[ganong] stone medallion OF LAKE UTOPL'\ 101 



Upon one occasion, while in conversation with an old resident of St. George, 

 he gave me an account of a somewhat singular monument which, many years before 

 this period, stood on the summit of a hill near the canal, and about one-half mile 

 distant from the place where the carved stone was found. It consisted of a large 

 oval or rounded stone, weighing as my informant roughly estimates, seventy-five 

 hundredweight, lying on three vertical stone columns, from ten inches to one foot 



in height, and firmly sunk in the ground My informant stated that 



the boys and other visitors were in the habit of throwing stones at the columns, 

 and that eventually the monument was tumbled over, by the combined effort of 

 a number of ship carpenters, and fell crashing into the valley. 



It is interesting to trace the matter backwards. In 1878, Mr. 

 C. C. Ward, in an article in Scrihneis Monthly already mentioned, 

 says, along with his mention of the medallion: — 



On one of the mountains on Lake Utopia there was at one time, a curious 

 structure resembling an altar, and built with large slabs of granite. Recently some 

 vandals, in order to gratify an idiotic whim, tumbled the largest block down the 

 hill-side, and into the lake. 



In 1873 Dr. Leith Adams, with his account of the medallion in 

 his Field and Forest Ramhlets, already cited, adds: — 



I spent several days in the locality searching for further relics, and more especi- 

 ally the remains of a temple building said to have existed at one time on a bluff 

 overlooking the lake, of which, however, not a trace was observable. 



In the same year E. J. Russell, in the Canadian Illustrated News, 

 (VII, 1873, 216) gave an excellent account of the red granite mountains 

 near St. George, w^hose value was then first achieving recognition. 

 He does not mention temple or altar (nor does he in his article on 

 the Lake in the preceding volume in which he describes thj medallion), 

 but in speaking of ihe cliffs near which the temple-altar is said to 

 have existed, he says:- — • 



Some enormous masses in some parts have detacl ed themselves from the face 

 of the mountain, and lay all ready for shipment, fitted to form the base of a sarco- 

 phagus for a President of the United States or a Prime Minister of the Dominion. 

 One piece, which is called "Cleopatra's Needle" contains not less than one hundred 

 tons of stone without a flaw, and rests at an angle of about 45 deg. against the solid 

 sides of its grandfather. 



In an accompanying woodcut, he shows this great and very 

 regular columnar rock in its leaning position, presenting indeed, an 

 aspect as though it had been toppled over from the cliff. 



Back of 1873 I have not been able to trace any mention of the 

 temple-altar, and it is significant that C. C. Ward, in his excellent 

 account of the finding of the medallion, and his mention of other 

 interesting relics of that region (in the London Illustrated News of 

 1864 already cited), does not refer to it. Mr. Vroom, Avhose interest 



