Page:Niagara, a poem - Abraham Moore (1822).djvu/20



About five miles below lake Erie, the river Niagara is divided into two streams forming an island, called Grand Island, about 12 miles long, and nearly as wide; below which they are re-united into one broad and smooth expanse, which continues about two miles, till it reaches the rapids; down which it runs through reefs of rocks falling about fifty feet in the course of the last mile; it is then again divided by a small island, called Goat Island, and falls on each side of it over the precipices which form the Great Cataracts.

In November, 1821, two men (supposed to be intoxicated) fastened their boat to a wooden bridge across the Chippeway Creek, (which empties itself into the Niagara on the Canadian side, about two miles above the falls,) and fell asleep. By some means, the boat being probably ill-secured, got loose with the men in it, and drifted into the rapids; where they awoke in the greatest agitation, and were hurried over the falls, and lost. A table, which they had on board, was seen a few days after-wards floating down the stream; but neither the boat, nor either of the men has ever been heard of since.

Alluding not only to the size and strength of the cataract, but to the well-known story of Hercules, who in his last frenzy flung Lichas, his attendant, from the top of Mount Æta, in Greece, into the sea between Locris and Eubæa.—Ovid's Met. lib. 9. l. 211. Milt. Par. Lost, b. 2. l. 544.