Below Stone the river passes Sandon, an old village. There are not many prettier places in all the valley of the Trent than the park of the Harrowbys with its slopes of grove and sward, the higher parts of which command views of unusual extent, not only over the rich river valley of the Trent, but also as far as the Wrekin and Caradoc hills. On elevated ground, at the edge of the park, is the parish church, containing several interesting remains of olden time, the most conspicuous, though by no means the most ancient, being the monument to Sampson Erdeswick, the historian of Staffordshire, and former owner of the estate, who died in the year 1603. The property ultimately passed into the hands of the Duke of Hamilton, and a law-suit in regard to it is reported to have occasioned the quarrel between the duke and Lord Mohun which, as is well known, had so tragic an ending. Erdeswick's house, of which the site is still marked, was a fine old brick and timber edifice, surrounded by a moat; but in the last century a new and uninteresting mansion was erected by Lord Archibald Hamilton, which was burned down in 1848, and replaced by a more handsome building in the Tudor style. From him the property was purchased by an ancestor of the present owner, the Earl of Harrowby. Rather below Sandon, near the little village of Shirleywich, brine is obtained. Fortunately, however, for the beauty of the scenery, there has been no temptation to establish extensive salt works. The quiet little villages on the lowlands, near the river, offer nothing to delay the traveller; but the grey ruins, high on the left bank, mark a place of some note. Those two broken towers, those fragments of curtain-wall, are remnants of Chartley Castle; the moorland, which extends back from the park, is one of the few spots in England where the descendants of _bos primigenius_ still linger on in a semi-wild condition. The castle, though it carries back its history to early in the thirteenth century, makes little figure in history. The present house is on lower ground, and parts of it are older than the reign of Elizabeth, who not only visited it herself, but made it one of the prisons of Mary Queen of Scots. The estate formerly was included among those of the great Earls of Chester, but has for long been part of the family property of the present owner, Earl Ferrers. There is a tragic tale about a former earl, who was a man of ungovernable temper--probably insane, and shot his own steward. Feudal times were then too far away, and his coronet could not save him from the halter. [Illustration: INGESTRE HALL.]