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with the grounds around. The park abounds in groves and avenues of noble oaks, splendid drives, and beautiful scenery. The river Derwent flows through it and immediately in front of the mansion, in the rear of which there is a long range of hills, the southern spur of the highlands of the Derbyshire moors, crowned with a thick growth of timber, and kept in a wild and rugged state. Several artificial cascades are formed over these ridges by conducting water to the summit through tunnels and pipes, and causing it to rush headlong down the hill-side over rocks and jagged projections, so arranged as to create foam and spray. The principal stream, thus diverted, falls about one hundred feet, and is some twenty feet wide. It has the appearance from below of a shower of silver, and strongly resembles the Catskill Mountain cascade, when seen from a distance. Art has done wonders for Chatsworth; but nature, too, has there been lavish of her charms.

There is a small castle in the park near the river, surrounded by a moat, in which, it is said, Mary, the unhappy Queen of Scots, was imprisoned for thirteen years. It is a circular stone building, and at this time the interior is filled with earth, and trees are growing in the centre. The walls are massive and strong, and at some points overhung with ivy. Age is traceable on every part, and whether it was or was not the prison-house of the queen whose romantic history is in every school-girl's recollection, it has evidently been at some period the dungeon of more than one captive.

The rain fell fast during the day, marring our pleasure for a time, but not entirely. It was our intention to visit Haddon Hall, but the storm prevented, and we were obliged to be content with Chatsworth and its vicinity. Our host at Baslow was a friendly person, and after we had dined he and I entered into conversation upon various subjects, and among them the United States was one. He knew several persons who now reside in America-young men who went from Chatsworth. them go, and stated that Mr. Paxton, the originator of the Crystal Palace, presented each with sums varying from five to ten pounds at the time of their departure.

He saw

Here, by accident, I was put into possession of a leaf in the

history of this gentleman, interesting in many respects. He was a gardener in early life, and is a native of Berwickshire, Scotland. The Duke of Devonshire, while on a visit to a markettown, where there were flowers for sale, was attracted by a particular collection, which exhibited greater care and skill in their culture than any others. He inquired who raised them, and learned that it was the gardener who had them for sale. A proposition was at once made by the nobleman to the horticulturist, and, as it was advantageous, it was accepted. He went to Chatsworth, where he arrived about twenty-five years ago, with not more than six shillings in his pocket. Here he had every advantage of exercising his peculiar talent, and, as he was industrious, and attentive to his master's interests, he gradually arose to favor and power. He suggested alterations in the park, and they were made. He removed and transplanted oaks and elms; formed splendid and continuous alcoves and arbors, where before were straggling trees, and added greatly to the beauty and splendor of the estate. The confidence of the nobleman became unbounded, and he gave the servant full control over Chatsworth. He now employs and discharges-receives and expends, and has become so identified with the domain as to be known in the neighborhood as the "little duke."

The peer calls him by the familiar term of "my friend," and he is a man respected and esteemed by all. He bears his honors modestly, and does not (like too many who have been elevated to distinction from nothing) forget his early companions and fellowlaborers. When he visits Chatsworth, he always has a word for his former associates, and all love him for it. It was at his suggestion that the splendid conservatory at Chatsworth Hall was built, and that minor palace of glass suggested the more magnificent one in Hyde Park. But there is another person deserving some praise in this design, and that is a Mr. Robinson, an architect, who resides at Baslow. Mr. Paxton is not a draughtsman; he can tell how he wants a thing done, and knows whether it is properly made, but he cannot put his ideas on paper or furnish a draught of the thing he wishes built. Mr. Robinson can. He is one of the most capable men in England. Paxton

knows and appreciates his talents and professional skill, and what Paxton suggests, the other makes a draught of. Paxton originated the Glass Palace, but, had it not been for Mr. Robinson, the probabilities are that it never would have had a form, "a local habitation, or a name." The drawings were made at Baslow, by Mr. Robinson, for which Mr. Paxton gave him £100, or a sum nearly equal to $500; and it is asserted that neither he nor his wife drew a sober breath until the last penny of the one hundred pounds. in question was gone. My informant was a man of veracity, had been a fellow-workman with Sir Joseph Paxton (this being now his title), and gave me his name as authority for the statement. He offered to introduce me to the architect, whose cottage was within full view from where I then stood.

