20 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OP 'HIE 



long acquired the veneration of the Indians, and are 

 justly considered as their perpetual land-marks. We 

 cannot reasonably suppose that this enormous col- 

 lection of adventitious rocks can have been very far 

 conveyed from their original situation ; still from the 

 existence of facts, it does not appear that the Huron 

 lake constitutes a boundary betwixt these formations. 

 If I mistake not, both Kalm and Carver inform us 

 of the existence of fibrous gypsum or alabaster on the 

 banks of the Utawas ; a river, which by the aid of 

 inconsiderable portages, affords a navigable commu- 

 nication from Montreal to French river of lake Huron. 

 In connection with this formation is found the softish 

 brown-red argillaceous stone, so much esteemed and 

 employed by. the Indians in the manufacture of their 

 pipes. By Carver, and others, it is improperly 

 termed a serpentine, but appears to be merely a clay- 

 stone, of which I then obtained a specimen from the 

 river in question. There is also equal reason to cre- 

 dit the existence of fibrous gypsum in that country, 

 of which 1 received specimens during my stay at 

 the island of Michilimakinak. Hence it would ap- 

 pear, that we are to search for the termination of the 

 stratum we are tracing beyond the northern shores of 

 the Huron, and that it in all probability ceases where 

 the fibrous gypsum and red clay- stone commence. 



This calcareous platform is not even disturbed by 

 a single elevated hill along the whole southern bor- 

 der of lake Erie. The ridge, however, traversed by 

 the cataract of Niagara, and the falls, of Gennessee, 



