep cave open at 
 the top) is about half a mile in length, and its al 
 most subterranean river, in that distance, plunges 
 over four precipices in exceedingly beautiful cas 
 cades. On the successive rocky terraces between 
 the Falls, the torrent takes every variety of rapids 
 and whirlpools ; and, perhaps, in all the scenery of 
 the Avorld, there is no river, which, in the same 
 space, presents so many of the various shapes and 
 beauties of running and falling water. The Indian 
 name of the stream (the Kanata, which means the 
 amber river] expresses one of its peculiarities, and, 
 probably from the depth of shade cast by the two 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 71 
 
 dark and overhanging walls twixt which it flows, 
 the water is everywhere of a peculiarly rich lustre 
 and color, and, in the edges of one or two of the 
 cascades, as yellow as gold. Artists, in drawing this 
 river, fail, somehow, in giving the impression of deep- 
 down-itude which is produced by the close approach 
 of the two lofty walls of rock, capped by the over- 
 leaning woods, and with the sky apparently resting, 
 like a ceiling, upon the leafy architraves. It con 
 veys, somehow, the effect of a s 6fe/-natural river 
 on a different level, altogether, from our common 
 and above-ground water-courses. If there were 
 truly, as the poets say figuratively, " worlds within 
 worlds," this would look as if an earthquake had 
 cracked open the outer globe, and exposed, through 
 the yawning fissure, one of the rivers of the globe 
 below the usual under-ground level of "down 
 among the dead men" being, as you walk upon its 
 banks, between you and the daylight. 
 
 Considering the amount of surprise and pleasure 
 which one feels in a walk up the ravine at Trenton, 
 it is remarkable how little one finds to say about it, 
 the day after. Is it that mere scenery, without his 
 tory, is enjoyable without being suggestive, or, amid 
 the tumult of the rushing torrent at one s feet, is the 
 
72 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 milk of thought too much agitated for the cream to 
 rise ? I fancied yesterday, as I rested on the soft 
 est rock I could find at the upper end of the ravine, 
 that I should tumble you out a letter to-day, with 
 the ideas pitching forth like saw-logs over a water 
 fall ; but my memory has nothing in it to-day but 
 the rocks and rapids it took in the talent wrapped 
 in its napkin of delight remaining in unimproved 
 statu-qtio-sity. One certainly gets the impression, 
 while the sight and hearing are so overwhelmed, 
 that one s mind is famously at work, and that we 
 shall hear from it to-morrow ; but it is Jean Paul, I 
 think, who says that "the mill makes the most 
 noise when there is no grist in the hopper." I have 
 a couple more days to stay here, however, and, 
 meantime, I will leave these first impressions in in 
 cubation. Look for one more letter from Trenton, 
 therefore, for which I will borrow an hour or two on 
 the morning of leaving. 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 ft 
 
 HAT wry " American swallow," 
 which, the zoologists tell us, " de 
 vours fifteen hundred caterpillars a 
 week, and performs every action on 
 the wing except incubation and sleeping," 
 should establish a depot for the sale of 
 his feathers for with the quill of no 
 slower bird can a man comfortably write, in the act 
 of mental digestion and during bodily travel. If 
 you find my style jerk-y and abrupt, and my ad 
 joining chambers of thought, as they say in conch- 
 ology, without " the connecting siphuncle" which 
 should make the transition as velvet-y to the read 
 er s foot as the carpet from a boudoir to a lady s 
 chamber, let the defects rather make you wonder 
 that I wrote at all than that I wrote no better. To 
 feel, and tell of it while you feel, is, (besides,) as 
 lovers and writers alike know, very difficult busi 
 ness notwithstanding Shakspeare s doctrine that 
 " every time serves for the matter that is then born 
 in it." And so for another of those fatal too-quick- 
 
74 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 ities, for all manner of which, it seems to me, life is 
 full of irresistible inducement. 
 
