certainly during the 17th Century; made the locality famous, far and wide; was among the earliest known of America's healing remedies. It was evidently a leading, and a much-sought-for, prescription among the Aborigines. To-day, it has no value whatever. It is still to be found in abundance in the immediate vicinity of the Falls, in the Gorge below them; but no one seeks to gather it, save as a curiosity.

But, in those early days, among the ignorant and phenomenally superstitious Savages, those "Erie Stones," to be "found only at Niagara," seemed to them a special gift from the Great Spirit to his children. To the Savages, they were, veritably, "Big Medicine."

Their fame lasted for many a year. They were gathered and traded in—yes, and used—even until the middle of the 18th Century. As late as 1787, their reputation still clung to the great Fall.

That year, Capt. Enys, of the 29th Regiment, British, was at Niagara, and wrote of them—they were no longer called "Erie Stones," but the substance was known as "petrified spray of the Falls,"—