By the power thou wottest of, Rescue now from dust and worm ; Once again, I charge thee come! Child and crown and life and realm: Past thy reign, thy battles done, King of Israel! shalt thou see, Thou and thine shall be with me.' LETTERS OF HORACE FRITZ, ESQ. NO. II. My last letter to you, Tom, ended with our passage up the Cayuga. Ithaca is not immediately upon the lake. It lies in a lap of hills, a mile from the landing. It is too flat to be picturesque, except from an elevated position, but it is laid out prettily, and many of the houses have a look even of opulence. There are admirable situations for building upon the side-hills, and when the inhabitants begin to get over the business-fever of the West, and build for beauty as well as shelter, it is to be hoped they will improve their natural advantages, and make the town what it might be, one of the prettiest in the western country. We found a hotel, ornamented, as is common at the West, with piazzas, and presenting altogether a very imposing exterior. It was sufficiently so at least, to alarm Job, who is annoyed by the obsequiousness of the servants at such places, and cannot get over his respect for the well-tied cravat and Adonis head which not unfrequently present themselves in answer to his timid pull of the bell-wire. I sometimes think the rascals take the humor of his character, for they serve him with an air of quizzical devotion which draws from his simple-hearted generosity a fee equally disproportioned to their desert and his ability. We secured comfortable rooms, but the supper was villanous. The table was black with flies, the coffee was an irreverent misnomer, and I felt obliged, notwithstanding Job's entreaties for mercy, to inflict upon the damsel who officiated at the side-table the old but salutary discipline of requesting that the hair and the butter might be put upon separate plates. There is a more unpretending public house on the opposite side, and from a glance I got in passing, of a sanded floor curiously swept, and a flower-pot in the second story, indicating taste in the landlord's daughter, I recommend it to you in preference to its more showy rival. I was awoke the next morning by the ringing of bells. Job sat by the window with his white cravat tied with unusual care, reading his Bible, and I presumed without farther evidence that it was Sunday. One is particularly liable to forgetfulness upon this point on a journey. At home I feel as if I should know the day from its very atmosphere. There is a hush and a pervading repose in the Sabbath morning which seems peculiar to it, and which reproves you like a presence, for a violation. But away from accustomed associations the charm is broken. The looking after accommodations, the paying of servants, the fatigue, the bustle of the hotel, and, more than all, the absence of that feeling of decent cleanliness which has so much to do with devotion, crowd your week-day impressions constantly upon you, and you cannot realize it. Besides, there is nothing like a New-England observance of the Sabbath at the West. The stage-coaches are coming in and departing as on any other day, and the lower classes of people are lounging about their doors or clustered at the corners of the streets. Not a traveller in a thousand thinks of lying by, and if in the vicinity of a fall or any object of curiosity, the coaches are even more in demand on that day, and provision is made as a matter of course for a greater number of visitors. It is true that a great proportion of these travellers are from New-England--but it only proves that moral obligation is at least very much assisted by circumstances, and that the principle is not strong enough to sustain itself against general custom and example. In the course of a morning ramble, I discovered that there was a camp-meeting at a short distance from town, and by a promise to Job that I would go to church with him in the afternoon, I persuaded him to accompany me. We started as the last bell was ringing. People were flocking out from every quarter in every possible variety of dress and deportment, and there was of course no difficulty in finding the place of encampment. It was beautifully chosen. The temporary pulpit was erected in the depth of a magnificent wood, high up on the side of the mountain, and the congregation, already immense, were seated on rough benches placed in a crescent around. It was certainly the most majestic place of worship I ever entered. June was in its pride, and the deep shadow of the wood was unpenetrated by a ray of sunshine, and the immense trunks of the. forest trees, tall and bare, and supporting, like a wrought roof, the immense masses of foliage growing only on their tops, looked (they always did look so to me) like the pillars of a superhuman temple. I have wondered less since, Tom, at the high enthusiasm of the Covenanters. The effect, the mental elevation of the scene is prodigious. It is impossible, at any time, to enter a dark old wood without a feeling of awe, but to stand under its deep shadows in the midst of an immense congregation of people, assembled so, as it were, in the more immediate presence of God, with a single human voice praying out audibly in its awful stillness-positively it seems to me a height of sublimity which the pomp of a cathedral, with its arches and pealing organ, and all the circumstance of artificial grandeur, cannot even approach. Job fell on his knees with the rest of the multitude, and would listen to none of my criticisms. In justice to my piety, however, I must say that I made no attempt at arresting his attention till the voice of the preacher, which was low and impressive at first, assumed a screaming and disgusting rant, which effectually destroyed my solemnity. After the prayer was concluded, I got Job up, and insisted on making the circuit of the congregation. The men and women were divided, but there was a line of contact where, with proper discretion, one might speak with the "sisters," and under cover of Job's physiognomy, the gravity of which, I was sure, would pose the most suspicious of deacons, I succeeded in insinuating myself between a square, straight-haired fellow, and a dove-eyed sister, who was rocking her pretty figure to and fro with an air of particular devotion. I commenced an acquaintance by offering her my bonbonniere, (the only time, Tom, that my liquorish tooth was ever pressed