American Notes for General Circulation

by Dickens, Chales

  that there was no danger of his falling asleep, for every now and

  then a wheel would strike against an unseen stump with such a jerk,

  that he was fain to hold on pretty tight and pretty quick, to keep

  himself upon the box. Nor was there any reason to dread the least

  danger from furious driving, inasmuch as over that broken ground

  the horses had enough to do to walk; as to shying, there was no

  room for that; and a herd of wild elephants could not have run away

  in such a wood, with such a coach at their heels. So we stumbled

  along, quite satisfied.

  These stumps of trees are a curious feature in American travelling.

  The varying illusions they present to the unaccustomed eye as it

  grows dark, are quite astonishing in their number and reality.

  Now, there is a Grecian urn erected in the centre of a lonely

  field; now there is a woman weeping at a tomb; now a very

  commonplace old gentleman in a white waistcoat, with a thumb thrust

  into each arm-hole of his coat; now a student poring on a book; now

  a crouching negro; now, a horse, a dog, a cannon, an armed man; a

  hunch-back throwing off his cloak and stepping forth into the

  light. They were often as entertaining to me as so many glasses in

  a magic lantern, and never took their shapes at my bidding, but

  seemed to force themselves upon me, whether I would or no; and

  strange to say, I sometimes recognised in them counterparts of

  figures once familiar to me in pictures attached to childish books,

  Page 131

  Dickens, Charles - American Notes for General Circulation

  forgotten long ago.

  It soon became too dark, however, even for this amusement, and the

  trees were so close together that their dry branches rattled

  against the coach on either side, and obliged us all to keep our

  heads within. It lightened too, for three whole hours; each flash

  being very bright, and blue, and long; and as the vivid streaks

  came darting in among the crowded branches, and the thunder rolled

  gloomily above the tree tops, one could scarcely help thinking that

  there were better neighbourhoods at such a time than thick woods

  afforded.

  At length, between ten and eleven o'clock at night, a few feeble

  lights appeared in the distance, and Upper Sandusky, an Indian

  village, where we were to stay till morning, lay before us.

  They were gone to bed at the log Inn, which was the only house of

  entertainment in the place, but soon answered to our knocking, and

  got some tea for us in a sort of kitchen or common room, tapestried

  with old newspapers, pasted against the wall. The bed-chamber to

  which my wife and I were shown, was a large, low, ghostly room;

  with a quantity of withered branches on the hearth, and two doors

  without any fastening, opposite to each other, both opening on the

  black night and wild country, and so contrived, that one of them

  always blew the other open: a novelty in domestic architecture,

  which I do not remember to have seen before, and which I was

  somewhat disconcerted to have forced on my attention after getting

  into bed, as I had a considerable sum in gold for our travelling

  expenses, in my dressing-case. Some of the luggage, however, piled

  against the panels, soon settled this difficulty, and my sleep

  would not have been very much affected that night, I believe,

  though it had failed to do so.

  My Boston friend climbed up to bed, somewhere in the roof, where

  another guest was already snoring hugely. But being bitten beyond

  his power of endurance, he turned out again, and fled for shelter

  to the coach, which was airing itself in front of the house. This

  was not a very politic step, as it turned out; for the pigs

  scenting him, and looking upon the coach as a kind of pie with some

  manner of meat inside, grunted round it so hideously, that he was

  afraid to come out again, and lay there shivering, till morning.

  Nor was it possible to warm him, when he did come out, by means of

  a glass of brandy: for in Indian villages, the legislature, with a

  very good and wise intention, forbids the sale of spirits by tavern

  keepers. The precaution, however, is quite inefficacious, for the

  Indians never fail to procure liquor of a worse kind, at a dearer

  price, from travelling pedlars.

  It is a settlement of the Wyandot Indians who inhabit this place.

  Among the company at breakfast was a mild old gentleman, who had

  been for many years employed by the United States Government in

  conducting negotiations with the Indians, and who had just

  concluded a treaty with these people by which they bound

  themselves, in consideration of a certain annual sum, to remove

  next year to some land provided for them, west of the Mississippi,

  and a little way beyond St. Louis. He gave me a moving account of

  their strong attachment to the familiar scenes of their infancy,

  and in particular to the burial-places of their kindred; and of

  their great reluctance to leave them. He had witnessed many such

  removals, and always with pain, though he knew that they departed

  for their own good. The question whether this tribe should go or

  stay, had been discussed among them a day or two before, in a hut

  erected for the purpose, the logs of which still lay upon the

  ground before the inn. When the speaking was done, the ayes and

  Page 132

  Dickens, Charles - American Notes for General Circulation

  noes were ranged on opposite sides, and every male adult voted in

  his turn. The moment the result was known, the minority (a large

  one) cheerfully yielded to the rest, and withdrew all kind of

  opposition.