 It is not often, my dear Morris, that we have 
 found occasion to complain of woman s performance 
 of her part as the sex ornamental. In most times 
 and places, she refreshingly varies the dulness of 
 the picture of life, dressing for her place as appro 
 priately as do the lilies and roses, and deserving, 
 like them, (of course,) to toil not, neither should she 
 spin. To be ornamental is to be useful enough. 
 Charmingly as women become most situations in 
 which we see them, however, they, by the present 
 fashion, dress most tamely for the places where 
 striking costume is most needed. I felt this quite 
 sensibly yesterday. From my seat under a tree, 
 where I dreamed away the delicious summer fore 
 noon, I had the range of the ravine ; and everybody 
 who passed through made part of my landscape, 
 for, at least, half an hour of their climbings and 
 hal tings. You know how much any romantic scene 
 is heightened in its effect by human figures. Every 
 new group changed and embellished the glorious 
 combination of rock, foliage, and water below me, 
 and I studied their dresses and attitudes as you 
 would criticise them in a picture. The men, with 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 -.^4t : 
 
 their two sticks of legs, and ;; 
 angular hats, looked abominably, of 
 course. I was glad when they were 
 out of the perspective. But the ladies 
 of each party, with their flowing skirts, 
 veils lifted by the wind, picturesque 
 bonnets and parasols, were charming 
 outlines as heighteners to the effect, and 
 would have been all that was wanted 
 to render it perfect only that 
 they were clad in the colors of 
 
 colors of t 
 
 in slatft- i 
 
 the rock behind them in slate 
 colored riding- dresses, Avithout a 
 
 single exception, 
 and in bonnets and 
 
76 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 ribbons adapted, with the same economy, to the 
 dust of the road. In the course of the morning, 
 one lady came along, apparently an invalid, resting 
 at every spot where she could find a seat, and for 
 her use, the gentleman who was with her carried a 
 crimson shawl, flung over his shoulder. You would 
 need to be an artist to understand how much that 
 one shawl embellished the scene. It concentrated 
 the light of the whole ravine, and though there were 
 parties of pretty girls above and below, and new 
 comers every two or three minutes, I found my eye 
 
 fastened to this red shawl and its immediate neio-h- 
 
 t> 
 
 borhood, during the whole time of its remaining 
 within view. I made as vigorous a vow as the 
 heavenly languor of the atmosphere would sustain, 
 to address, through the Home Journal, an appeal to 
 the ladies of our land of beauty, imploring them to 
 carry, at least, a scarf over the arm, white, red, or 
 blue, when they mingle in the landscapes of our 
 romantic resorts thus supplying all that is wanted 
 to such glorious pictures as Trenton and Niagara ; 
 while, at the same time, they thus, artistically as 
 well as justly, become the luminous centre to which 
 the remainder of the scene is entirely subservient. 
 Do you not see, Morris, that if a lady in a blue 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 77 
 
 travelling-habit had chanced to have passed up the 
 ravine during my look-out from this point of per 
 spective, Trenton Falls would have seemed to me to 
 be only an enhancement of her figure and appear 
 ance secondary altogether to her primary and con 
 centrating impression on the eye ? Ladies should 
 avail themselves of such opportunities, even at some 
 more pains and expense ; for, of all the chance ob 
 stacles to appreciation of female beauty or style, the 
 want of suitable background and surroundings is 
 the most frequent and effectual. 
 
 And, apropos of seeing fine things to advantage, 
 why could not you, my fine Brigadier, give us a 
 tableaux vivant at Trenton ordering some of your 
 companies of red-coats to campaign it for a week at 
 the Falls, and let us see how the " war of waters" 
 would look, thundering down upon the rocks amid 
 flags and uniforms ? Why, it would be one of the 
 most brilliant shows possible to contrive a putting 
 of Nature into holiday costume, as it were ; and I 
 scarce know which would more embellish the other, 
 brigade or cataract. On the platform above each 
 of the four Falls there is room enough to encamp 
 two or three companies in tents ; and, fancy looking 
 down the gorge from the summit of the cliffs above, 
 
