footed fowls, poached eggs or rere roasted is also right nourishing meats, as is aforesaid."

If the patient would like a little fruit after his 'diet,' the doctor is quite willing that he should take "almonds, raisins, pomegranates, figs," and so forth. Wine he does not actually prohibit but for a poor sick, or as he calls it, crazed' body; at Buxton, some good ale, "neither too new nor too stale, and not overhopped, is the best drink." With these a sick man might make shift pretty well. It is reasonable to suppose that they were obtainable at Buxton, by their being so carefully prescribed by the Buxton doctor.

But then it is possible that Buxton may have become so degenerate in the course of a century that the 'gentry' who repaired thither may have been glad to be "regaled with a viand which the host called mutton, but which the guests strongly suspected to be dog." Of course it is possible, though it is generally stated that the baths continue to grow in fame and favour: let us see whether we cannot find some contemporary notices of Buxton viands. This time the philosopher of Malmesbury shall lend us aid. Just about the time referred to, Hobbes wrote a Latin poem, already mentioned, De Mirabilibus Pecci, published in 1636 and 1666; and again in 1678, with an English version on the opposite page. There he relates the particulars of a visit which he paid to the Buxton Baths. Arriving towards evening, the travellers resolved to bathe, "while turfy fuel does prepare our supper." When they returned to their room, "the spread tables" told that the supper was ready. Now observe with what viands they were regaled: it is not a very stately supper, but there is no suspicion of dog:

"Then in by candle-light our meats convey'd,

Where a small bowl, but not whole baths of broth At our request is plac'd to be supt off : The mutton taken from 't apart is laid; From the same sheep a smoking loin is had, Hot drawn from off the spit; with a young fowl From the demolish'd egg was lately stole, And butter'd pease by spoonfuls. But rich wine In vain we seek; ale in black pots that shine, Good ale we drink. Thus supt, afar nappy We with tobacco drive off sleep and care."-p. 70. We had collected a good many other notes, but it would be useless to pursue the subject further. Enough for us is it to know that "in the seventeenth century, the gentry of Derbyshire and of the neighbouring counties who repaired to Buxton were not crowded into low wooden sheds, or regaled with oatcake and with a viand which the hosts called mutton, but which the guests strongly suspected to be dog." Enough is it to know that if the viands were not luxurious, they were wholesome and substantial; and that if the lodgings were what we might think rude, they were at any rate comfortable.

We have been thus particular in inquiring into this defamation of poor Buxton, and in clearing off the stain cast on her early character, as in duty bound, being for the nonce her humble servitor. But it is

to question these broad and startling statements. We are rather too apt now-a-days not merely to dwell with complacency on our own comforts and luxuries, but to exaggerate the poor make-shifts and unrefined contrivances of our semi-barbarous great-grandfathers. No doubt we are very much wealthier, and therefore happier and wiser than the poor creatures of that dismal age-but, after all, they were flesh and blood, and did somehow manage to crawl through their pitiable existence; it will be at least generous on our part, therefore, not to expend needless pity upon them, or make them worse off than they were, or their state more deplorable. It is not difficult to guess how it was that Mr. Macaulay fell into this error. A dull man might have taken Master Thomas's lively exaggeration for a grave narrative-as dull men are said to have read the narrative of Captain Gulliver; but Mr. Macaulay could not so have blundered. He has probably trusted to his memory, or to a hasty note made when looking through Wilkins's edition of Sir Thomas Browne's Works (perhaps when he reviewed it), and he had forgotten that Young Browne's Tour was not a substantive work, and so did not turn to it to verify the quotation or reference when sitting down to the history.

Having seen what Buxton was, or was not, let us look a while at what it is. From the seventeenth century downwards, it seems to have maintained and increased its popularity. Many additions and improvements were made at different times; but for those which have stamped on Buxton its general character and appearance, the town is indebted to the late Duke of Devonshire, who almost entirely rebuilt the fashionable or visitor's part of the town. The chief pile of building in Buxton-that which distinguishes the town both close at hand and from a distance the Crescent, was commenced by him "about the year 1789, and completed in seven years afterwards, at a cost of £120,000." For a town of but a few hundred inhabitants it is a structure of uncommon size. It is three stories high; the lower one is rusticated, and forms an arcade, which serves as a covered promenade. "The span of the Crescent is 200 feet, and each wing measures 58 feet, making the whole extent of the front 316 feet." It contains 378 windows. The style is Doric; the architect was Mr. Carr, of York. Among the additions made by the present duke, the new church is the most important and noticeable. It is a large and graceFrom its elevated ful edifice, in the Tuscan style. position, it is a leading feature in every view of the town. Of the additions made to the visitors' means of enjoyment, the laying out and planting the hill in front of the Crescent, and the construction of the Duke's Drive,' are the principal. The former is a considerable improvement to the appearance of the town itself, as well as a grateful boon to the resident, to whom it furnishes-together with the Serpentine Walks' formed down by the side of the Wye-as pleasant and cheerful a variety of home walks as in an inland town he could expect or desire. All are open freely alike to rich or poor.

