The proofs of the residence of early man in the district are afforded by the considerable variety of remains that have been discovered in the bone caves of the High Peak near Buxton, in those of the high lands above Wirksworth, and more especially in the Creswell caves on the verge of Nottinghamshire. In Grant Allen’s remarkable and generally accurate book on the beginnings of county history throughout England, a singular blunder is made with regard to Derbyshire; it is there stated that this county “was almost uninhabited until long after the English settlement of Britain, with the solitary exception of a few isolated Roman stations.” Archæology, however, puts such a statement as this to complete rout. Difficult as it is to understand how such large bands of savage men were able to maintain themselves in so wild a district, it is the fact that the Peak of Derbyshire was, so to speak, thickly populated by prehistoric tribes. A glance at the map of prehistoric remains, given in the first volume of the _Victoria History of the County of Derby_, to illustrate Mr. Ward’s article, will at once show that the whole of that part of North Derbyshire which extends from Ashbourne to Chapel-en-le-Frith on the west, from thence to Derwent Chapel on the north, and then southward through Hathersage and Winster back again to Ashbourne, is peppered all over with the red symbols that betoken the barrows or lows which were the burial places of our forefathers during the neolithic and subsequent ages. Round Stanton-in-the-Peak and Hathersage the barrows, circles and other early remains occur with such frequency that it is difficult to mark even small dots on the map without them running into each other. When the Romans held Derbyshire they had five chief stations in the county, namely, at Little Chester, near Derby; at Brough, near Hope; at Buxton; at Melandra Castle, on the verge of Cheshire; and near Wirksworth. The chief Roman road, termed Ryknield Street, entered the county at Monksbridge, between Repton and Egginton; crossing the Derwent by Derby to Little Chester, the road proceeded to Chesterfield, and thence into Yorkshire. Another road crossed the south of the county, entering Derbyshire on the east near Sawley, and passing through Little Chester to Rocester, in Staffordshire. A whole group of other roads radiated throughout the Peak from Buxton as a centre.