78 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 and seeing these successive terraces, with waterfall 
 and military array, precipices and wild forest, in 
 picturesque and magnificent combination ! The fact 
 is, my sodger, that the usual habiliments of mankind 
 are made to harmonize with brick walls and dirty 
 streets, and when we come into Nature s gorgeous 
 palaces of scenery, looking the " forked radishes" 
 that we are, there is no resisting the conviction that 
 we are either wofully out of place, or not dressed 
 with suitable regard to the local pomp and circum 
 stance. Suggest to our friend Beebe to invent, at 
 least, a sombrero, and advertise it as the thing which 
 etiquette requires should be worn at Niagara and 
 Trenton, instead of a hat with petty rirn. There 
 would be an obvious propriety in the fashion. Where 
 Nature appears in her waterfall epaulettes, armor 
 of rocks, and dancing plumes of foliage, surely there 
 should be some manner of corresponding toggery 
 wherewith to wait upon her. 
 
 We have had the full of the moon and a cloudless 
 sky for the last two or three nights, and of course 
 we have walked the ravine till the " small hours," 
 seeing with wonder the transforming effects of moon 
 light and its black shadows on the Falls and preci 
 pices. I have no idea (you will be glad to know) 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 79 
 
 of trying to reproduce these sublimities on paper 
 at least not with my travelling stock of verbs and 
 adjectives. To "sandwich the moon in a muffin," 
 one must have time and a ladder of dictionaries. 
 But one or two effects struck me which perhaps are 
 worth briefly naming, and I will throw into the lot 
 a poetical figure, which you may use in your next 
 song giving credit to your " distinguished fellow- 
 citizen," the Moon, for the original suggestion. 
 
 The fourth Fall (or the one which is flanked by 
 the ruins of a saw-mill) is perhaps a hundred feet 
 across ; and its curve over the upper rock and its 
 break upon the lower one, form two parallel lines, 
 the water everywhere falling the same distance with 
 the evenness of an artificial cascade. The stream 
 not being very full just now, it came over, in twenty 
 or thirty places, thicker than elsewhere ; and the 
 effect, from a distance, as the moonlight lay full 
 upon it, was that of twenty or thirty immovable 
 marble columns, connected by transparent curtains 
 of falling lace, and with bases in imitation of foam. 
 Now it struck me that this might suggest a new and 
 fanciful order of architecture, suitable at least to 
 the structure of green-houses, the glass roofs of 
 which are curved over and slope to the ground with 
 
80 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 very much tlie contour of a waterfall. Please men 
 tion this to Downing, the next time you meet him 
 on board the Thomas Powell, arid he ll mention it 
 (for the use of some happy, extravagant dog, who 
 can afford a whim or so) in his next book on Rural 
 Architecture. 
 
 Subterranean as this foaming river looks by day, 
 it looks like a river in cloud-land by night. The 
 side of the ravine which is in shadow, is one undis- 
 tinguishable mass of black, with its wavy upper edge 
 in strong relief against the sky, and, as the foaming 
 stream catches the light from the opposite and moon 
 lit side, it is outlined distinctly on its bed of dark 
 ness, and seems winding its way between hills of 
 clouds, half black, half luminous. Below, where all 
 is deep shadow except the river, you might fancy it 
 a silver mine laid open to your view amid subterra 
 nean darkness by the wand of an enchanter, or (if 
 you prefer a military trope, my dear General) a 
 long white plume laid lengthwise between the ridges 
 of a cocked hat. 
 
 And now for the poetical similitude I promised 
 you please put yourself opposite the biggest cat 
 aract of all, the lowest one, where the whole body 
 of the river is forced into the narrowing approach to 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 81 
 