The baths are numerous, and fitted up with every possible regard for convenience and comfort. The temperature of the water is somewhat higher than that of Matlock, but inferior to that of Bath. The Buxton water is applied both internally and externally in a great many disorders; and if it were the custom now as of yore to make votive offerings, St. Anne's shrine would display now, as it did when the Commissioners demolished it, a goodly collection of "shirts and shifts and crutches." There are several places for drinking as well as bathing: but now, as three centuries ago, the principal fount is "St. Anne's Well," which is situated close by the hotel of the same name. The spring is covered by a neat little Grecian building. The water in St. Anne's Well has a temperature of 81°. A little distance from it rises another spring, the water of which is quite cold. These springs formed one of the Wonders of the Peak, and are duly celebrated in the poems so entitled. pretty to observe," says Master Thomas Browne, "the hissing of the cold and hot springs, so nigh one another, that by putting my hand into the water I conceived one finger to freeze till the other could not endure the heat of the boiling spring just by it." Buxton had in 1841 a population of 1500. There is accommodation in the hotels and boarding-houses for about the same number of strangers. The average visitors to Buxton during the season is between 14,000 and 15,000.

"It was

Mr. Rhodes has in a few words described the appearance of the town: "The upper part of Buxton is truly a Derbyshire village; the lower, in the elegance of its buildings, its show, and its parade, approximates to Bath." The fashionable part, with its stately buildings, its gardens and promenades filled with welldressed company moving to and fro while the band is performing popular melodies, is, in the height of the season, a gay place, and will be looked upon with pleasure: and the contrast is certainly striking between it and the upper part-but we confess to having a liking for the latter, and by no means agree with Mr. Rhodes' description of it as miserable, mean, and povertystricken. We like it for not being smooth, and formal, and Bath-like. Buxton presents no very remarkable appearance from the surrounding country. It is perhaps seen to most advantage from the higher grounds about Fairfield. (Cut, No. 7.)

There are charming walks and drives around Buxton: but we have no room left to speak of them. The Valley of the Wye by Shirbrook Dell, Ashwood Dale, and Lover's Leap, is very fine; and there are splendid views from the heights which border it. On the other side is the bare bleak mountain, Axe Edge, from which there is a range of prospects of marvellous extent. During the Ordnance Survey, the station on Axe Edge was connected with others on the tower of Lincoln Cathedral and the summit of Snowdon-the reflector placed on the latter was distinctly visible, though ninety miles distant. On the slopes of Axe Edge four of the rivers of Derbyshire take their rise: the Goit, the Dane, the

Dove, and the Wye. The source of the Wye is just out of the Macclesfield road, about a mile from Buxton, in a spot which gives no promise of the future beauty of the river. The Dove rises high up the mountainside, some distance above the village of Dove Head, and is a pretty streamlet from the first. We must mention Pool's Hole, which was once reckoned among the wonders of the Peak; and boasts of having been visited by Mary Queen of Scots while she was a resident at Buxton for the benefit of the waters. It is inferior to the Castleton caverns, yet worth visiting. The other notabilia of Buxton must go unnamed.

DOVE DALE.

From Buxton, Dove Dale is some sixteen miles distant. The upper part of the river is pretty in parts, and a resolute pedestrian would prefer following loosely its guidance to Dove Dale to taking the road. If that be not done, it is advisable, if time permits, to join the river at Hartington, for the sake of visiting the scenery of the Second Part of the Complete Angler.' Just where the broad meadows begin to contract, is the little fishing-house built by Charles Cotton, and by him dedicated to fishermen, and which all fishermen and all lovers of the gentle craft regard with peculiar interest. The little house is still perfect as when Cotton owned, and, in the person of Viator, so pleasantly described it ; and Izaak Walton added to it and to the surrounding scene the crowning charm by declaring, that though some part of the fishing-house has been described, the pleasantness of the river, mountains, and meadows cannot; unless Sir Philip Sidney, or Mr. Cotton's father, were again alive to do it."

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Just beyond the fishing-house the Dove has forced a way through a rocky glen, which, though short, is nearly as fine in its way as anything along the river. The dale is richly wooded, the rocks are bold, and the river full and rapid. A large piece of rock, which rises out of the bed of the river, and is quite detached from the parent cliff, has given the name of Pike Pool to part of the dell. Cotton's notice of it is worth quoting. "Viator. What have we got here? a rock springing up in the middle of the river? this is one of the oddest sights that ever I saw. Piscator. Why, sir, from that pike, that you see standing up there distant from the rock, this is called Pike Pool: and young Mr. Izaak Walton was so pleased with it, as to draw it in landscape in black and white." This drawing is lost, but there is a sketch of it in black and white by old Mr. Izaak Walton, which he added by way of note to the above passage. "It is a rock in the fashion of a spiresteeple, and almost as big. It stands in the midst of the river Dove; and not far from Mr. Cotton's house, below which place this delicate river takes a swift career betwixt many mighty rocks, much higher and bigger than St. Paul's church before it was burnt." How characteristic a touch is that of the excellent old linendraper of Fleet Street!