There is at Chatsworth a model village, called Edensor, built at the expense of the Duke of Devonshire, after the designs furnished by Mr. Paxton and his protégé. Every house is different, and for beauty and comfort the place stands unrivalled. The houses are in the various styles of rural and cottage architecture, now so popular in the United States, and each one is a neat convenient villa. The old church in the village is one of the most romantic in England. It stands above the level of the street, and is surrounded by a natural colonnade of trees, so arranged as to look like the tall arches of a bridge. The branches have been trimmed smoothly off on two sides, and the summits are made quite flat and level. The remaining branches intertwine each other, and form one of the most beautiful ranges of arches in the world. The trunks of the trees look like tall columns, while the curves and foliage above form a range of emerald spans unsurpassed in elegance. In the chancel of the church are the tombs of the Cavendish family. There are several marble figures stretched at full length on the tombs like so many ghostly dead; and on one of the vaults there is a human skeleton, cut from the whitest marble, reminding the visitor forcibly of the folly of distinctions in this life, and the certainty of death. The church is an ancient building, nearly covered with ivy, and stands like a heavy sentinel, watching over the expanse before it.

We left Baslow late in the afternoon, and, as the stage was

gone, determined to walk to Sheffield, a distance of twelve miles. The road was wet and covered with a white mud formed by the rain and dust arising from the wear of the material used on the turnpikes in that part of the island. The storm subsided, and although the winds were keen and high, the walk was far from disagreeable. When we got cleverly out on to the moors, the night set in, and a dull cloudy sky overhung the bleak and desolate hills. Occasional drops of rain fell from the flying vapors, and blackness covered the face of the land. As we wended our way over the dreary waste, each, as if by mutual consent, fell into a train of musings agreeable to himself.

The sublime in nature always produces, in my mind, a chain of melancholy but pleasing reflections, and there, at night, under a gloomy sky, on the sterile moors of England, the same thoughts arose that pressed upon my soul on the boundless prairies of the west, and the restless waters of the ocean.

We reached Sheffield at a late hour, tired and jaded with our long walk and the day's excursion.

CHAPTER VI.

THE HOMES AND GRAVES OF BYRON AND MARY CHAWORTHNOTTINGHAM-HENRY KIRKE WHITE.

BYRON'S grave, at Hucknall, and Newstead Abbey are objects of interest to me, and after a lengthened stay at Sheffield, I took an outside seat on the stage for Mansfield, from which place I proceeded on foot. The road lay through a succession of scenery such as meets the eye only in England; and which greets the traveller with little variation throughout the southern part of the island of Great Britain. The town of Chesterfield, on this route, is remarkable for the singular spire of the old church, which reminds one of the leaning tower of Pisa. It is constructed of wood, and, although nearly straight, is built so as to appear, from any point of view, as if it were leaning at an angle of fifteen or twenty

degrees. Between this town and Mansfield, there are two celebrated castles-one the old palace of Hardwick; the other the ancient baronial stronghold of Bolsover. In the centre of the main square of the last-named town, there is a fine Gothic monument to the memory of Lord George Bentinck, a young English nobleman who died a few years ago, at a time when he was rapidly rising to eminence as a statesman in the British Parliament.

Having strapped my knapsack on my back, I left Mansfield, and took the turnpike to Derby, the nearest way to Hucknall. The day was warm and pleasant, and my route lay over a moor, once a part of Sherwood Forest. The road for some distance was very indifferent, and equally bad with any in the United States. For miles there were but few houses within sight; and wild shrubbery and yellow blossoming furze grew in abundance along the highway. The soil was sandy, and poorly cultivated where cultivation was attempted. I walked a distance of nine miles over lands once the haunts of Robin Hood and his "merrie foresters;" and in some places the wood was so thick that it did not require a very active imagination to people it with the descendants of the bold outlaw and his followers. Groves of fir and pines, interspersed with magnificent oaks, whose branches shadowed all the wild, formed a cool retreat and pleasant shade for the weary traveller.

I sat down on the bank of a gurgling stream, bright and clear, which flowed from a clump of noble trees near by, and fell into a train of thought on the events in a man's history, and the realization of my boyish daydreams. I was on classic soil-in Sherwood Forest-surrounded by giant forest-kings and English sylvan scenery. A herd of deer was grazing under the shade of the tall trees, and methought I saw the melancholy Jacques standing against the strong trunk of an old oak, soliloquizing on a wounded stag that had "ta'en a hurt" from the aim of some green-robed forester. The day was calm, the sky banked up with fleecy clouds, and the scenery such as a novelist would desire to paintultra-romantic.

As I pursued my course along the road, I passed an inn bearing

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