 a precipice, and pitches into the foamy gulf below, 
 like the overthrow of Lucifer and his hosts. From 
 one cause and another, this is the angriest downfall 
 of waters possible ; and the rock, over which it 
 tumbles, here makes a curve, and comes round with 
 a battlemented projection, looking the cataract full 
 in the face. As we stood gazing at this, last night, 
 a little after midnight, the moon threw the shadow 
 of the rock, slantwise, across the face of the Fall. 
 I found myself insensibly watching to see whether 
 the delicate outline of this shadow would not vary. 
 There it lay, still as the shade of a church-window 
 across a marble slab on the wall, drawing its fine 
 line over the most phrensied tumult of the lashed 
 and agonized waters, and dividing whatever leaped 
 across it, foam, spray, or driving mist, with invaria 
 ble truthfulness to the rock that lay behind. Now, 
 my song-maker, if you ever have a great man to 
 make famous a hero who unflinchingly represents 
 a great principle amid the raging opposition, hatred, 
 and malice of mankind there is your similitude ! 
 Calm as the shadow of a rock across the foam of a 
 cataract, would be a neat thing to " salt down" for 
 Calhoun or Van Buren (whichever holds out best 
 or first wants it) and it would go off, in one of 
 
82 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 your speeches, like a Paixhan gun. I tied a knot 
 in the end of my cravat, standing at the Fall, to re 
 member it for you. 
 
 Baron de Trobriand has been here for the last day 
 or two, as I mentioned in my last letter. I had 
 been reading, on the road, a French novel, of which 
 he is the author, (" Les Gentils hommes de I Quest,") 
 and I am amused to see how he carries out, in his 
 impulsive and enthusiastic Avay of enjoying scenery, 
 the impression you get of his character from his 
 buoyant and brilliant style of writing. We have 
 not seen him at a meal since he has been here. 
 After one look at the Falls, he came back and made 
 a foray upon the larder, got a tin kettle in which he 
 packed the simple provender he might want, and 
 was off with his portfolio to sketch and ramble out 
 the day, impatient alike of the restraints of meals or 
 companions. He returns at night with his slight 
 and elegant features burnt with the sun, wet to the 
 knees with wading the rapids, and quite overdone 
 with fatigue, and rejoins the gay but more leisurely 
 and luxurious party with which he travels. Look 
 ing down from one of the cliffs yesterday afternoon, 
 I saw him hard at work, ankle- deep in water, bring 
 ing pieces of rock and building a causeway across 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 83 
 
 the shallows of the stream, to induce the ladies to 
 come to the edge of the Falls, otherwise inaccessible. 
 He has made one or two charming sketches of the 
 ravine, being, as you know, an admirable artist. 
 There is an infusion of joyousness and impulse, as 
 well as of genius, in the noble blood of this gentle 
 man who has come to live among us ; and I trust 
 that, with the increase of our already large French 
 j ^ population, he will think it worth 
 
 while to graft himself on our pe 
 riodical literature, and give it an 
 effervescence that it needs. You 
 remember his gay critiques of the 
 Opera last winter. 
 
 I meant to have described 
 to you the path through the 
 forest, along the edge of the 
 cliff overhanging 
 the ravine its 
 
8-i TRENTON FALLS 
 
 beauty by moonlight, with its fire-fly lamps and lo 
 cust hymns the lunar rainbow visible from one of 
 its eyries and other stuff for poetry with which I 
 mentally filled my pockets in strolling about ; but 
 my letter is long, and I have still an addition to 
 make to it, for the use of visitors to Trenton. Chan 
 cing to have taken with me a new Poem, " Niagara," 
 by Rev. C. H, A. BULKLEY, I found " my sentiments 
 better expressed" in some of his thoughts about 
 water-courses, and as other people may like to have 
 their thinking done for them, as well as I, I simply 
 copy them out, and so end my letter. He is a man 
 of thought, as you see, by the way, and 
 the book is worth reading throughout. ) 
 
 See postscript, and believe me, 
 Yours, &c., 
 
 ->::&, 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 85 
 
 P. S. Thus speculates Mr. Bulkley : 
 
 Ix thy hoarse strains is heard the desolate wail 
 
 Of streams unnumbered wandering far away 
 
 From mountain homes, where, neath the shady rocks, 
 
 Their parent springs gave them a peaceful birth ; 
 
 In one united voice their grief resounds, 
 
 Mourning the loss of pensive woods and vales, 
 
 No more to greet their musical return ; 
 
 Downward, clasped tremblingly in wild embrace, 
 
 They headlong plunge and writhe in agony ; 
 
