(As we approach it the fifth time.)

Roar on, roar on thou king of roaring waters — 
Pour on, pour on thou queen of pouring waters —
    Such heavy thunders in thy roarings !
    Such endless wonders in thy pourings !

( As we walk over the long iron bridge to Goat Island.)

Leap on, leap on thou king of leaping waters — 
Sweep on, sweep on thou queen of sweeping waters —
    Such mighty tossings in thy leapings !
    Such sightly glossings in thy sweepings !

( As we rest among the rocks and trees on the Three Sister 
Islands.)

Sound on, sound on thou king of sounding waters — 
Bound on, bound on thou queen of bounding waters- 
    Such soothing sweetness in thy soundings ! 
    Such wooing neatness in thy boundings !

( As we study the contending rapids along the west side of Goat Island.)

Drive on, drive on thou king of driving waters — 
Strive on, strive on thou queen of striving waters —
    Such royal turnings in thy drivings !
    Such loyal yearnings in thy strivings !

( As we stand on the smooth foundation rocks of 
the Old Tower, at the verge of the great Horseshoe Fall.)

Plunge on, plunge on thou king of plunging waters — 
Lunge on, lunge on thou queen of lunging waters — 
    Such ponderous slowness in thy plungings !
    Such wonderous boldness in thy lungings !

( As we look down from the grassy verge of Luna Island.)

Wend on, wend on thou king of wending waters — 
Blend on, blend on thou queen of blending waters —
    Such winding chasms in thy wendings !
    Such shining fathoms in thy blendings !

( As we sit on the rocks of the Canadian Shore in a sunny day.)

Beam on, beam on thou king of beaming waters — 
Stream on, stream on thou queen of streaming waters —
    Such showers of brightness in thy beamings ! 
    Such towers of whiteness in thy streamings !

( As we approach Prospect Point in the American Park.)

Jar on, jar on thou king of jarring waters — 
Mar on, mar on thou queen of marring waters —
    Such rumbling deepness in thy jarrings !
    Such humbling steepness in thy marrings !

( As we look over the trembling wall at Prospect Point.)

Pound on, pound on thou king of pounding waters — 
Mound on, mound on thou queen of mounding waters—
    Such anvil chorals in thy poundings ! 
    Such grand memorials in thy moundings !

( As we enter the Cave of the Winds on Goat Island.)

Crash on, crash on thou king of crashing waters —  
Dash on, dash on thou queen of dashing waters —
    Such tangled echoes in thy crashings !
    Such spangled haloes in thy dashings !

( As we linger on the quivering wire bridge, one 
hundred and ninety feet above the purified river below.)

Roam on, roam on thou king of roaming waters — 
Foam on, foam on thou queen of foaming waters —
    Such playful rollings in thy roamings !
    Such graceful scrollings in thy foamings !

( As we sit quietly on the beautiful river banks, about 
one mile below the Falls on the American side.)

Move on, move on thou king of moving waters — 
Groove on, groove on thou queen of grooving waters —
    Such awful grandeur in thy movings !
    Such walls of splendor in thy groovings !

( As we view the Whirlpool Rapids from below the elevator.)

Go on, go on thou king of going waters — 
Flow on, flow on thou queen of flowing waters —
    Such piling billows in thy goings !
    Such smiling pillows in thy flowings !

(As we stroll along the steep banks of the Whirlpool, toward a large 
overhanging pine, that stands three hundred and fifty feet above the water.)

Whirl on, whirl on thou king of whirling waters — 
Swirl on, swirl on thou queen of swirling waters —
    Such peerless surgings in thy whirlings !
    Such fearless mergings in thy swirlings !

Seethe on, seethe on thou king of seething waters — 
Wreathe on, wreathe on thou queen of wreathing waters —
    Such boiling acres in thy seethings !
    Such coiling breakers in thy wreathings !

(As we sit on the rocks with our feet at the waters’
 edge of the Whirlpool Outlet.)

Rush on, rush on thou king of rushing waters — 
Blush on, blush on thou queen of blushing waters —
    Such matchless gradings in thy rushings !
    Such rapturous shadings in thy blushings !

                         ( Our parting reflections. )

Chime on, chime on thou king of chiming waters — 
Rhyme on, rhyme on thou queen of rhyming waters —
    Such holy pleasures in thy chimings !
    Such lowly measures in thy rhymings !

