Bishop Hatfield in the town; and there are affiliated colleges of medicine and of physical science at Newcastle-on-Tyne, which seem likely to have a successful career, and greatly strengthen the hold of the University on the north of England.

The town of Durham, though a fairly thriving place, and now apparently increasing, does not present those signs of commercial activity which its position in an important mining district might lead us to expect. It is more remarkable for its situation than its buildings, whether of a past or of the present age. The streets, especially in the neighbourhood of the castle, are rather narrow, steep, and irregular, with a certain picturesqueness about them as a whole, but with few structures of sufficient interest to call for any special remark. Large suburbs are situated on the other bank of the Wear, reached by bridges from either side of the narrower part of the peninsula. Three of the parish churches still retain some interesting portions of Norman work, and the churchyard of one of them, St. Oswald's, commands a remarkably fine view of the eastern part of the cathedral across the glen of the Wear. But the glory of Durham, after its cathedral, are the walks in this glen among the thickly growing trees, both beneath its ramparts and on the opposite bank of the Wear. There, under the over-hanging boughs, we seem to forget the city in the mazes of a forest; and when the great masses of impending masonry are masked for a moment by the leafy screen, the town and the cultivated land, the coal-pits and the railways vanish from our memory, and fancy can bring back most easily the days when the coffin of Cuthbert first rested on the clearing in the primæval forest.

About a mile to the west of the cathedral is a spot closely connected with its history, and memorable in the annals of England. Here, on October 17th, in the year 1346, was fought the battle of Neville's Cross. The victory of Cressy had been won a few months previously, but as Edward and the flower of the English army were yet in France, the King of Scotland deemed that his opportunity was come, and that the northern provinces were defenceless. Gathering together an army of some 40,000 men, he swept over the borders, devastating all the land before him. The chief among his nobles accompanied him; the most sacred relic in Scotland was present in the host to encourage the troops on the battle-field. This was the "Black Rood," a crucifix of blackened silver, delivered so mysteriously to David I., on the spot between the town of Edinburgh and the crags of Arthur's Seat, where afterwards the Abbey of Holyrood was reared to its honour. But though the King of England was over the sea, his Queen Philippa was in England, and did not shrink from the danger. An army was assembled, to which the palatinate sent its contingent, and was placed under the command of Earl Neville. The invaders drew near to the walls of Durham; the English troops, considerably their inferiors in number, awaited their approach. The Bishop of Durham was present at the head of his men, and there was also an "Ark of God" in the English camp; for the prior, in obedience to a vision, had brought from the cathedral one of its choicest treasures, "the holy corporax cloth wherewith St. Cuthbert covered the chalice when he used to say Mass." This was attached to the point of a spear and displayed on the Red Hills in sight of the army. From the cathedral tower the monks beheld the battle-field, and prayed for the victory of the defenders of their From nine till noon the conflict lasted; the English archers with their cloth-yard shafts, the Scotchmen with their Lochaber axes, smote down many a man on either side;

saint.

BATTLE OF NEVILLE'S CROSS.

79

but at last the watchers on the tower turned from prayer to praise, for the Scottish host wavered and broke, and the Black Rood proved less potent than the Banner of St. Cuthbert. It was a dark day for Scotland; the slain numbered 15,000, the king was wounded and a prisoner, many of his nobles killed or taken, and the Black Rood was the prize of the conquerors. Once before it had been for awhile in English hands, but this time it was lost to Scotland for ever. Henceforth it was numbered among the treasures which were collected together in the Nine Altars Chapel. After the battle the "corporax cloth" was attached to a velvet banner, and "was afterwards present with the king's host on many occasions. It was carried against Scotland by Richard II. in 1385, and by Henry IV. in 1401; and it waved over the men of the Bishopric at Flodden.” * At other times it was fastened to the platform of St. Cuthbert's shrine, where also stood the King of Scotland's "ancient" and his banner, another trophy of the battle of Neville's Cross, together with that of Lord Neville and "divers other noblemen's ancients." These were dispersed at the Restoration like the other treasures of the shrine. What became of the Black Rood is not known, but the Banner of St. Cuthbert "fell into the possession of Dean Whittingham, whose wife, called Catherine, being a French woman (as is credibly reported by eyewitnesses), did most despitefully burn the same in her fire, to the open contempt and disgrace of all ancient relics." This, perhaps, was no great loss, but one cannot help regretting the reckless dispersion, and often destruction, of those many treasures of ancient art which were accumulated in Durham, as abundantly as in any of our cathedrals. The idea that anything might be interesting from its history, when it ceased to be sacred as a relic, does not seem to have entered into the minds of men two or three centuries since; and we can scarcely wonder or blame, when we see that for generations after the negligence of their successors was hardly less destructive to the remains of the olden time than the first outburst of iconoclastic zeal. At Durham, for example, we read of choice manuscripts being so utterly neglected in the days of Queen Anre, that the nursemaids cut out the illuminations to make picture-books for the canons' children! Dark as may have been the ages that reared the lordly pile of Durham, and loaded the shrine of Cuthbert with offerings, the days which permitted such recklessness as this, or those which saw the galilee threatened, the central tower stuccoed, and the chapter-house destroyed, can hardly have been dim with excess of light.

