Miller s Dale. 137 



the stream. From this point also access is easy to Lath- 

 kill Dale, and many another of the gems of Derbyshire. 

 Darley Dale, with its majestic yew, one of the oldest and 

 grandest trees in England, and Matlock, with its mighty 

 Tor, are places for the longest of summer days we can 

 do with no less when the sunshine is oriental and sunset 

 is a kaleidoscope. 



For a simple afternoon, there is nothing within easy 

 reach more delicious than Miller's Dale itself, the signifi- 

 cance of which name is really the lucid and babbling 

 Wye, in its sweetest portion, and the unique recess which 

 holds Chee Tor, not to mention the pretty Wormhill 

 springs. The entrance to the vale is close to the station, 

 the path lying first through a long-extended grove of 

 trees, then changing to the green turf of a most beautiful 

 seclusion, the ground rising in pleasant slopes, smooth 

 except where broken by uncovered rock, while by our 

 side, all the way, the stream runs peacefully, circling at 

 times in quiet pools, or quickening in ripples that seem 

 to speak, the shallower parts decked with pebbles that 

 are covered, when the sun shines, with lacework of leaf- 

 shadows. The springs are at the foot of the slope where 

 a steep and rugged path leads to Wormhill. The water 

 wells out of the ground just as in the streets of a city 

 when some great conduit underneath has given way, 

 being derived, there can be no doubt, from some far- 

 distant original source, whence it has travelled by secret 

 subterranean channels. The phenomenon is in Derby- 

 shire by no means an uncommon one. Streams in 



