Table Rock

“ At last you reach the dilapidated staircase which descends the perpendicular face of the cliff, and clambering around its base upon a rotten and slimy plank, you find yourself below the overhanging mass of Table Rock. You are close at the edge of the falling water, which descends in a mass apparently as solid as though carved from marble. You now begin to comprehend the hight of the fall. It makes you dizzy to look up to the upper edge of the rushing column. You stand just midway between the top and the bottom. Above you hangs the imminent mass of Table Rock ”

“ The gloom of the cavern (for I speak always as if under the Table Rock) needs no assistance from the shade of evening; and the terrible grandeur of the whole is not felt the less for being distinctly seen.
We again visited this wonder of nature in our return from Lake Erie; and have now gazed upon it in all lights, and at all hours,—under the rising, meridian, and setting sun, and under the pale moon when
“riding in her highest noon.” ”

“ The residents, however, though admitting the occurrence of changes, say they are very slow, and that no very rapid alteration has taken place since the fall of a great part of Table Rock some years ago: but masses of stone may be washed away every day without their knowing it. ”

“ Instead of being allowed to sit quietly on Table Rock, gazing upon the cataract, the visitor, yielding to the demands of a supposed necessity, is dragged a weary round—he must see the Falls from the front, from above, and from below; he must go behind them, and be drenched by them; he must descend spiral staircases at the risk of his limbs, and cross ferries at that of his life; he must visit Bloody Run, the Burning Springs, and Indian curiosity-shops, which have nothing to do with them at all ”

“ I knew the danger and disagreeableness of the exploit before I went, and, had I known that "going behind the sheet" was synonymous with "going to Termination Rock," I should never have gone. No person who has not a very strong head ought to go at all, and it is by every one far better omitted, as the remaining portion of Table Rock may fall at any moment, for which reason some of the most respectable guides decline to take visitors underneath it. I believe that no amateur ever thinks of going a second time. ”

“ As the visitor stands and looks through the trees the rapids glitter before him, and then hide themselves behind islands. They glitter and sparkle in far distances under the bright [Pg 84] foliage till the remembrance is lost, and one knows not which way they run.
Close to the cataract, exactly at the spot from whence in former days the Table Rock used to project from the land over the boiling caldron below, there is now a shaft down which you will descend to the level of the river, and pass between the rock and the torrent. ”

“ From the point where he crosses, to Table Rock, the line of the Falls is measurable at three quarters of a mile; and it is this immense extent which, more than any other feature, takes the traveller by surprise. The tide at the Ferry sets very strongly down, and the athletic men who are employed here, keep the boat up against it with difficulty. Arrived near the opposite landing, however, there is a slight counter-current, and the large rocks near the shore serve as a breakwater, behind which the boat runs smoothly to her moorings. ”

“ Immediately beneath the projecting portion of the table-rock, so often mentioned, there is a cavity or niche in the face of the cliff, visible, on a clear day, even from the foot of the mountain, and inaccessible from the top only because there are few men in the world of sufficient nerve to attempt reaching it, by climbing over the face of the cliff,—an exploit the very thought of which is appalling. ”

“ The Halsey claim lay about a mile east of Table Mountain near Montezuma, a mining camp then far in its decline. Table Mountain is one of the geological curiosities, if not wonders of Tuolumne and California. As a well-defined wall it is forty miles long. Through Tuolumne it is a veritable wall, from 250 to 600 feet in height, flat as a floor on the top. That top has an average width of 300 yards. The “table” is composed of what we miners call “lava.” It is a honey-combed, metallic-looking rock, which on being struck with a sledge emits a sulphurous smell. ”

“ When the earth beneath the slab is partly worn away the stone protects it from the weather, and thus these natural tables are formed. The pedestals of the Manitou table-rocks are formed of a coarse sandstone, while the tables are of mica schist. ”

“ They often assume odd forms, and particularly so when they grow sidewise from the perpendicular clefts in the face of the rocky banks. The bottom of the gorge is rugged and striking. Huge table rocks slant upwards, and the torrents of water dashing against them rear up and pass over or around the obstructions. ”

“ Across the valley, or the Kloof, I saw the lower grassy slopes of Table Mountain, where the trees dwindled till they dotted the hill-side like spare scrub. Above the trees is a cut in the mountain, above that the bare grass, and then the frowning weather-worn bastions of the mountain with its ancient horizontal strata. It is cut and scarped into gullies and chimneys; for the mountain climber it offers difficult and impossible climbs at every point. Down the upper gullies hung wisps of ragged cloud, pouring over from the plateau 4000 feet above the town. ”

“ A gleaming speck of light flamed on the mirror's polished surface as it caught the sun, danced on fern and bush and boulder as I raised the glass and then, as I steadied it, came tremulously to rest on the topmost pinnacle of that terraced rock which Garth and I had climbed on the previous afternoon.
From where I stood I could see the edges of the three shelves which had been cut by some forgotten generation of cave-dwellers out of the friable volcanic rock. The speck of light trembled on the crag on a level with the topmost terrace. ”

“ Descending ladder after ladder, and passing on from gallery to gallery, stepping over rough stones and awkward holes, now stooping down under masses of overhanging rock, and now climbing over stony projections beneath your feet, you are at length informed that you are vertically 120 feet below the sea-level, and horizontally 480 feet under the bottom of the ocean or beyond low-water mark, while still deeper down human beings are hewing the hard rock. The brine oozes through the metallic ceiling, and the sound of distant waters falls faintly upon the ear. ”

