s its waters rush down their
steep, stony trough; the eerie and mysterious sounds which, sometimes like
a mingling of startling shrieks and clangs, and sometimes, to the active
imagination, like the far-off lamentations of imprisoned spirits,[9]
occasionally rise from the semi-cavernous chasm which has been hollowed
out behind the great pool beneath the cliff; the gentle murmuring note of
the White Lady Fall, tangled threads of sound from which fall in fitful
cadences on the ear as the wind rises and falls athwart the falls; and
lastly, but by no means leastly, the undulating and endless varieties of
sounds which, having broken away from their original source, are ever
wandering and echoing around the rock-bound gorge. Beautiful indeed and
altogether indescribable are the elements of melody which are created by
the falling waters of the Arrowborn river!

And the music, too, seemed to be for ever varying, for the choral odes
which were sweetly chanted to the ear were not perpetually continuous, and
at times, owing to some change in the direction of the wind as it swirled
around the gorge, the choral element was subordinated to the deep thunder
of the Rajah Fall, or the vague tumult of startling discords which arose
at intervals from the semi-cavernous walls of the pool into which plunge
the waters of the Rajah and Roarer Falls. And then these sounds would
gradually lose their predominance, and the more uniform sounds in which
all the four falls joined would once more fill the air and charm the ear.
And thus the attention could never be lulled to sleep, for here monotony
was not, and the mind was always kept in an attitude of expectancy for the
variations in the music which were sure to come, and, so far as they
reached the ear, were never the same combinations of sounds that had been
heard before. All the elements of melody were here, indeed, in profuse
abundance, and it seemed as if they only required to be caught by some
master hand and strung into methodical musical combinations to yield to
the mind and feelings those exquisite sensations which music alone can in
any effective degree convey.

And besides the effects we have noticed, there is the motion of colour
constantly, though gradually, shifting and altering, for, as the sun
declines, the rainbow hues move steadily upwards on the face of the falls,
and the colours of the rocks, which are of varying shades of purple and
yellow, continually alter in character with