On passing from this spot, you have, if you follow the stream, to traverse a "long, narrow, and desolate

valley, called Narrow Dale." It has been called "barren of wood, and, with one or two exceptions, devoid of beauty." Barren of wood it is, and perhaps devoid of beauty; but its very desolateness has an attraction. The hill-sides run up to a great height very precipitously, bare, craggy, and void of vegetation save grass and furze, and a little stunted brushwood. Here and there huge rocky fragments project from the slopes, and occasionally large spaces consist wholly of screes; while the river, pent within a close rocky channel, courses rapidly along the deep bottom. This may not be beauty, but is something that is at least very agreeable to look upon.

Mill Dale, which succeeds, is less interesting; but very curious and picturesque is the sort of village by the bridge, or rather disjointed collection of houses, which seem as though they were fitted into or carved out of the knolls and recesses of the rock. But visitors to Dove Dale do not come thus far; they almost invariably enter it from the south, and turn back again when they have ascended it as far as Dove Holes.

Perhaps it is best, as well as most convenient, to approach Dove Dale on the southern side. It has at any rate the advantage that it obliges the visitor to retrace his steps, and so see the Dale in both directions. Dove Dale is nearly three miles long; it has many short and sharp windings, and some pretty long ones; but on the whole its direction is north and south; and hence, as the banks rise up on either hand into lofty broken cliffs and craggy hills, and other lofty hills raise themselves in the distance wherever the valley opens sufficiently to permit them to be seen, the reader who is used to look on Nature with an observant eye, will see that very much of the character and beauty of the several spots will depend on the time of day and state of the weather in which they are witnessed. If Dove Dale be passed through as the sun is sinking behind the hills on a bright autumnal afternoon or evening, there would be little hesitation in saying that the downward walk is by far the finest, notwithstanding some glorious scenes in the opposite direction: at other hours the decision would probably be the reverse,

We are not going to enter upon any particular description of Dove Dale. That has been done often enough already, and we have neither time nor inclination to do it again just now. We can only point out two or three of the noted points as we stroll through it. The opening of the Dale on this northern side is very grand. On both sides the rocks rise in enormous masses from the river, black, bare, and frowning. By some mighty convulsion of Nature, the rocks seem to have been rent asunder, while the storms of ages have torn and riven the surface. Here bold spiry fragments stand detached; there gloomy caverns seem to pierce into the heart of the mountain. Beyond rise lofty moorland slopes; while the stream forces its way beyond the opposing blocks of mossy stone that lie in its channel. But far enough to see this tourists seldom proceed. A little further is what is commonly what is commonly considered the northern entrance to Dove Dale. Here

on the left, is a vast wall of rock, running up, after it has gained some height above the river, into a craggy mountain slope. On the right, a huge, insulated, shapeless column, called Pickering Tor, rises from the river to a great elevation. By its base a few light trees dip into the clear stream, and the hills are pretty thickly clad with foliage: and all these, with the rich. prospect beyond, the river, here calm as the pale blue sky which bends above, repeats in its dark bosom. Our view belongs to this lower part of the dale. (Cut, No. 8.)

As you proceed, scenes of exquisite loveliness alternate with those in which a rugged grandeur predominates. Sometimes you seem shut in a close shady dell, where luxuriant trees hide all the lower rocks, and overhang the water. Sometimes hardly a tree is to be seen, but the hill-sides are covered with short grass, and heath and furze contrast with the gray protruding crags about which they love to cluster. Occasionally the whole hill-sides seem broken up, and spiry pinnacles and irregular ragged crags stand up like fragments of some wide ruin. In some places the rocks rise up abruptly to a vast height, and beetling masses impend threateningly. The river, too, seems to adapt itself to the character of each succeeding scene. At one time it glides quietly and smoothly; at others it rattles rapidly over a pebbly bed again it winds between large loose pieces of rock, that have fallen from the adjoining heights; and all through the dale it every now and then forms into some delicious little foaming water-breaks.

But the tourist must not, if he can climb, confine himself to the bottom of the dale. From the slopes of the hills, and from the summits of the cliffs, some noble views of the windings of the dale and the varying forms of the hills which border it are obtainable. One spot he will, of course, not omit to ascend. Reynard's Cave is one of the 'lions' of Dove Dale; it will be found about halfway up the dale, at some height up the hill-side on the left. Before you reach the cave you come upon an enormous isolated mass of rock, which rises from the hill-a sort of natural triumphal arch: its appearance is very strange, having so artificial a look, though manifestly natural. From it you have a grand view of the dale; and the river, with its water-breaks, looks very charming from this height. Some yards higher up is the cave, a natural excavation, which pierces for a short distance into the rock; this is sometimes called Reynard's Hall, and another recess close by, Reynard's Kitchen.

In parting with Dove Dale, let us only add that, after not having seen it for some years, and having, meanwhile, witnessed much beautiful and famous scenery, we strolled about it the other day with as much delight as the first time we saw it, and quitted it as unwillingly. Although we cannot do more, we must not neglect to recommend the visitor to Dove Dale on no account to leave the grounds of Ilam Hall, or the village of Ilam, unseen.