And now I must turn to another of the beautifiers of the earth—the Waterfall; which in the same object at once presents to the mind the beautiful, but apparently incongruous idea, of fixedness and motion—a single existence in which we perceive unceasing change and everlasting duration. The waterfall may be called the voice of the landscape, for, unlike the rocks and woods which utter sounds as the passive instruments played on by the elements, the waterfall strikes its own chords, and rock and mountains re-echo in rich unison. And this is a land abounding in cataracts; in these Northern States where shall we turn and not find them? Have we not Kaaterskill, Trenton, the Flume, the Genesee, stupendous Niagara, and a hundred others, named and nameless ones, whose exceeding beauty must be acknowledged when the hand of taste shall point them out? 1
"The Falls of the Caterskill in Winter"
Winter, hoary, stern and strong,
Sits the mountain crags among:
On his bleak and horrid throne,
Drift on drift the snow is piled
Into forms grotesque and wild:
Ice-ribbed precipices shed
Cold light round his grisly head:
Clouds athwart his brows are bound
Ever whirling round and round.2