"Handbook of the Cathedrals of England: "Durham, p. 297. tie, ensign.

"Description of the Ancient Monuments," quoted in Handbook, p. 297.

Buxton-St. Anne's Well-Its Condition in the Middle Ages-Modern Buxton-Glen of the Wye-Chee Tor- MillersdaleBakewell and its Church-Haddon Hall-The Vernon Family-Rowsley-Chatsworth, its History and TreasuresMatlock-The Caves, Mines, Mosaic-work, and Cotton-spinning.

RAKEWELL CHURCH.

HE scenery of these two rivers is as full of varied interest as any in Derbyshire. It may certainly be equalled, and perhaps be surpassed, by one or two more limited districts, but there is no line of country which so well combines the grand and the lovely: the crags and narrow dales of the limestone, the wider and richer valleys of the sandstone, the bare moors, and the wooded slopes, together with mineral springs, historic mansions, and other remains of olden time.

We will trace the course of these rivers from Buxton to Matlock only, from the one fountain of health to the other, since below the latter place the scenery of the Derwent becomes less characteristic. The Wye rises in the bare hills to the north of Buxton, but until it reaches that town its scenery is in no way remarkable. Buxton itself is full 900 feet above the sea, but being sheltered by yet higher ground, enjoys a climate bracing without being bleak. It owes its fame and prosperity to its mineral springs, which were known even to the Romans. By what name it went in those days has not been ascertained, but portions of baths and other remains prove beyond question that they had settlements here, and even then held its waters in esteem. One of their baths, discovered towards the end of the last century, when the present Crescent was commenced, was about ten yards long and half as much in breadth. An inscribed Roman milestone was also found here, and Roman roads are known to have passed through the town.

The principal spring-called St. Anne's Well-is enumerated by old Charles Cotton as one of the seven wonders of the Peak. The temperature of the waters is about 82° Fahrenheit; they are limpid, tasteless, and inodorous. "To their purity, to the mildness and uniformity of their temperature at all times and seasons, neither depressing the vital powers by cold nor enervating them by heat, and to their impregnation with nitrogen gas, may be attributed in no inconsiderable degree their salutary effects."* In addition to nitrogen and some carbonic acid gas, their solid contents, which are small in quantity, are chiefly carbonates of lime and of magnesia, sulphate of lime, and chlorides of soda and potash. The waters are drunk and are used for baths, the latter being considered the more important application. They are chiefly beneficial in long-continued gouty and rheumatic affections, in many nervous disorders, and in derangements of the digestive organs. Perhaps at the present day no mineral spring in England enjoys a higher reputation or is more frequented than Buxton, and it seems able to hold its own against the French and German spas, which have so greatly diminished the attractions of the "wells" where before the days of railways our forefathers used to congregate.

In the Middle Ages the reputation of St. Anne's Well seems to have been very great, but we are not aware at what period the spring was placed under the protection of that saint. A chapel was built upon or near the spring to receive the solemn offerings of the pilgrims who resorted thither in search of health. This we learn from a letter addressed to Lord Cromwell by one Sir W. Bassett, at the time when Henry VIII. made a visitation of shrines.