Chide on, chide on thou king of chiding waters — 
Glide on, glide on thou queen of gliding waters — 
    Such timely warnings in thy chidings ! 
    Such fine adornings in thy glidings !

Fall on, fall on thou king of falling waters — 
Call on, call on thou queen of calling waters —
    Such massive speedings in thy fallings !
    Such passive pleadings in thy callings !

Praise on, praise on thou king of praising waters — 
Haze on, haze on thou queen of hazing waters —
    Such plain old stories in thy praisings !
    Such rain-bow glories in thy hazings !

Farewell, farewell thou king of preaching waters — 
Farewell, farewell thou queen of teaching waters — 
    Such awe Divine in all thy preachings. 
    No words of mine can voice thy teachings.

---

Source:  Chester E. Pond. The Falls of Niagara Our School of Sublimity. Topeka, Kansas, 1888.  Cover title: The Sublime Niagara of Our World.

N.B.  This poem comes after a series of lessons by Pond about Niagara Falls, as “Thoughtful persons visit the Falls not so much for temporary pleasure as for permanent soul culture. Not simply to be able to say, “I have seen the great Niagara,” but to become better acquainted with Niagara’s great Creator.

View these lessons on Hathi Trust:

 

GOD, in His ages past the dawn of days,
Writ one white line of praise,
Which now, in this great stress and hour of need,
I bend my soul to read.
I break the sullen bonds of wearying time,
And with one leap sublime,
Force my astounded soul go back and stand
In the primaeval land !

The tresses of the ancient flood are kissed
With virginal, white mist.
The same soft, thunderous sound
Thrills the wild woods around,
But oh the vast and mighty peace that broods
On these green solitudes,
Where the great land, with one tremendous tone,
Litanies to God, alone !

Tongue of the continent! Thou whose hymning shakes
The bosom of the lakes !
O sacrificial torrent, keen and bright,
Hurled from thy glorious height !
Thou sacerdotal presence, clothed in power,
At once the victim and the white-robed priest,
Whose praise throughout these ages hath not ceased,
Whose altar steams with incense every hour !
Lo, in all days, from thy white waters, rise
The savors of perpetual sacrifice !
I see pale prophecy of Christ’s dear blood !—
The transubstantiation of thy flood !

Oh the wild wonder of the vast emotion
Of the perturbed wave,
That cries and wanders like the fearful ocean,
Seeking, with none to save !
In their wide agony the rapids roam,
A world of waves, an universe of pain !
The vexed, tumultous clamor of their foam
Crying to God with agonized refrain,
Where the sad rocks their quivering summits hide
In the loud anguish of the refluent tide.

Yet, with a willingness that leaps to sorrow
Swift run the ragged surges to the height,
And from their pain is born a pure delight—
The fear to-day, the snowy peace to-morrow !—
Cleaving like darts their swift and silvery way
With sudden gleams, and barbs of glittering spray,
They hurry to the brink, and swift are lost
In that stupendous leap, that infinite holocaust !

Oh Christ-like glory of the praying water
That leaps forever to its mystic death !
And from the anguish of that sobbing slaughter
Lifts the clear glory of the torrent’s breath,
Where like a paean of rapturous victory calls
The solemn jubilation of the falls !

O alabastrine priest—thy splendor spraying
More lasting than the immemorial hills !
O monument of waves, O undecaying
While God’s right hand thy flowing chalice fills !
Under the transient world’s astonished eyes
Thou offerest abiding sacrifice !

In the pale morning, when the rising sun
Flatters thy pouring flood with slanting beams,
Most reverent thy duteous waters run,
And hymn to God with all their thousand streams.
And in the blazing majesty of noon,
Still lifts thy wave its sacrificial tune,
And spills, like jewels of some eastern story,
Its bright, impetuous avalanche of glory !

And in the stilly spaces of the night,
While heaven wonders with its wakeful stars,
Thou prayest still, beneath the solemn light,
In booming tones that reach to heaven’s bars,
Keeping thy vigils, while the angelic moon
Walks on thy perilous verge with glorious shoon,
Chanting from foam and spray without encease
Thy yearning immemorial prayer for peace !

---

Source: Kilmer, Joyce (ed.) Dreams and Images: An Anthology of Catholic Poets. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1926c1917.

