622 YONGE STREET AND DUNDAS STREET. 



order of the Society, where the accounts transmitted might appear to> 

 justify it, produce in time a very complete account and system of these 

 military Roman remains, as well as of other municipia, and perhaps 

 baths and other vestiges of Roman magnificence. I beg pardon for 

 the liberty I have taken of suggesting thus much, and for detaining 

 you so long upon this subject; but I thought the explanation neces- 

 sary to elucidate the occasion of the treatise transmitted from Major 

 Rooke, and I also thought the subject not unworthy of the attention 

 of the Society. It will give both Major Rooke and me great pleasure 

 if they should be of the same opinion, or if they should think what 

 has been offered in any degree deserving their notice. I am, with 

 regard. Sir, your most obedient and humble servant, Geo. Yonge." 

 This communication to tho Society of Antiquaries is dated "Strat- 

 ford Place, May 7, 1788." After reading it, we can readily under- 

 stand why the fiirst organizer and Governor of Upper Canada, General 

 Simcoe, should have attached the name of Sir George Yonge to the- 

 great military road cast up and hewn out by him, in 1793, through 

 the primitive woods from Lake Ontario to Lake Huron. It was not 

 simply as a compliment to the Secretary at War of the day, but it 

 was also something to give special gratification to a Fellow of the 

 Society of Antiquaries who had made himself, by his observation and 

 research, an authority on Roman roads. The application, too, of the 

 term " Street" to the two great original highways opened up within 

 the new province, and intersecting each other at right angles in the 

 heart of its capital town, is thus explained. It was to follow the- 

 example of the old Roman colonizers, who wisely made it an essential 

 part of their system to e&tablish at once, throughout the length and 

 breadth of each region occupied, a public way, well constructed, and 

 usually paved with blocks of stone — hence called a via strata — 

 vernaeularized into Street by our Saxon forefathers. Thus we have 

 Watling Street, a Ronxan road leading from Richborough to Canter- 

 bury and London ; Ickneild Street, a Roman road leading from 

 Tynemouth through York, Derby, and Birmingham to St. David's; 

 Ermin Street, leading from Southampton, also to St. David's. Whilst 

 Ardwick-le-Street in Yorkslaire, Chester-le-Street in Durham, Stretton, 

 Stratton, Streatham, and several places called Stretford and Stratford, 

 all imply that they were each of them situated on the line of some 

 old Roman street or road. 