The spring was visited in the reign of Elizabeth by her illustrious captive, Mary, Queen of Scots, who, while in custody of the Earl of Shrewsbury, came four times to Buxton to take the waters. She suffered severely from rheumatism, and it is said that she received great benefit from the baths. Her abode was at an old house known as the Hall; this stood on the site of an hotel which still bears the name of the "Old Hall." At that time Buxton seems to have offered to its visitors accommodation much more limited than at the present, as it consisted only of a single bath-house, such as may now be seen at some of the remote Continental spas. A contemporary author thus describes the place : "Joyning to the chefe springe, betwene the river and the bath, is a very goodly house, foure square, foure stories hye, so well compacte with houses of offices beneath and above and rounde about, with a great chamber and other goodly lodgings to the number of 30, that it is and will be a beauty to behold, and very notable for the honourable and worshipful that shall nede to repaire thither, as also for other. Yea, the poorest shall have lodgings and bed hard by, for their uses only. The bathes also so bravely bewtified with seats round about, defended from the ambyent ayre, and chimneys for fyre to ayre your garments in the bathe's syde, and other necessaries most decent." The author goes on to speak of the desirability of a "sanctuarie for the sick during their abode there for all minor offences, and of a licence being granted them "to eate fleshe at all tymes." He also describes the games and other provisions made for the pastime of the visitors.

These continued to increase in number, and in the year 1780 the Crescent-the

* "Observations on the Buxton Waters," quoted in Black's "Guide to Derbyshire."

"Benefit of the Auncient Bathes of Buckstones," by J. Jones (1572); quoted in Black's Guide, p. 46.

nucleus of modern Buxton-was built by the Duke of Devonshire. It is much admired in guide-books. Since that period, and especially during the last thirty years, great additions and improvements have been made in Buxton by the liberality and public spirit of the successors to the Devonshire estates and title. New baths, in glass and iron, have been erected, which have a handsome appearance, and are said to be very convenient; a market-place has been built; the town has been drained and in many ways improved; and railway communication with Manchester on the one side, and Derby and the south on the other, renders it a very favourable place of resort. There is also a hospital for the poor, in which, on the recommendation of subscribers, patients are admitted from all parts of the kingdom. They receive for a certain time board, lodging, bathing, and medical attendance gratuitously. The establishment makes up 120 beds, and stands on one of the best sites in Buxton, occupied formerly by the stables of the Old Hall. It is itself a monument of "the last munificent charity of William Spencer, sixth Duke of Devonshire, K.G., who allowed these buildings to be converted to the use of the sick poor, January, A.D. 1858."

It must not, however, be forgotten that the tepid spring, though the most important, is not the only mineral one in Buxton. Within a few yards of the natural hot spring a cold one rises from the same limestone rock-this singular juxtaposition being commented upon by Charles Cotton in his quaint little book, entitled "Wonders of the Peak," written two centuries since, who thus celebrates the Buxton well:

"Take, then, the wonder of this famous place :

This tepid fountain a twin sister has

Of the same beauty and complexion,

That, bubbling six foot off, joyns both in one;
But yet so cold withal, that who will stride,
When bathing, 'cross the bath but half so wide,
Shall in one body, which is strange, endure
At once an ague and a calenture."

At the back of the Crescent, by the side of the street, there is also a chalybeate spring, the waters of which, when drunk, are tonic, and are said to be beneficial to the eyes when used as a lotion.

Buxton is well provided with public gardens, beautifully laid out, but the neighbourhood is generally rather bleak and dreary, though it has been made less so of late years by judicious planting. A hill to the south is noted for "diamonds." These, however, are only quartz crystals of rather exceptional purity. They occur in some loose rubbish thought to be the refuse of mining works, and are generally found after this has been washed by recent rain. From the summit of the hill, occupied by a tower, is a fine view. On the way to this is a large cave, called Poole's Hole (from the name of an outlaw, who is said to have made it his haunt), another of the "seven wonders of Derbyshire." There are within numerous stalactites and stalagmites, and now that the cave is lighted up by gas it is said to be well worth a visit. Under the "old style" of one or two flickering tallow candles it was certainly inferior to several of the Derbyshire