Skip to main content

Falling...

 


How do you persuade visitors to come and stay in your hotel?

Well, here was a tourist gimmick – a truly extraordinary stunt – that got people on board, so to speak. And it worked, in a way.

In fact, not a single person ended up on this fated boat, the real crew having jumped ship at the last moment, leaving pretend people from old stories.

Oh yes, and a motley un-consenting cargo of captured creatures.

Let me tell you more…

 

 

Niagara Falls, 3.00 p.m., 8th September, 1827

 

The bears swam ashore before the ship hit the Falls

so they were alright.  I'm told the dog did the same

and the geese – at least, two of them survived the drop

as did the cat. The foxes I'm not sure about

while nobody speaks of the racoon.

 

As for the buffalo – well, he was penned

and crushed by a falling mast.  Perhaps

that instant death was best, being spared

from the heart-stopping fall, though exposed to the din

and the terror of those still on board

 

except for the dummies, an effigy crew –

Adams and Jackson, the piratical Blue Beard,

Natty Ewart, with Beverley up in the fore top

whose job was to look out for breakers

while everyone cheered as the schooner was smashed.

 

William Forsyth of the Pavilion Hotel

along with his colleagues and fellow hoteliers

were delighted to see some twenty thousand

come to watch this scene of destruction

and death, from their various viewpoints

 

safe and secure, in steamers and carriages –

a sight that was truly sublime, said the paper,

The Herald of Cleveland, the day passing off

with great satisfaction.  Then unharmed and dry

the crowd dispersed for rest and refreshment.

 


What took place on that September day nearly two hundred years ago demonstrates the strange ways in which mankind takes its pleasure and finds entertainment.

I’m not sure anything more needs to be said.




Comments

  1. Thank you Richard , i very much look forward to your monthly entertainment . I find it fascinating that for some time after reading them , i sit and reflect .

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rake Daddy Rake

  As with lots of good stories, there are many versions. Basically this one's about a pair of Wiltshire yokels raking a pond for kegs of smuggled brandy.  They feigned lunacy when surprised by the excise men, saying that they were trying to rake out the full moon which was reflected in the water.  Their ruse was successful. The officials had no trouble in deciding they were lunatics, so left them to their raking. Interestingly, the Lunacy Act of 1842 defined a lunatic as someone ‘afflicted with a period of fatuity in the period following a full moon’. I suppose any time falls into the category of a 'period following a full moon'.  As for fatuity, that might include all of us on certain occasions, not least since it's not stated how long 'a period' is.  Perhaps then we're all occasionally lunatic... Be all that as it may, on this occasion the lunatics (I've put inverted commas round the word and taken them out several times) outwitted the sober and sane, ...

The Three Hares

  The Three Hares We continue on our way running, running, running around held together tip to tip so I can hear what she can hear as well as her. And the other follows me in front of her – we are joined up by our ears so we follow, lead and follow running, running, running around we continue on our way. Running, running, running around – no cause for worry – what's to come has already been. The future's past – watch us here – we're going nowhere – the last is first and first is last. Our present moment sees us still although we seem to race – running, running, running around we continue. On our way running, running, running around hearing your persistent questions – why do you keep on asking? We cannot tell you any more. May you share your senses and find soft silence at your centre which is so close, while you go on running, running, running around. The turning of the year, with the various thoughts about the past and the future that c...

Bear Necessities

  Coming back to an old work place can be startling, especially if it's been abandoned. Abandoned not just by you, but by those who might have followed. Forsaken for good, even if circumstances had made it impossible to continue. It might not help much to remind oneself that part of the reason for all this was that the work was inefficient, clumsy and had become outmoded. Maybe worst of all would be to find amongst the ruins and abandonment an entirely inappropriate new clueless set of incumbents who could never have understood how hard we'd tried? But perhaps after all, that might be consoling. A comforting realisation that all has not been wasted, that new uses have been found for what we've left behind – in short, that life goes on. We hope. The Forecaster   This was where we lived and worked – a weather station way up north – Wrangel Island, to be precise Kolyuchin – north of Chukotka.   We made observations, carefully measured the various meteorolo...