ROMAN MINOR SETTLEMENTS, ETC. 207 



though much obliterated by the modern turnpike road which 

 continnes in its line as far as Little Over, where, a little before 

 it reaches the two milestone, the Roman road keeps its north 

 north-east direction, while the present one slants to the east 

 towards Derby. The old road, though not easy to be dis- 

 tinguished in the cultivation so near a populous town, crossed 

 Nun's Green, and proceeded down Darley-slade to the banks 

 of the Derwent, passing that river by a bridge (the piers of 

 which may be felt in a dry summer) to the station at Little 

 Chester * * * . It is by no means improbable that the 

 British Rykneld Street crossed the Derwent lower down at a 

 ford, perhaps at the very place where Derby now stands, and then 

 resuming its northerly course, would pass the east wall of the 

 Roman town as Stukeley has represented it in his map. The 

 Roman road, however, on crossing the Derwent, seems to have 

 passed the meadows near the north gate of the station, and after 

 clearing the houses of the vicus, would fall into the Rykneld 

 Street near the north-east angle of the vallum, and proceed 

 with it in its old line. The ground about the modern Little 

 Chester being chiefly under the plough, the ridge of the road 

 near it has been long destroyed; but on passing Breadsall 

 Priory on the left, and rising up towards the alms-houses on 

 Morley-moor, a large fragment of it is visible on the right hand, 

 and again, though less plainly, on the moor itself, abutting on 

 the fence about a hundred yards east of Brackley Gate. It next 

 appears close to Horsley Park, a little west of the lodge, and is 

 very high, covered with furze in the first enclosure ; then passing 

 through another field or two, crosses the road from Wirksworth 

 to Nottingham, about a hundred yards west of Horsley Wood- 

 house, being quite plain in the inclosure south of the road called 

 Castlecroft, and again in the field to the north of it. It now 

 enters an old lane, which it soon quits, and may be seen in a 

 field or two to the left, running down to a house called Cumber- 

 some, which stands upon it ; from hence down another field over 

 Botolph (corruptly Bottle) Brook, which it crosses straight for the 

 Smithy-houses, and enters a lane, called from it the Street-lane, 



