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WHICH, AS IT TOOK THE LEAD IN WAGING WAR WITH ENGLAND

A HUNDRED YEARS AGO,

NOW TAKES THE LEAD IN WAGING PEACE,

AS A HOMAGE TO ITS GREATNESS

AND A GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE OF THE HOSPITALITY RECEIVED
AT MY FIRST RESTING-PLACE IN AMERICA.

TO THE AMERICAN FALL AT NIAGARA.

Niagara, national emblem! Cataract

Born of the maddened rapids, sweeping down
Direct, resistless from the abyss's crown
Into the deep, fierce pool with vast impact
Scarce broken by the giant boulders, stacked
To meet thine onslaught, threatening to drown
Each tillaged plain, each level-loving town
'Twixt thee and ocean. Lo! the type exact!

America Niagarized the world.

Europe, a hundred years agone, beheld
An avalanche, like pent-up Erie, hurled
Through barriers, to which the rocks of eld
Seemed toy things-leaping into godlike space
A sign and wonder to the human race.

DOUGLAS SLADEN

NIAGARA, October 18, 1889.

1

I desire to crave the indulgence of the reader for typographical errors, the book having had the disadvantage of passing through the Press while I was away in Japan, without the proper works at hand for correcting the proofs.

DOUGLAS SLADEN.

YOKOHAMA, 7th December 1889.