Country Rambles, and Manchester Walks and Wild Flowers: Being Rural Wanderings in Cheshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, and YorkshireGrindon, Leo H. (Leo Hartley)
History
Country Rambles, and Manchester Walks and Wild Flowers: Being Rural Wanderings in Cheshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, and Yorkshire
Grindon, Leo H. (Leo Hartley)
England -- Description and travel; Natural history -- England -- Manchester
Rostherne, in turn, is the pleasantest way of pedestrian approach
to Tatton Park, so liberally opened to visitors by Lord Egerton,
on compliance with certain rules. Visitors bent on seeing Tatton
only, should go part way from Bowdon by vehicle; for here, as at
Cotterill, we want, as in a picture-gallery, every minute, and to
let too much time be consumed in mere travel is a mistake. To make a
too hasty and thoughtless use of our opportunities of pleasure is in
any case to throw away the half of them; the pleasure of the country
beyond all others requires a calm and unhurried step, a free and
unwistful mind and eye, such as cannot possibly be if, by waste or
extravagance, we are "tied to time,"--only when, by a wise economy
of our resources in this respect, we liberate ourselves from care
about trains and timebills, do we catch nature's sweetest smiles.
The boundary measurement of this beautiful park is upwards of ten
miles, and of its two thousand one hundred and thirty-five acres no
fewer than four hundred are occupied by woods and plantations, with
seventy-nine acres of water. Here we may stroll beneath green vaults
of foliage, and be reminded of the aisles of cathedrals. Here we may
contemplate the _viridis senectus_ of glorious old oaks that have
watched the flow of generations. Here, in autumn, we learn, from a
thousand old foresters--from beech, and chestnut, and elm--that brave
men, though overtaken by inclemencies there is no withstanding, still
put a good face upon their fallen fortunes, and, like Cæsar, who drew
his purple around him, die royally; and at Christmas, when the wind
seems to mourn amid the denuded boughs, here again we feel how grand
is the contrasted life of the great, green, shining, scarlet-beaded
hollies that in summer we took no note of. The gardens, including
conservatories and fernery, access to all of which is likewise
liberally permitted, are crowded with objects of interest--one hardly
knows whether inside their gates, or outside, is the more delectable.
The park was up till quite recently, the play-ground of nearly a
thousand deer, and still (1882) contains many hundreds. The sight of
them is one of the pleasures of the return walk to Knutsford, to which
place Tatton Park more especially pertains.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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