126 A Iderley Edge. 



ALDERLEY needs no eulogy, speaking, like a lady, for 

 itself. Whatever smoke-engendered thoughts may oc- 

 cupy the mind from Stockport onwards for twenty 

 minutes, they are effectually dispelled by the sight of the 

 stately hill, in the distance dressed with fir-woods, and 

 hitherward a medley of nature and art, that rises right in 

 front as we pass Wilmslow, and well deserves the name 

 of Alderley Edge. The familiar acquaintance with this 

 place on the part of all Manchester people renders any 

 long account of it unnecessary. Suffice it to say that 

 the Edge is a steep and beautifully curving cliff, of great 

 elevation, and some two miles in length, (reckoning to 

 the out-of-sight portion that overlooks Bollington,) with 

 here and there great slants of green, rough and project- 

 ing rocks, and innumerable fir-trees, with, in parts, 

 glorious oaks and birches, paths traversing the whole, 

 and introducing us to deep and sequestered glades 

 that in autumn are crowded with ferns. The remoter 

 parts form a portion of the addenda to Lord Stanley's 

 park ; the extremity next the station is thickly studded 

 with handsome residences, half hidden by trees, and 

 which were commenced in 1845, or the year after the 

 building of the Queen's Hotel. 



From many points upon the summit is obtained a 



upon Ornithology, but Bucke's " Beauties, Harmonies, and Sub- 

 limities of Nature," I. 221-233; "Time's Telescope" for 1815, 

 1821, and 1823, pp. respectively, 139, 118, and 106. Also vol. 4 

 of that admirable old journal the "Analyst," and Leigh Hunt's 

 "Imagination and Fancy," p. 261. 



