58 THE VERMONTER. 



face of Hoosac Mountain is so steep that the idea of any agency pushing the bowlder 

 along the surface is absurd. We see at once that it must have been lifted up and carried 

 over the gulf. And then how happened it to be set down just on the edge of the moun- 

 tain? 



FIG. 20. 



The Vermouter in Florida. 



Such huge bowlders are beginning to excite a good deal of popular interest. One in 

 Danvers, Mass., called Ship Rock, and weighing 1556 tons, surrounded by a multitude of 

 smaller ones, has been purchased by a Scientific Society in Essex county, and an iron ladder 

 attached to it. This is a commendable example ; for in many parts of the country these 

 bowlders will be used for building, as was done with perhaps the largest one in New Eng- 

 land at Fall River, and thus some of the most striking proofs of the drift agency be de- 

 stroyed. That in Florida will hardly be exposed to such a use, but we predict that not 

 many years will elapse before it will be visited by travelers especially as it lies not many 

 miles from the Hoosac Tunnel as an object of scientific interest. We hope there will be 

 found public spirit enough in Adams to build a decent road to it, clear away the sur- 

 rounding trees, and place a ladder against it, so that from its top now inaccessible a 

 view may be obtained of the deep valley to the west, above described. 



But though this child of Vermont has chosen its residence a little beyond the limits of 

 the State, enough others remain within those limits of perhaps deeper interest. One in 

 Stamford (12 feet high, 20 feet long and 18 feet wide) was used by an early settler as a but- 

 tress against which he built his house, and it now goes by the name of Rock Raymond. 

 But the most gigantic specimen with which we have met, lies on the naked ledges on a 

 high hill on the farm of Jonathan Dix, in the west part of Whitingham. From this hill 

 we look westerly into the valley of Deerfield river, which must be over 500 feet deep, and 

 from the character of the rock, corresponding to that of the Green Mountains (a highly 

 micaceous gneiss) , we feel sure that the bowlder was transported across this valley. Yet 

 its length is 40 feet ; its horizontal circumference 125 feet ; its average width 32 feet ; its 

 cubic contents 40,000 feet, and its weight 3400 tons. Think of the power requisite in the 

 first place to tear off from the ledge such a gigantic mass, and then to lift it up and carry 

 it across a deep mountain valley, and then to plant it near the highest part of a rocky 

 ridge. It does not seem to have been much rounded, and cannot therefore have been 