into the service of philosophy) and soon found that I could out-charm the exhortation. It was a mere experiment upon the sincerity of the flock, and without pretending by any means that it was a specimen of the whole, I give it to you as it occurred, and you may draw your own inference. We staid through several addresses, but I looked in vain for the "Macbriar" eloquence. There were one or two sensible, plain men among them, but those who suffered themselves to get excited, grew disconnected and extravagant, and soon lost sight of both reason and logic. I became weary of it long before it was over, and as, principle aside, my friendship for Job would not allow me to distress him by irreverence, I found the preservation of a grave perpendicular upon a rough board for three long hours a matter of doubtful edification. The next morning, after getting the proper instructions, we started on an excursion for the picturesque. The formation of this part of the State is very peculiar. The Lake Country, as it is called, is a large tract embracing the Cayuga, the Seneca, and one or two smaller lakes, lying several hundred feet below the general level. The whole section was once, undoubtedly, the bottom of an immense lake, whose barrier, on this side at least, was very bold and precipitous. The hypothesis is strengthened by the formation of the hills, and by the fact that all the streams pour over the high level into the valley as a natural basin. The last circumstance lets you at once into the secret of the singularly romantic character of the scenery. The country abounds with creeks, and their descent from the highlands is accompanied with a constant developement of beauty. The declivity is not always immediate, and, in some instances, extends back for two or three miles from the plain; but in every instance the stream is sufficiently violent to have worn deep into the earth, and the untouched and luxuriant vegetation of the banks, overhanging and shadowing the deep courses, adds exceedingly to the effect. We selected one out of the many to which we were directed, to follow up to its source. It was more like threading a cavern than pursuing any matter of daylight. The water was comparatively low, and the rocky bed for a great part of the distance was passable on foot. We found, however, that cascades from ten to twenty feet in height were constantly occurring, and that there were basins to swim and slippery places to ascend-things which could not be done consistently with a taste for dry garments. We stripped ourselves therefore of our hats, shoes, and all unnecessary clothing, and depositing them in a cleft of the rock, commenced our ascent, barefoot and bare-headed. We were well rewarded for our trouble. The course of the creek was shaded for almost the whole distance with trees leaning over and meeting above it, and the atmosphere, shut in from the winds, and scarcely affected by the sun, had the refreshing coolness of a grotto. Falls of water cannot be otherwise than beautiful, and among these there was a splendid variety-some falling with a clear leap like a sheet of glass, and some dashing down a broken declivity, and covering the pool below with a foam of dazzling whiteness. It was fine mineralizing, as you may suppose, among the exposed strata, and Job was irreligious enough to wish for his hammer. If the existence of Genii Locorum had been anything but poetry, he would have been annihilated on the spot. We returned a little more rapidly than we ascended by the aid of an early accomplishment of mine which I found some difficulty in teaching to Job-seat-sliding. The descent upon a smooth school bench, however, was nothing to the velocity given by a slippery rock, polished by water, and we were sent into the deep basins with a violence which Job did not think, after the first experiment, at all worthy of repetition. Necessity and practice, however, reconcile us to all things, and we continued our way, swimming, sliding and walking, till we reached the opening. Our deposit was safe in the cleft, and we concluded our romance as all romance concludes in this working-day world-with a luncheon. We found many other beautiful spots about Ithaca, one particularly which I will mention because it is near the town, and you may not, with your indolent habits, be disposed to go far for the picturesque. It is called Fall Creek, and is in sight of the road to the lake. You will find it extremely beautiful. I will not inflict upon you descriptions of the remainder of our loiterings about this place, and with an injunction to you to put down Ithaca as one of the sections of the West most worthy attention, I leave it. Upon sounding Job, I found that, like me, he cherished a tender recollection of the Canal, and we again turned our faces northward. We had made the passage of both lakes, and as there was no excuse but indolence for taking the boats, I consented, though most unwillingly, to suffer by the stage road which passes between them to Geneva. No incidents occur now-a-days in land travelling. We made the journey with the usual patience of those who travel for pleasure, and of course have a prerogative of getting angry at every thing which interferes with their intention, and without any occurrence on the way to start a remark from Job, (except that the halfway town is called Ovid, upon which he made the expected classical observation,) or a single passenger worth quizzing or talking to, we were set down once more at Geneva. The names throughout this region are, by the way, rather more classical than usual for a back-woods nomenclature. I cannot conceive, unless the naming of the towns was committed to a convention of schoolmasters, how it should have happened that Ithaca, Homer, Virgil, Ovid, Aurora, and Bellona, should be the names of towns all adjacent to each other. Pray suggest it to Dr. Mitchell as a subject for an essay. The next day we were upon the Canal again, gliding on with its luxurious and imperceptible motion. Job's good humor and loquacity increased with our advance, and once more I remitted my vow against future wanderings, and felt travelling to be a pleasure. We soon reached the "Embankment"-one of the many evidences on this canal of the prodigious enterprise and perseverance of its projector. It is a ridge two miles in length, and seventy or eighty feet high, built across the valley of the Irondequoit creek. You cannot |