 Upward their deep groan goes to hill and glen, 
 
 Till, mingled in despair, seaward they roll, 
 
 To swell the caves of Ocean never full, 
 
 Repeating loudly all along his shore, 
 
 In the sad moanings of the heaving surf, 
 
 Like this, the anguish of their ebbing life : 
 
 " Oh, wood-crowned hills ! in whose cool grottoes born, 
 
 "We leaped to light with chimes of early spring, 
 
 And down your deep ravines and shady sides, 
 
 Flowed with the music of the youthful heart ; 
 
 "We long, with outstretched arms and mournful plaint, 
 
 To mount your heights again, and play in love 
 
 "With the green children of the forest home ; 
 
 To start in silence from the fissured rock, 
 
 And roll in peace along your verdant cheeks ; 
 
 Oh ! when, ye listening hills, shall we return, 
 
 And bubble up again within your hearts ? 
 
 Ye sun-clad vales ! that slept in light unchecked, 
 
 With visions beauteous as an infant s dream, 
 
86 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 How joyously along thy banks we played, 
 
 Where yellow moccasins and the wild-rose grew, 
 
 Like maidens dancing in the spring-time gay, 
 
 With tinkling feet upon the dewy lawn ! 
 
 Oh, blessed vales ! shall we behold again 
 
 Your peaceful images and quiet slopes, 
 
 The guardian tenants of your pathless home, 
 
 Or breathe the stillness of your fragrant air ? 
 
 Ah ! how we yearn to bend our footsteps back. 
 
 And tread your devious pathways once agaiu ! 
 
 How fiercely, yet, alas ! how vainly now, 
 
 We beat against the stern imprisoning shore, 
 
 That stretches out its everlasting bar, 
 
 Foe to return, defying every siege ! 
 
 Ye wandering spirits of the land-wind, hear ! 
 
 We mourn for you whom oft we joyful bore 
 
 On loving bosoms where your footsteps played ; 
 
 Say, never more shall we in your embrace 
 
 Be held, nor in your unseen presence sport ? 
 
 Come, ye blest breathings of the earth, come now, 
 
 From glen and grove, and waft us back again 
 
 To those sweet play -grounds of our infant days. 
 
 Ye mountains ! looking down from star-crowned heights, 
 
 Whose guardian summits watched us in our mirth, 
 
 As parents eye the life-springs of their hearts ; 
 
 Was it not joy for us to dwell beneath 
 
 Your shadows, resting from the noonday heat ? 
 
 Ay ! it was bliss to cool our sun-struck tide 
 
 Beneath th umbrageous shelter of your woods ! 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 87 
 
 To you, to leaf-clad hills, to shining vales, 
 
 Must we now speak that bitter word, Farewell ? 
 
 Must we the strife of fierce leviathans 
 
 Endure, and ever bear th oppressive weight 
 
 Of laden barks, that break the yielding wave ? 
 
 Must we be driven and scourged like heartless slaves, 
 
 By the keen lashes of the tempest s hand, 
 
 Or tremble at the terror of his frown ? 
 
 We would that once again the heated lip 
 
 Of the lone hunter or the hard-pressed stag, 
 
 Of school-boy loosed from Wisdom s serious look, 
 
 Or herds that stood midway within the tide, 
 
 Might draw refreshing life from our cool fonts ; 
 
 We would that some sweet maiden might once more, 
 
 With her reflected image glassed below, 
 
 Smooth her dishevelled locks her love to meet ; 
 
 Oh ! that again we might in rapture hear 
 
 Those heart-warm words that gushed with new-born Lopes, 
 
 And loving promises from blended hearts, 
 
 Repeated in the babblings of our wave ; 
 
 That we might see those fond embraces, full 
 
 Of Life s deep rapture unalloyed and bright ! 
 
 We miss the cottage by the emerald bank, 
 
 Where merry voices bubbled with our springs, 
 
 And tones of prayer were heard at vesper-time. 
 