  We met some of these poor Indians afterwards, riding on shaggy

  ponies. They were so like the meaner sort of gipsies, that if I

  could have seen any of them in England, I should have concluded, as

  a matter of course, that they belonged to that wandering and

  restless people.

  Leaving this town directly after breakfast, we pushed forward

  again, over a rather worse road than yesterday, if possible, and

  arrived about noon at Tiffin, where we parted with the extra. At

  two o'clock we took the railroad; the travelling on which was very

  slow, its construction being indifferent, and the ground wet and

  marshy; and arrived at Sandusky in time to dine that evening. We

  put up at a comfortable little hotel on the brink of Lake Erie, lay

  there that night, and had no choice but to wait there next day,

  until a steamboat bound for Buffalo appeared. The town, which was

  sluggish and uninteresting enough, was something like the back of

  an English watering-place, out of the season.

  Our host, who was very attentive and anxious to make us

  comfortable, was a handsome middle-aged man, who had come to this

  town from New England, in which part of the country he was

  'raised.' When I say that he constantly walked in and out of the

  room with his hat on; and stopped to converse in the same free-andeasy

  state; and lay down on our sofa, and pulled his newspaper out

  of his pocket, and read it at his ease; I
merely mention these

  traits as characteristic of the country: not at all as being

  matter of complaint, or as having been disagreeable to me. I

  should undoubtedly be offended by such proceedings at home, because

  there they are not the custom, and where they are not, they would

  be impertinencies; but in America, the only desire of a goodnatured

  fellow of this kind, is to treat his guests hospitably and

  well; and I had no more right, and I can truly say no more

  disposition, to measure his conduct by our English rule and

  standard, than I had to quarrel with him for not being of the exact

  stature which would qualify him for admission into the Queen's

  grenadier guards. As little inclination had I to find fault with a

  funny old lady who was an upper domestic in this establishment, and

  who, when she came to wait upon us at any meal, sat herself down

  comfortably in the most convenient chair, and producing a large pin

  to pick her teeth with, remained performing that ceremony, and

  steadfastly regarding us meanwhile with much gravity and composure

  (now and then pressing us to eat a little more), until it was time

  to clear away. It was enough for us, that whatever we wished done

  was done with great civility and readiness, and a desire to oblige,

  not only here, but everywhere else; and that all our wants were, in

  general, zealously anticipated.

  We were taking an early dinner at this house, on the day after our

  arrival, which was Sunday, when a steamboat came in sight, and

  presently touched at the wharf. As she proved to be on her way to

  Buffalo, we hurried on board with all speed, and soon left Sandusky

  far behind us.

  She was a large vessel of five hundred tons, and handsomely fitted

  up, though with high-pressure engines; which always conveyed that

  kind of feeling to me, which I should be likely to experience, I

  think, if I had lodgings on the first-floor of a powder-mill. She

  was laden with flour, some casks of which commodity were stored

  upon the deck. The captain coming up to have a little

  Page 133

  Dickens, Charles - American Notes for General Circulation

  conversation, and to introduce a friend, seated himself astride of

  one of these barrels, like a Bacchus of private life; and pulling a

  great clasp-knife out of his pocket, began to 'whittle' it as he

  talked, by paring thin slices off the edges. And he whittled with

  such industry and hearty good will, that but for his being called

  away very soon, it must have disappeared bodily, and left nothing

  in its place but grist and shavings.

  After calling at one or two flat places, with low dams stretching

  out into the lake, whereon were stumpy lighthouses, like windmills

  without sails, the whole looking like a Dutch vignette, we came at

  midnight to Cleveland, where we lay all night, and until nine

  o'clock next morning.

  I entertained quite a curiosity in reference to this place, from

  having seen at Sandusky a specimen of its literature in the shape

  of a newspaper, which was very strong indeed upon the subject of

  Lord Ashburton's recent arrival at Washington, to adjust the points

  in dispute between the United States Government and Great Britain:

  informing its readers that as America had 'whipped' England in her

  infancy, and whipped her again in her youth, so it was clearly

  necessary that she must whip her once again in her maturity; and

  pledging its credit to all True Americans, that if Mr. Webster did

  his duty in the approaching negotiations, and sent the English Lord

  home again in double quick time, they should, within two years,

  sing 'Yankee Doodle in Hyde Park, and Hail Columbia in the scarlet

  courts of Westminster!' I found it a pretty town, and had the

  satisfaction of beholding the outside of the office of the journal

  from which I have just quoted. I did not enjoy the delight of

  seeing the wit who indited the paragraph in question, but I have no

  doubt he is a prodigious man in his way, and held in high repute by

  a select circle.