About Edward Francis Gareché

 

    The sweep majestie of the river’s brow,
        Which far above extends from shore to shore—
    (It glows in memory’s magic mirror now,)
        Heaven’s bright blue arch rising behind and o’er—
    The Lakesprung torrents—as with ceaseless roar,
        Over the everlasting rocks they roll,
    Forever to the dizzy leap before—
        All rush at once upon the startled soul,
At the first transient glance your eye throws o’er the whole.

    But sight is mingled at the heart with sound—
        The loud, the deafening thunder of the fall,
    Which seems at first all feeling to confound,
        The brain to madden and the breast appal,
    And spread annihilation over all !—
        The dazzling whiteness of the sheeted foam,
    Which to the eye seems like a snowbuilt wall,
        On which is reared a bright Cerulean dome, 
That Poets well might take for fancy’s airy home ;—

    The clouds of rising and dissolving spray,
        Which wave and wanton in the gusty wind,
    On which the sunbeams hold their magic play,
        Painting gay rainbows of each glorious kind,
    That change their shape and colour, like the mind
        Of soft and ductile youth, with every scene,
    Of light and shade—now swelling unconfin’d,
        In matchless beauty with resplendent sheen—
Now bursting—leaving but the black abyss between ;—

    The dark and dripping cliffs which overhead,
        Rise like the warbuilt towers of ancient time,
    Breathing defiance, and inspiring dread,
        Which echo back with emphasis sublime,
    The cataract’s awful sounds, in measur’d chime,
        Rolling along the deep and distant pass,
    Until at length the bloodstain’d heights they climb,
        Where swell’d the roar of battle—when, alas !
Our country’s sons and foes fell in one mingled mass ;—

    And the still darker torrent at your feet,
        Whose greenwreath’d floods boil up from the abyss,
    To whose unfathom’d depths, in one broad sheet,
        They thundering fell—whose tides with horrid hiss,
    Like venom’d serpents vast, do seem, I wis,
        Writhing in pain, and madly rushing by,
    Towards far Ontario’s bed : —All—all, of this,
        Must have struck on the heart—the ear—the eye—
To wake the burning soul of its sublimity.

    O ! I have thought—and thought did well beseem
        A scene so fraught with wondrous majesty—
    If with such wonders His creation teem,
        What must the glory of the Author be !
    With what deep reverence and humility,
        Ought we to bow before His mighty hand !—
    Lord of Creation and Eternity !
        Shall human pride not quail at His command ?
The thunder of His power, O who can understand !

---

Source: The American Baptist Magazine,  vol. V, no. 12, December 1825

Falls of Niagara: A Sketch is simply signed “Newton.” Newton is probably John Newton Brown, ordained as a Baptist minister in 1824, and who later became the editor of the American Baptist Publication Society in 1848.  John Newton Brown wrote another poem about Niagara Falls, The Falls of Niagara 

See John Newton Brown’s entry in Wikipedia

Whate’er I’ve been told of thy wonders is true !
All nature at once seems to rush on my view,
And, lost in the trance you occasion, I cry,
How stupendous the scene ! what an atom am I !
How thy waves, wildly foaming, and hurled around,
Rise in volumes of mist from thy cauldron profound,
And in tears, which thy fury has caused, brightly plays,
The rainbow that dazzles my sight with its blaze !
Like the tyrant of Europe, whose merciless force
Bears down ev’ry mound which opposes his course :
While the halo, whose glory encircles his head,
Is formed by the tears which the wretched have shed.
O who should not rather all glory forego,
Than gain it by battle, and bloodshed and wo !
O who would not rather inhabit the vale,
Than dwell on the Andes, the sport of each gale !
Near Etna I’ve stray’d with impressions most sweet,
Through vineyards that circle with verdure its feet ;
But felt not the least inclination to tread
On the ashes which cover its cloud-piercing head.
And though with sensations I ne’er knew before,
I bend me enraptur’d to list to thy roar,
And, as thy blue streams irresistibly roll,
Feel the awe most sublime which possesses my soul ;
Yet I would not for worlds that my life were like thee !
O far be each thought of such tumult from me !
Far, far be each wish that ambition might form
To delight in the horrour and roar of the storm.
Let me, cool and clear, glide on free from all taint,
Dispensing relief to the weary and faint ;
No torrent that bursts to affright and amaze,
But the smooth, gentle stream, through the valley that strays.

---

Source:  The Port Folio. New Series, vol. 4, no. 1, July 4, 1807

Oliver Oldschool, Esq. was a pseudonym for Joseph Dennie. Read about Dennie