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The Peak of Derbyshire
Original Size
The traveller into Derbyshire, unaccustomed to the district, may not unnaturally inquire for “the Peak,” which he has been taught to consider one of the chief English mountains, and the name of which has always suggested to him something like a pyramid of rock,—an English Matterhorn. He will be soon undeceived, and then may paradoxically declare the peculiarity of “the Peak District” to be that there is no Peak! The range so called is a bulky mass of millstone grit, rising irregularly from the limestone | formation which occupies the southern part of Derbyshire, and extending in long spurs, or arms, north and north-east into Yorkshire as far as Sheffield, and west and south into Cheshire and Staffordshire. The plateau is covered by wild moorland, clothed with fern, moss and heather, and broken up by deep hollows and glens, through which streamlets descend, each through its own belt of verdure, from the spongy morasses above, forming in their course many a minute but picturesque waterfall. The pedestrian who establishes himself in the little inn at Ashopton, will have the opportunity of exploring many a breezy height and romantic glen; while, if he has strength of limb and of lungs to make his way to Kinderscout, the highest point of all, he will breathe, at the elevation of not quite two thousand feet, as fresh and exhilarating an atmosphere as can be found anywhere in these islands; the busy smoky city of Manchester being at a distance, “as the crow flies,” of little more than fifteen miles! It is no wonder that a select company of hard-worked men, who have lighted on this nook among the hills, having a taste for natural history, resort hither year after year, finding a refreshment in the repeated visit equal at least to that which their fellow-citizens enjoy, at greater cost, in the terraces of Buxton, or on the gigantic slope of Matlock Bank.
Where the limestone emerges from under the mass of grit, the scenery altogether changes. For roughly-rounded, dark-coloured rocks, covered with ling and bracken, now appear narrow glens, bold escarped edges, cliffs splintered into pinnacles and pierced by wonderful caves traversed by hidden streams. Of these caves the “Peak Cavern” at Castleton is the largest, that of the “Blue John Mine” the most beautiful, from its veins of Derbyshire spar.
The tourist, however, who confines himself to the Peak District proper, with its immediately outlying scenery, will have a very inadequate view of the charms of Derbyshire. He can scarcely do better than begin at the other extremity, ascending the Dove through its limestone valley as far as Buxton, thence taking rail to Chapel-en-le-Frith, expatiating over the Peak moorlands according to time and inclination, descending to the limestone region again at Castleton, and following the Derwent in its downward course to Ambergate, pausing in his way to visit Chatsworth and Haddon Hall, and to stay awhile at Matlock.
Having thus planned our own journey, our starting-point was Ashbourne, a quiet, pretty little town at the extremity of a branch railway. There was not much in the town itself to detain us: we could only pay a hurried visit to the church, whose beautiful spire, 212 feet high, is sometimes called the Pride of the Peak. There are some striking monuments; and among them one with an inscription of almost unequalled mournfulness. It is to an only child, a daughter: “She was in form and intellect most exquisite. The unfortunate parents ventured their all on this frail bark, and the wreck was total.” Never was plaint of sorrowing despair more touching. Let us hope, both that the parents’ darling was a lamb in the Good Shepherd’s fold, and that the sorrowing father and mother found at length that there can be no total wreck to those whose treasure is in heaven!
A night’s refreshing rest at the inn, where several nationalities oddly combine to make up one complex sign—the fierce Saracen, the thick-lipped negro, the English huntsman in his coat of Lincoln green!—and we sallied forth on a glorious day of early autumn to make our first acquaintance with Dovedale. Leaving the town at the extremity furthest from the railway station, we found ourselves on a well-kept, undulating road, skirted by fair pastures on either hand; the absence of cornfields being a very marked feature in the landscape. Turning into pleasant country lanes to the left, we soon reached the garden gate of a finely-situated rural inn, the “Peveril ut’ the Peak,” whence a short cut would have led us over the brow of the hill into Dovedale; but we were anxious to visit Ilam, and therefore made a détour as far as the “Izaak Walton,” so well known to brothers of the “gentle craft.” A little farther, and we were in the identical Happy Valley of Rasselas, where we found a charming little village, with schoolhouse and drinking-fountain, park and hall and church, and every cottage a picture.