 We see not now the Poet with his book, 
 
 Wrapt in the ecstasy of thought, alone 
 
 And on the grassy slope reclined at length, 
 
 Anon beholding Nature and his page, 
 
88 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 To form anew from her loved images 
 And sentiments of other hearts, combined 
 With those begotten in his busy soul, 
 A bright creation for the wondering world. 
 Ah ! not the least, we miss the errant lad 
 With hook and line of rude construction formed, 
 And writhing worm to lure the simple trout ; 
 And the light skip of footless keels that sped 
 With flying sail or paddle o er our tide, 
 By mirthful songs or measured shouts well-timed. 
 Whither, ah ! whither shall we look to find 
 A pathway opened for our backward step ? 
 0, Sun ! thou only helper in our woe, 
 Come with thy beams and gently draw us up ; 
 Let clouds that follow in thy regal train, 
 Bend at thy word from their ethereal flight, 
 And bear us in their bosoms to our homes. 
 Come, ere in anguish, as we beat the beach, 
 To drive the sand or break the heartless rock, 
 And dig our pathway back again to joy, 
 We yield to Ocean s power our ebbing hearts, 
 And all despairing die along the shore !" 
 Alas ! how vain their cry ! tis like the prayer 
 Of disappointed Age that asks for youth ! 
 Of souls that rushed down Life s declivities, 
 In all the madness of their heated hopes ; 
 Man s heart-wrung wishes fall back on our ears, 
 Like the deep moanings of returnlcss streams ! 
 ****** 
 
ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 SO 
 
 conclusion, we regret to say that 
 J we can offer neither clue nor guide to 
 the innumerable thoughts that have 
 been suggested to the glowing imagi 
 nations oi tue many remarkable and gifted persons 
 who have visited Trenton. The best minds of the 
 country have been subjected to these stirring and 
 sweet influences, and delicious memories have been 
 laid up, with brilliant fancies to keep them company, 
 and we know not where to point to these unseen 
 but most valuable treasures. Still, they are not 
 lost. Bright visions of scenery, and the deep 
 thoughts they awaken, are always well turned to 
 account. Some are used in oratory and some in 
 poetry, some in the pulpit and some in love, some 
 in books and some to make homes happy and so, 
 Trenton influences are distributed and do good, even 
 though we cannot trace them from where they 
 spring. ; But still, it is interesting to know who has 
 been here and particularly, what celebrities, that 
 
90 TRENTON FALLS 
 
 have since passed away and how the Falls impressed 
 them, and what they chanced to express. Of these 
 points of interest, Mr. Moore s memory is a store 
 house ; and though we have in vain urged him to 
 make a record of his mementoes of the distinguished 
 guests he has incidentally mentioned to us,* he is 
 a walking suppression of a delightful volume of 
 souvenirs of Trenton and its visitors. We hope he 
 may yet give it to print. 
 
 With the new plank road, the enlargements and 
 improvements of the Hotel, and Mr. Moore, the pro 
 prietor s, long-cherished interest in the place, TREN 
 TON FALLS have now become quite the most delight 
 ful of the romantic resorts of the country, and there 
 is certainly no spot where so many advantages are 
 offered to the lovers of seclusion and nature. 
 
 * Among others, Charming, Bishop Hobart, De Witt Clinton, 
 John Quincy Adams, Chancellor Kent, Judge Story, Dr. Sam 
 uel Mitchell, Edmund Kean, arid Joseph Bonaparte. 
 
PRINCIPAL ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 SHERMAN FALL Frontispiece. 
 
 VILLAGE FALL PAGE 12 
 
 HIGH 
 
 GH FALLS, ) 
 Front view, ) 
 
 HIGH FALLS, 
 
 Looking down the ravine, 
 
 CASCADE OF THE ALHAMBRA .......................... 24 
 
 VIEW FROM CARMICHAEL S POINT, OF UPPER PART OF HIGH 
 
 FALL, THE MILL-DAM FALL IN THE DISTANCE ........... 32 
 
 SCENE NEAR THE ROCKY HEART ....................... 34 
 
 MILL-DAM FALL ........................ ........... 78 
 
 HOTEL (WEST WING) ................................ 90 
 
GEORGE P. PUTNAM S NEW PUBLICATIONS. 
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