136 Country Rambles. 



fireworks, no doubt has a kind of sublimity. Still there is 

 nothing to please, unless it be pleasure to stand in a dark 

 inferno that seems no part of our own world, and which 

 can scarcely be entered without a feeling of dismay. The 

 ruins of Peveril Castle, and the fine old Norman arch in 

 Castleton church are both very interesting to the archae- 

 ologist. The position of the former is most curious, the 

 castle seeming from the foot of the hill to stand upon a 

 simple slope of turf, whereas in reality just behind it 

 there is an impassable abyss. 



This inestimable line, the Midland, carries us also to 

 " Miller's Dale," from which station! there is a branch at 

 an acute returning angle to Buxton; thence onwards to 

 " Monsal Dale," Hassop, Bakewell, Rowsley, Darley, and 

 Matlock. Monsal Dale, ipsissima, has been called the 

 "Arcadia of the Peak." It may be so. Remembering 

 the ancient and golden canon that it is the eye of the 

 lover that makes the beauty, the judgment may be let 

 stand as one that was true and just to the man who 

 pronounced it. The poet asks, "Who can paint like 

 nature?" Surely he forgot the sweet facility of the human 

 heart; in any case, there are no festoons like those woven 

 by the spirit of man. Hassop, the next in order, is the 

 nearest point of departure, on foot, for Chatsworth, 

 though Bakewell has somewhat the advantage as regards 

 scenery upon the way. Bakewell is the centre also for 

 Haddon Hall, reached thence, on foot, in half an hour. 

 Rowsley supplies the carriage-way to Chatsworth, and a 

 shady and retired walk thereto along the western side of 



