Pictures of Canadian Life by James Ewing Ritchie

As in duty bound, I have reached Niagara Falls, and from motives equally conscientious forbear to trouble you with either poetry or prose on the scene that now meets my eye. In seeing them I have an advantage-that in this early season of the year I am alone and free from the crowd of visitors that sometimes infest the spot. As it is, there is quite enough of modern civilization there to disturb the poetry of the place; and the scream of the steam-engine sadly interferes with the enjoyment of that everlasting roar which rises as the vast body of waters tumbles over the falls-raising up majestic mountains of mist-and then sweeps grandly to the rapids, in the raging whirlpools of which poor Captain Webb lost his life, or, in plainer words, committed suicide. Then there are the cabmen, who will not give you a moment's peace, and affect not to understand you when you intimate that you prefer to walk rather than to ride; and a grand walk it is, about a mile from the station on the Canadian side. Far, far below is the river-a chasm in a mass of old dark rock-into which you peer with wondering eyes till the brain is almost dizzy. Words fail to convey the impressions, as passing cloud and fleeting sunshine add to the marvellous beauty of the spot. I scrambled down to where the ferry-boat is, and drank in all the charm of the place, not caring to be ferried across, quite satisfied with watching the eternal fall of water as I sat there-a mere human speck in that mysterious grandeur. The white man has come and made the place his own. He has now thrown three bridges across it, and on the American side has built a brewery, whose ‘Niagara ales' are famous all over the American Continent.

I am glad to say that it is only on the Canadian side that you have a good view of the Falls; but on neither side is there what there ought to be, a wilderness. On each side there are houses and hotels, and churches, all the way; and I was offered Guinness's Dublin Stout and Bass's Pale Ale, just as if I were dining in a Fleet Street restaurant. On my return I met a funeral procession. Death had come into one of the wooden houses on the side, and the friends and relatives had ridden in their buggies and country carts to pay the last tribute of respect to the deceased. Yes; death is lord of life-in the New World as well as in the Old.