The People Have Also A World Of Superstitious
Stories Relating To This Place, One Of Which Is That Some Person
Once Threw Into It A Goose, Which Appeared Again At Two Miles'
Distance In The Great Cavern I Have Already Mentioned, Quite
Stripped Of Its Feathers.
But I will not stuff my letters with many
of these fabulous histories.
They reckon that they have in Derbyshire seven wonders of nature, of
which this Elden Hole, the hill of Mam Tor, and the great cavern I
have been at are the principal.
The remaining four wonders are Pool's Hole, which has some
resemblance to this that I have seen, as I am told, for I did not
see it; next St. Anne's Well, where there are two springs which rise
close to each other, the one of which is boiling hot, the other as
cold as ice; the next is Tide's Well, not far from the town of that
name through which I passed. It is a spring or well, which in
general flows or runs underground imperceptibly, and then all at
once rushes forth with a mighty rumbling or subterranean noise,
which is said to have something musical in it, and overflows its
banks; lastly Chatsworth, a palace or seat belonging to the Dukes of
Devonshire, at the foot of a mountain whose summit is covered with
eternal snow, and therefore always gives one the idea of winter, at
the same time that the most delightful spring blooms at its foot. I
can give you no further description of these latter wonders, as I
only know them by the account given me by others. They were the
subjects with which my guide, the shoemaker, entertained me during
our walk.
While this man was showing me everything within his knowledge that
he thought most interesting, he often expressed his admiration on
thinking how much of the world I had already seen; and the idea
excited in him so lively a desire to travel, that I had much to do
to reason him out of it. He could not help talking of it the whole
evening, and again and again protested that, had he not got a wife
and child, he would set off in the morning at daybreak along with
me; for here in Castleton there is but little to be earned by the
hardest labour or even genius. Provisions are not cheap, and in
short, there is no scope for exertion. This honest man was not yet
thirty.
As we returned, he wished yet to show me the lead mines, but it was
too late. Yet, late as it was, he mended my shoes the same evening,
and I must do him the justice to add in a very masterly manner.
But I am sorry to tell you I have brought a cough from the cavern
that does not at all please me; indeed, it occasions me no little
pain, which makes me suppose that one must needs breathe a very
unwholesome damp air in this cavern.
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