The present case about two
o'clock this afternoon, gave me Niagara, its superb severity of action
and color and majestic grouping, in one short, indescribable show.
We were very slowly crossing the Suspension bridge-not a full stop
anywhere, but next to it--the day clear, sunny, still--and I out on
the platform. The falls were in plain view about a mile off, but very
distinct, and no roar--hardly a murmur. The river tumbling green and
white, far below me; the dark high banks, the plentiful umbrage, many
bronze cedars, in shadow; and tempering and arching all the immense
materiality, a clear sky overhead, with a few white clouds, limpid,
spiritual, silent. Brief, and as quiet as brief, that picture--a
remembrance always afterwards. Such are the things, indeed, I lay away
with my life's rare and blessed bits of hours, reminiscent, past--the
wild sea-storm I once saw one winter day, off Fire island--the elder
Booth in Richard, that famous night forty years ago in the old
Bowery--or Alboni in the children's scene in Norma--or night-views,
I remember, on the field, after battles in Virginia--or the peculiar
sentiment of moonlight and stars over the great Plains, western
Kansas--or scooting up New York bay, with a stiff breeze and a good
yacht, off Navesink. With these, I say, I henceforth place that view,
that afternoon, that combination complete, that five minutes' perfect
absorption of Niagara--not the great majestic gem alone by itself, but
set complete in all its varied, full, indispensable surroundings.
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