“ Our modern impatience can hardly endure the thought. The announcement one evening that at dawn we should sight Table Mountain was extremely pleasant. The arrival had the never-fading charm. “I see papa!” sang out little M. “How are the children?” hailed papa from the quay. “All well!” And we land on utterly new ground to begin a new experience. A short train journey, turning the flank of Table Mountain, brings us to our new home at Rosebank, where I find a pair of shapely Cape ponies harnessed to the Victoria awaiting us at the station. ”

“ As usual, every one you look at puts out the hand to beg. The tavern where we stopped to dine seemed more like a great barn, or cavern, than any thing else. We go groping along perfectly dark stone passages, stumbling up a stone staircase, and gaining light only when the door of a kind of reception room opens upon us—a long, rough-looking room, without any carpet, furnished with a table, and some chairs, and a rude sofa. ”

“ The masses of rock, turned into grotesque shapes by the lathe of Nature, stand out sharply and boldly defined against the sky-line, owing to the clearness of the atmosphere. They have a peculiar beauty, their weird charm being accentuated by the vivid contrasting colourings of the various geological strata standing out in distinct lines. Looking down from the brink of the gorge, in the glare of the noonday sun or the soft light of the sunrise or sunset, the floor of the valley resembles a huge Persian carpet, with its intense multitudinous hues. ”

“ Bare naked walls of logs, the interstices rudely stuffed with moss and clay,—a few uncouth wooden stools,—a rough table,—a bed of skins,—and implements of war and the chase hung in various places about the room, all illuminated more brilliantly by the fire on the hearth than by the miserable tallow candle, stuck in a lamp of humid clay, that glimmered on the table,—were not the only objects to attract the wanderer's eye. ”

“ On the left of the true Table Mountain there is a rugged and ragged dip, and further still the rocks rise again in the sharper pinnacles of the Devil's Peak. That slopes away till it runs down into the house-dotted Cape flats, and beyond it lie Rondebosch, Wynberg and Constantia. Across the grey and misty flats other mountains rise—mountains of a strange shape which suggests a peculiar and unusual geological formation. ”

“ The back of the Table Mountain, so called from its top appearing horizontal for several hundred yards, indeed, for near half a mile, is rugged, and of a most dismal hue. When the wind blows from the westward, the clouds come rolling down, perfectly concealing the mountain nearly to what appears to be its base. ”

“ The stupendous columnar side walls—the depth and strength of the ocean with which the cavern is filled—the variety of tints formed by stalactites dropping and petrifying between the pillars, and resembling a sort of chasing of yellow or cream-coloured marble filling the interstices of the roof—the corresponding variety below, where the ocean rolls over a red, and in some places a violet-coloured rock, the basis of the basaltic pillars—the dreadful noise of those august billows so well corresponding with the grandeur of the scene—are all circumstances elsewhere unparalleled. ”

“ There was a square in the center marked 177“Tavern,” doubtless the place the boys had seen that day through the thick timber growth. A straight line ran off in one direction to a point marked on the border of the map “south,” followed by the note: “From Tavern half a mile.” Close to this was a rude skeleton, with a black spot close by marked “treasure rock.” The skeleton of a tree had a huge split through the trunk, in which were the words “big split hemlock.” ”

“ I find here a race very marked in its characteristics, altogether in harmony with the soil that supports it; meagre, gloomy, rough, and angular in its forms and in its instincts. At the tavern every one has his knife in his belt, and he drives the point into the lower face of the table, between his legs; after that they talk, they drink, they contradict one another, they become excited, and they fight. The houses are of an incredible dirtiness. ”

“ Aqueous rocks of about the same age extend for hundreds of miles over the lake-district of North America, and exhibit in like manner a stratification nearly undisturbed. The Table Mountain at the Cape of Good Hope is another example of highly elevated yet perfectly horizontal strata, no less than 3500 feet in thickness, and consisting of sandstone of very ancient date. ”

“ So standing he will look up among the falling waters, or down into the deep misty pit, from which they reascend in almost as palpable a bulk. The rock will be at his right hand, high and hard, and dark and straight, like the wall of some huge cavern, such as children enter in their dreams. ”

“ Then, for a crowd began to gather round them, wearily enough they turned up another street at hazard. Thus they wended their way back toward the great central rock, thinking that there they might find some more hospitable tavern. ”

“ It would seem that the solid mass of the hill has been shivered here into vast, roughly cubical fragments, between which lie the irregular passages and narrow chambers of the cavern. Many tempting galleries lead the explorer on and on till they dwindle to a mere rabbit hole, or till he finds himself wedged in the cleft between two enormous surfaces of rock. Disorderly accumulations of boulders and splinters cover the floor; there is hardly a level spot anywhere, and it is desirable to explore every yard carefully with a taper or a lantern to avoid the consequences of a rash step. ”

“ That made an extraordinary long hole, as you may imagine, and reached far down into the earth; and, as I leaned over it to try to see to the bottom, I lost my balance and tumbled in. Unfortunately, the hole led directly into the vast space you see outside this mountain; but I managed to catch a point of rock that projected from this cavern, and so saved myself from tumbling headlong into the black waves beneath, where the tongues of flame that dart out would certainly have consumed me. ”

“ And then the country tavern, whose long shed and sanded hall give surety to the stranger and his beast of a comfortable noon-tide baiting; or, in the more solitary townships, where the places of entertainment are few and far between, the quiet nook by the forest road-side, where the dipper hangs beside the overflowing water-trough, and the guide-board measures out the long miles between him and his evening resting-place; each and all objects of pleasant recollection to the traveller, as he muses upon his journeyings in after life. ”

“ The bottom is reached from the elevated waste where we stand by a very rough irregular winding incline plane—for although the descent is full of great blocks of stones, dreadfully steep, and liker a deranged staircase than anything else, we still call it a steep incline plane from the level of the plateau to the passage beneath which leads into the valley—high rock-walls rising on either side as we descend. ”