and ceaseless strokes, and surrounded by an unimaginable and oppressive grandeur. My mind recoiled from the immensity of the tumbling tide; and thought of time and eternity, and felt that nothing but its own immortality could rise against the force of such an element.
The guide now stopped to take breath. He told us, by hallooing in our ears at the top of his voice, “that we must turn our heads away from the spray when it blew against us, draw the hand downwards over the face if we felt giddy, and not rely too much on the loose pieces of rock.” With these instructions he began to conduct us, one by one beneath the sheet. A few steps farther, and the light of the sun no longer shone upon us. There was a grave-like twilight, which enabled us to see our way, when the irregular blasts of wind drove the water from us; but most of the time it was blown upon us from the sheet with such fury that every drop seemed a sting, and in such quantities that the weight was almost insupportable. My situation was distracting, it grew darker at every step, and in addition to the general tremor with which everything in the neighbourhood of Niagara is shuddering, I could feel the shreds and splinters of the rock yield as I seized them for support, and my feet were continually slipping from the slimy stones. I was obliged, more than once, to have recourse to the prescription of the guide to cure my giddiness, and though I would have given the world to retrace my steps, I felt myself following his darkened figure, vanishing before me, as the maniac, faithful to the phantoms of his illusion,
