io Marple Ridge. 



vast plain with its incalculable wealth of life. Let 

 those who make a pilgrimage hither not forget to bring 

 their opera-glasses, which, however useful if we would 

 scan the features of a cantatrice, have a higher and 

 more becoming use on the mountain-side. 



Pursuing the road along the ridge, at last we reach 

 the church and village that give name* to it, the former 

 almost as conspicuous a landmark as Lyme Cage. If 

 bent upon a rural ramble, it is better to turn out of it very 

 soon, not far from the highest part, through a broken 

 place of ingress upon the right, close to a cottage, and 

 so again on to the surface of the grass. Now we are 

 upon the brow of a steep slope that falls in the reverse 

 direction; Strines, with its white buildings, immediately 

 below ; the long and sinuous line of shining water that in- 

 dicates the Peak-forest canal, bearing away to the right ; 

 the Derbyshire hills face to face with our own ; the new 

 railway line, that promises conveyance to London, via 

 Guide-bridge and Buxton, in a shorter time than we can 

 travel by any other, skimming along the base ; and New- 

 mills, in many buildings, half disclosing itself above. 

 Descending this almost precipitous field, bearing to the 

 left, and crossing the canal, we reach the banks of the 

 river Goyt, and when over the curious old bridge at the 

 foot of Strawberry-hill, have entered the county of spar, 

 not, however, to see mineral curiosities to-day, Derbyshire 

 being at this part of its frontiers precisely similar in 

 productions to North Cheshire. Considerable choice 



