Читать книгу The Niagara River - Archer Butler Hulbert - Страница 13

What is commonly known as the Goat Island group consists of the island of that name, containing some seventy acres of land, and sixteen other islands or rocks contiguous thereto. Without undertaking to dispute or defend many of the extravagant assertions made in behalf of Goat Island, to which have been given the titles "Temple of Nature," "Enchanted Isles," "Isle of Beauty," "Shrine of the Deity," "Fairy Isles," etc. it would, I think, be difficult to disprove the statement often made that no other seventy acres on the continent are more interesting than these bearing this homely name. From the standpoint of the artist and naturalist this statement would probably pass unquestioned. The views already alluded to of the American and Canadian rapids to be gained from this delightful vantage point are probably unparalleled. To the botanist Goat Island is a paradise. Sir Joseph Hooker affirmed that he found here a greater variety of vegetation within a given space than he had found in Europe or in America east of the Sierras, and Dr. Asa Gray confirmed the extravagant statement. Wrote Frederick Law Olmsted:

I have followed the Appalachian chain almost from end to end, and travelled on horseback "in search of the picturesque" over four thousand miles of the most promising parts of the continent without finding elsewhere the same quality of forest beauty which was once abundant about the Falls, and which is still to be observed on those parts of Goat Island where the original growth of trees and shrubs has not been disturbed, and where from caving banks trees are not now exposed to excessive dryness at the root.

In a report, prepared by David F. Day for the New York State Reservation Commissioners, we find explained, in part, the notable fertility of this little plot of ground, although the oft-returning misty rain from the Falls, and the fact that Goat Island never experiences the dangers of a "forward" spring have much to do in preserving its beautiful robe of colours:

A calcareous soil enriched with an abundance of organic matter like that of Goat Island would necessarily be one of great fertility. For the growth and sustentation of a forest and of such plants as prefer the woods to the openings it would far excel the deep and exhaustless alluvians of the prairie states.

It would be difficult to find within another territory so restricted in its limits so great a diversity of trees and shrubs and still more difficult to find in so small an area such examples of arboreal symmetry and perfection as the island has to exhibit.

The island received its flora from the mainland, in fact the botanist is unable to point out a single instance of tree, shrub, or herb, now growing upon the island not also to be found upon the mainland. But the distinguishing characteristic of its flora is not the possession of any plant elsewhere unknown, but the abundance of individuals and species, which the island displays. There are to be found in Western New York about 170 species of trees and shrubs. Goat Island and the immediate vicinity of the river near the Falls can show of these no less than 140. There are represented on the island four maples, three species of thorn, two species of ash, and six species, distributed in five genera, of the cone-bearing family. The one species of basswood belonging to the vicinity is also there.

Mr. Day has a catalogue of plants in his report to the Reservation Commissioners, giving 909 species of plants to be found on the Reservation, of which 758 are native and 151 foreign. Wrote Margaret Fuller:

The beautiful wood on Goat Island is full of flowers, many of the fairest love to do homage there. The wake robin and the May apple are in bloom, the former white, pink, green, purple, copying the rainbow of the Falls, and fit it for its presiding Deity when He walks the land, for they are of imperial size and shaped like stones for a diadem. Of the May apple I did not raise one green tent without finding a flower beneath.

Explaining the climatic advantages of the island Mr. Olmsted remarks:

First, the masses of ice which every winter are piled to a great height below the Falls and the great rushing body of ice cold water coming from the northern lakes in the spring prevent at Niagara the hardship under which trees elsewhere often suffer through sudden checks to premature growth. And second, when droughts elsewhere occur, as they do every few years, of such severity that trees in full foliage droop and dwindle and even sometimes cast their leaves, the atmosphere at Niagara is more or less moistened by the constantly evaporating spray of the Falls, and in certain situations bathed by drifting clouds of spray.

It is a very irony of fate that this marvellous gem among the islands of earth could not bear a name befitting its place in the admiration and esteem of a world; it was, I believe, Judge Porter himself that named this beautiful spot "Iris Island," a name altogether fitting in both wealth of suggestion and beauty of association. One John Steadman, remembered as a contractor to widen the old portage path from Lewiston to Fort Schlosser, and former owner of the island under a "Seneca patent," planted some turnips here, we are told, in the year 1770 A.D., and in the following autumn placed here "a number of animals, among them a male goat," to get them out of the reach of the bears and wolves that infested the neighbouring shore near his home two miles up the river. In the spring of 1771 it was found that the severe winter had been too much for all but the "male goat," who, unfortunately, survived the ordeal, and by so doing bids fair to hand his name down through the centuries attached to the most beautiful island in the world. In the Treaty of Ghent, which set our boundary line here, the island bears the name "Iris." Mr. Porter has stated that even if it were desirable to change the name now "it would seem impossible now to do so."[6] Is this the truth? Could not the commissioners who have the matters in hand do a great deal toward inaugurating a change to the old official name that would in the long run prove effective? The present writer is most positive that this could be done and that it is a thing that ought certainly to be attempted immediately. It would be surprising how much the change would be favoured if once attempted, if guide books and maps followed the new nomenclature. The only possible satisfaction that one can have in the present name is in the horrifying reflection that if the male goat had died the island would probably have been "Turnip Island" if not "Colic Island."

Below the islands resound the Falls. Perhaps there is no better method of describing this almost indescribable wonder than by taking the familiar walk about them beginning at the common point of commencement, Prospect Point.