132 Country Rambles. 



In the olden times it was similar at Stockport, though 

 now subdued by the constant casting in of dirt, if there 

 be truth, that is, in the record that in 1745, when the 

 Stockport bridge was blown up in order to check the 

 retreat of the Pretender, it ran beneath the arches "with 

 great fury." Upon the western banks of the Goyt, not 

 very far from Chadkirk. perched upon a romantic natural 

 terrace, there is another very interesting and celebrated 

 Elizabethan mansion, Marple Old Hall, the more 

 pleasing since, though subjected in 1659 to rather con- 

 siderable alterations, it appears to retain all the best of 

 the original characteristics. It is now draped also, in 

 part, with luxuriant ivy. The historical incidents con- 

 nected with Marple Hall are well known, those, at 

 least, which gather round the name of Cromwell. To 

 our own mind there is something better yet, the 

 spectacle in the earliest months of spring of the innu- 

 merable snowdrops, these dressing the woods and slopes 

 with their immaculate purity, almost to the water's edge. 

 Proceeding direct to Marple by the Midland, the 

 choicest of the many walks now at command begins with 

 descent of the hill upon the left, then, as soon as the 

 river is reached, keeping as near it as may be practi- 

 cable, through the lanes and meadows as far as 

 "Arkwright's Mill." No Ancoats mill is this one. 

 Originally called "Bottoms Mill," it was erected in 1790 

 by the celebrated Mr. Samuel Oldknow, of whom so 

 many memorials exist in the neighbourhood, including a 

 lettered tablet in Marple church, and who would seem 



