amongst huge stones, by which it is divided into separate currents, it is sometimes an object of considerable beauty." The environs of Buxton, as most travellers know, abound with natural curiosities and delightful scenery. On the Bakewell road we meet with lofty perpendicular rocks, which form, as it were, strong bulwarks to the valley of the Wye, and impart to it those interesting and romantic feelings with which most visitors and anglers on the river are inspired. At a short distance from the town, in a different direction, we fall in with those curious limestone quarries which have for long excited the attention of strangers. Pool's Hole is a cavern of considerable dimensions in the rock, somewhat contracted at its entrance, but more spacious in its inner courts. Stalacttes profusely cover its roof and sides; and towards its centre it contracts; but a little beyond, it again becomes wide and spacious. There is a huge column called "The Queen of Scots," from a tradition that she once stopped at this point. The whole length of the cavern is 560 yards. The dwelling houses on the side of the mountain seem to be excavated out of the débris of the lime-kilns. "Diamond Hill" is a spot which furnishes specimens of quartz, of a hexagonal shape, which are known by the name of Buxton diamonds. If we want to give an opinion as to the skill of the various anglers in the English counties, we should, without hesitation, award the palm for fly-fishing to Derbyshire. In no part of the country, indeed, have we met with men more careful in the arrangement of their tackle, or so successful in the use of it. They seem to be aware of the fact, that it is not the strength and clumsiness of the tackle, but the skill in the use of it, which must achieve the victory. That the maxim is a correct one, we do not doubt for a moment, and our own experience has proved beyond dispute, that in clear streams you cannot fish too fine, Often have we killed several brace of trout and grayling with the smallest blue and yellow duns; while others, using coarser materials, have in the same river failed utterly. Before concluding we shall make a remark or two on general matters connected with the angling of the Derbyshire streams. These shall be guided solely by our own personal experience and observation. As we know that anglers have often opinions and systems of their own, which are clotted with infallibility, we shall not deliver our councils with anything like a dogmatical air. We have always found short lines advantageous in these waters. The cast line and gut, with flies on, should never exceed the length of the rod. The narrow span of the river requires this arrangement, in order to throw a light and steady fly on the surface of those bright and glassy waters. We have often seen the want of sport consequent on a disregard of this precaution. Again, an angler must have a practised eye relative to the haunts of fish in these rivers. This is of mighty importance; but it is one of those habits which nothing save the closest and most accurate observations will enable the angler to form. When once possessed, however, it is invaluable. And lastly, we would just remark that a light mode of skewing the line is often useful, where the gushes and streams of air are so irregular and opposite. The same mode of throwing a line suited to the Tweed would be highly ludicrous and preposterous here. Short lines greatly facilitate the acquirement of this branch of fly-fishing. THE PRESERVE. ENGRAVED BY W. H. SMITH, FROM A PAINTING BY FUSSELL. Though all great nuisances must have an end, their fall rarely happens so instantaneously as the world might wish. It is the "d-nable reiteration" that will take the heart out of Smithfield market, the grist from the Banjo melodists, and the encore from "heat" racing. The Battue system, again, will trace its decline and fall in the same way many, perhaps, would affirm even now that our grandees will never suffer it to go; but going it is, nevertheless. The whole public have had their attention called to the use and abuse of the thing; and with their eyes once opened, it is remarkable how quick they are to drive nail after nail into the coffin of him their judgment has taught them to condemn. In their utter ignorance of the means provided, people read out with proper awe and respect, of his Grace the Duke of Drive-it-into-'em, and his friend the Honourable Captain Blazeaway, killing their three hundred and odd brace a day, with rabbits and hares in proportion. They fancied they saw a strong spice of the ancient manhood in Britain's chiefs, from such a chronicled performance, and lauded their prowess a-field accordingly. But times have changed now. The wide-awake country editor hesitates before he inserts at all any account of such a slaughter, well knowing what a handle it is to lay hold off. The enlightened public have fashioned their sportsmen now more by quality than quantity, and would prise a glowing account of a hard day far more than they would appreciate the imposing figure of a "field" one. There has been scarcely time yet to "get up" a grand paragraph of the latter kind; the only one indeed we have seen this season went to show how a noble duke, who was hunting the wild deer" in the north, had slain his twenty or thirty head in a day. And what then? What said the world at large to that? Why, the "grand total" itself let out to them it was not true sport; and so instead of being struck dumb with amazement at the prowess displayed, they christen his grace "Giblets" forthwith, and ask him at how much he sells it a pound? 66 When poor Jack Smith, with eighty pounds a year, a three-legged pointer, and leave to shoot over the radical brewer's five hundred acre estate-when he knocks them over in any and every sort of form he can get at them when he steals a march here, and circumvents a neighbour's birds there, all for the one momentous question of making a bag and getting a dinner; when the unhappy Smith, with the wildest of birds and worst of countries, owns to the "all's fair" in running up a score, the lookers on sneer and call him a "pot hunter." And yet within a very few years these said spectators used to open their eyes, and demi-god the great man, who, with three keepers and four guns, walked into a preserve where the pheasants came out to meet him like they would on an undiscovered island, and were brought down à la Mrs. Bond's ducks, at the simplest cry of "Come and be killed." Then, of course, in due time the game cart went round with the spoil hanging over the horse's back and out at the tail-board, and his grace was a "mighty hunter" forthwith; while friend Smith, with " only" all his pockets full, was a sneeking poacher and nothing more. And yet Smith was, by long odds, the better sportsman of the two; and, happy we are to write it, every body knows and admits it now. There have been many "aids and assists," to be sure, to help to send the Battue to that tomb it has brought so many to already. Protection, as the disinterested patriots at Manchester tell us, is gone for ever; and protection being rather a comprehensive term, it reaches now and then a little beyond the "grin and bear it" body of British yeomen. Squire Spring-gun, at this end of the shire, begins, or rather ends, the game by proclaiming that any of his tenants may kill the rabbits and hares ; his next-door neigbour, Mrs. Steel-trap, trumps him at once, by agreeing that provided her butler may share and share alike with them, her people may make all fish that comes to net, from a "Mollhern" to a moor hen; and "thirdly," rumour begins to assert that the Lord Lieutenant has turned his head keeper into a farm bailiff, and set all the watchers and understrappers to make a new road right through the heart of the favourite cover. With such announcement vice the grand doings of former times, we may once more venture to introduce "The Preserve" under its true title and as true sport. With a fair supply of birds, and a fair means of keeping them we have nothing further to say, than to wish our friends one and all, a steady hand, a quick eye, and a long innings. SKETCHES FROM THE " HEYTHROP COUNTRY." BY LATITAT. I love our merry England, a glorious land I ween; I love her old baronial halls, whose turrets from afar Speak tales of love and history, or deeds of feudal war; They stand on rocks and gentle hills, 'mongst trees and ivy green. When grey twilight or pale moonlight o'er nature softly sleeps, The restless spirit wings its flight o'er time and thought's wide world, In scenes like these, in such an hour, when busy memory plays |