There
can be no doubt that within the last two hundred years the
aspect of the Falls has been greatly altered. Goat Island
extended, up to a comparatively recent period, for another half
mile northerly in a triangular prolongation; some parts have
receded much over one hundred feet since 1841, others have
remained more or less stationary. In June, 1850, Table Rock
disappeared. Geologists tell us that the recession of the
Canadian Falls by erosion is five feet in one year. Even judging
it to be one foot in a year, the falls at the commencement of
the Christian era were near Prospect Point; three thousand years
ago it was at the upper steel arch bridge. Niagara shall in due
time pass away. The eroding power that has made Niagara will
perhaps be its undoing.
Nations shall rise into being and write a record of their
glorious supremacy, then pass away, forgotten perhaps save by a
record of their deeds or history of their decline. Nature plans
not for one season, but for all time. The years as they came to
the painted Iroquois will come with never-ending delight to
generations yet to be. Our faith in Nature's grandeur and beauty
becomes stronger as each succeeding year slips away; the
kingfisher shall still watch from his perch on some pine bough
the finny inhabitants below him; the chimney swifts will still
fly through the spray of the falls for their bath; the flowers,
if not on Goat Island, will be just as fair as those that
blossomed long ago in their pristine loveliness; the stars when
day is done will gleam in the velvet sky as brightly as those of
far Judea.
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