  There was a gentleman on board, to whom, as I unintentionally

  learned through the thin partition which divided our state-room

  from the cabin in which he and his wife conversed together, I was

  unwittingly the occasion of very great uneasiness. I don't know

  why or wherefore, but I appeared to run in his mind perpetually,

  and to dissatisfy him very much. First of all I heard him say:

  and the most ludicrous part of the business was, that he said it in

  my very ear, and could not have communicated more directly with me,

  if he had leaned upon my shoulder, and whispered me: 'Boz is on

  board still, my dear.' After a considerable pause, he added,

  complainingly, 'Boz keeps himself very close;' which was true

  enough, for I was not very well, and was lying down, with a book.

  I thought he had done with me after this, but I was deceived; for a

  long interval having elapsed, during which I imagine him to have

  been turning restlessly from side to side, and trying to go to

  sleep; he broke out again, with 'I suppose THAT Boz will be writing

  a book by-and-by, and putting all our names in it!' at which

  imaginary consequence of being on board a boat with Boz, he

  groaned, and became silent.

  We called at the town of Erie, at eight o'clock that night, and lay

  there an hour. Between five and six next morning, we arrived at

  Buffalo, where we breakfasted; and being too near the Great Falls

  to wait patiently anywhere else, we set off by the train, the same

  morning at nine o'clock, to Niagara.

  It was a miserable day; chilly and raw; a damp mist falling; and

  the trees in that northern region quite bare and wintry. Whenever

  the train halted, I listened for the roar; and was constantly

  straining my eyes in the direction where I knew the Falls must be,

  from seeing the river rolling on towards them; every moment

  Page 134

  Dickens, Charles - American Notes for General Circulation

  expecting to behold the spray. Within a few minutes of our

  stopping, not before, I saw two great white clouds rising up slowly

  and majestically from the depths of the earth. That was all. At

  length we alighted: and then for the first time, I heard the

  mighty rush of water, and felt the ground tremble underneath my

  feet.

  The bank is very steep, and was slippery with rain, and half-melted

  ice. I hardly know how I got down, but I was soon at the bottom,

  and climbing, with two English officers who were crossing and had

  joined me, over some broken rocks, deafened by the noise, halfblinded

  by the spray, and wet to the skin. We were at the foot of

  the American Fall. I could see an immense torrent of water tearing

  headlong down from some great height, but had no idea of shape, or

  situation, or anything but vague immensity.

  When we were seated in the little ferry-boat, and were crossing the

  swollen river immediately before both cataracts, I began to feel

  what it was: but I was in a manner stunned, and unable to

  comprehend the vastness
of the scene. It was not until I came on

  Table Rock, and looked - Great Heaven, on what a fall of brightgreen

  water! - that it came upon me in its full might and majesty.

  Then, when I felt how near to my Creator I was standing, the first

  effect, and the enduring one - instant and lasting - of the

  tremendous spectacle, was Peace. Peace of Mind, tranquillity, calm

  recollections of the Dead, great thoughts of Eternal Rest and

  Happiness: nothing of gloom or terror. Niagara was at once

  stamped upon my heart, an Image of Beauty; to remain there,

  changeless and indelible, until its pulses cease to beat, for ever.

  Oh, how the strife and trouble of daily life receded from my view,

  and lessened in the distance, during the ten memorable days we

  passed on that Enchanted Ground! What voices spoke from out the

  thundering water; what faces, faded from the earth, looked out upon

  me from its gleaming depths; what Heavenly promise glistened in

  those angels' tears, the drops of many hues, that showered around,

  and twined themselves about the gorgeous arches which the changing

  rainbows made!

  I never stirred in all that time from the Canadian side, whither I

  had gone at first. I never crossed the river again; for I knew

  there were people on the other shore, and in such a place it is

  natural to shun strange company. To wander to and fro all day, and

  see the cataracts from all points of view; to stand upon the edge

  of the great Horse-Shoe Fall, marking the hurried water gathering

  strength as it approached the verge, yet seeming, too, to pause

  before it shot into the gulf below; to gaze from the river's level

  up at the torrent as it came streaming down; to climb the

  neighbouring heights and watch it through the trees, and see the

  wreathing water in the rapids hurrying on to take its fearful

  plunge; to linger in the shadow of the solemn rocks three miles

  below; watching the river as, stirred by no visible cause, it

  heaved and eddied and awoke the echoes, being troubled yet, far

  down beneath the surface, by its giant leap; to have Niagara before

  me, lighted by the sun and by the moon, red in the day's decline,

  and grey as evening slowly fell upon it; to look upon it every day,

  and wake up in the night and hear its ceaseless voice: this was

  enough.

  I think in every quiet season now, still do those waters roll and