labour. Most of the men are said to be drunkards, and the women dissolute.

How different these scenes, where

"The pale-fac❜d artist plies the sickly trade,”

from our fields and forests, in which pure air, unconstrained motions, salubrious exhalations, and simple manners, give vigour to the limbs, and a healthful aspect to the face.

I am not, however, disposed to join those who rail at manufactures without informing us how we can do without them. I am fully persuaded of their importance to mankind, while I regret the physical, and, more than all, the moral evils which they produce.

Liverpool is the second town in England for foreign commerce, and Manchester the second for population. To-morrow morning I shall leave this town for the Peak of Derbyshire, where I may be detained a day or two by its mineral curiosities.

My companion, Mr. R-- -, having business in the northern manufacturing towns, and not caring to descend with me into mines and caverns, will leave me to-morrow, and depart for Yorkshire, while I must make my way alone; but, although solitary, I shall go cheerfully forward, nor feel disposed to adopt the plaintive strain;

"Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow."

No. VI.-JOURNEY TO THE PEAK.

Leave Manchester....Stockport....Use of the word fair....English stage coaches....Guards.... Baggage....Barren mountains.... Buxton....Ride on horseback....Tides well....Country people, their manners and language.....Singular scenery.... Beautiful contrast....Ancient castle.

RIDE TO BUXTON.

May 15. This morning, at five o'clock, I left Manchester, in the stage, for Buxton. The environs of Manchester appeared handsome, from the number of well cultivated fields, and neat houses, and two or three inconsiderable villages occurred in the distance of six miles, which brought us to Stockport on the Mersey. Stockport is a considerable ancient town, built of brick. There are some good houses, but most of them are decayed and destitute of beauty. The town has a considerable manufacture of cotton and printed goods. It stands on the declivity of a hill, and has a bridge over the Mersey, which was blown: up in 1745, to prevent the retreat of the rebels.

When we left Manchester, early in the morning, the sky was cloudy, and the weather threatening. On my getting into the coach, a stranger accosted me very civilly, and remarked that it was a fair morning. I bowed assent, although I could not comprehend how such a morning could be considered as fair. But, in the progress of our conversation, I found that he con sidered every day as fair which is not rainy. If this use of the word be general, it indicates that the fre. quent rains in this country cause them to assume a lower standard of fine weather, than what prevails in climates where the sun shines more constantly.

At Stockport we crossed the Mersey, and entered Cheshire. The weather becoming what I had been accustomed to consider as fair, that is, the sun really shining forth, I was induced to take a seat on the top of the coach, with the guard. Most of the English stage coaches travel with a guard. He is armed with a blunderbuss, or more commonly with pistols, which are fixed in holsters, connected with the top of the coach. To the duty of defending the coach he is rarely called; for, since the practice of travelling with a guard has become general in England, the stage coaches are seldom attacked. Besides guarding the coach, he is expected to open and shut the door, and aid in case of accident, so that the coachman is never called upon to leave his seat, and the passengers are not often exposed to the danger of having the horses take fright without any one to command the reins. Our custom in America is very bad on this point, for the driver frequently leaves his seat, and the horses are rarely tied.

The English guard sits on a seat, elevated nearly as high as the top of the coach. It is usually fixed on a large boot or box, extending down to the frame work on which the carriage is supported. A similar boot is fixed beneath the coachman's seat, and in these two the baggage is stowed, and as the whole is commonly on springs the parcels escape with little injury. Some part of the baggage is usually carried on the roof. In this way, travellers in English stages avoid the very troublesome lumber of baggage in the inside of the coach by which we are so much annoyed in American stages. In the older carriages, however, the coachman's and guard's seat is fixed upon the frame work, without any intervention of springs, and thus not only

they, but the baggage in the boots are constantly wor ried and chafed. The accommodations for travelling are now wonderfully great in England, but they are of comparatively recent origin. As I become more familiar with them I may resume the subject.

The guard and coachman as well as the servants at hotels expect their regular douceur. The rate is about one shilling to each for every 20 or 25 miles; it is not necessary to exceed this if the distance be 30 miles. For every 8, 10, or 15 miles the sum of sixpence is usually given. This tax is inevitable, and Americans, from ignorance of the country, and fear of being thought mean, usually pay more liberally than the natives.

In our passage across a corner of Cheshire, we rode through Disley and some other inconsiderable villages, built principally of a rude leaden coloured stone, but having a neat and comfortable appearance. We travelled over a mountainous country, along side of a canal, which we followed for several miles ;-boats, drawn by horses, were passing on the canal, and in one place, we saw it cross a river on arches.

Hills, of great height and extent, were all around us, and Derbyshire with its mountains was immediately on our left. A few groves, planted by the present generation, and a few fine pastures appeared, here and there, on the hills, but, they were generally very rude and barren, covered, for the most part, with a kind of brown heath, so thick and dark, that they appeared as if the fire had passed over them ;-you can conceive of nothing more desolate than the aspect of these hills for miles. It is to be presumed that Dr. Johnson never travelled here, or he would not have

discovered so much spleen at the nakedness of the

Scottish mountains.

The valleys among these hills were, with few exceptions, fertile, and, in many places, the heights were all white with heaps of lime, placed on them as a manure. The roads were generally good, but, for a few miles along the canal, they were indifferent. Between 8 and 9 o'clock, we arrived at Buxton, which is just within the limits of Derbyshire, at the distance of 22 miles from Manchester.

EXCURSION TO THE PEAK.

Finding that Buxton would be an advantageous point of departure, in my contemplated excursion to the Peak of Derbyshire, I deposited my baggage at the inn, relinquished my seat in the stage, which was go. ing forward to Derby, mounted a horse at 10 o'clock in the morning, and set forward, on a little journey, from which I expected much gratification. I had long wished to explore some of those dark recesses, where the Creator has hidden the treasures of the mineral kingdom, and to see, with my own eyes, the arrangement of strata, the position of spars and crystals, and the natural state of the metallic veins.

- I had the advantage of a delightful day, and with an empty portmanteau, to bring back any interesting things which I might find in the mines, I commenced my solitary journey. My road was over a very hilly country, and after passing the hamlet of Fairfield, the hills became more frequent, steep and lofty. The way was circuitous, winding, in spirals, around the hills, most of which were too steep to admit of a direct ascent. In one place the path led me along the edge of a precipice, which formed one side of a deep gulf