Hall is picturesquely situated on a rising ground, well wooded, near a
small lake, and contains, among other pictures, portraits of Fox, "Coke of
Norfolk," and several other political friends with whom the first Lord Crewe
was closely associated. The hounds meet there occasionally, when a "find" is
sure, and a gallop through the park a thing to be remembered.

* * * * *

NANTWICH, about five miles from Crewe, is one of the towns which supplies
Cheshire's salt exports, Middlewich and Northwich being the other two. In
all, rich brine springs are found, but the celebrated mines of rock-salt are
found at Northwich only. It is vulgarly imagined that the word wich has
something to do with salt, these three towns being often described as the
"Wiches." This is an error; and wich is merely an Anglo-Saxon corruption of
the Roman word vicus, as in Harwich. The salt-works of Nantwich are
mentioned in "Domesday Book." The town was more than once besieged during
the great civil wars, lastly by Lord Byron, unsuccessfully, with an army
chiefly Irish, which was compelled to raise the siege and defeated by Sir
Thomas Fairfax and Sir William Brereton.

Among the antiquities remaining is a cross Church, in a mixture of styles,
partly early English and partly decorated English, and a several curious old
houses of black timber and plaster.

The trade of this place has derived much advantage from the junction of the
Chester, Ellesmere, and Liverpool and Birmingham canals, close by.

At the Nantwich yearly fairs, samples of the famous Cheshire cheese made in
the neighbourhood, of the best brands, may be found. Major-General Harrison,
one of the Regicides who was put to death on the Restoration of Charles II.,
was a native of Nantwich, and Milton's widow, who was born in the
neighbourhood, died there in 1726.

Just before reaching the Hartford Bridge Station, on the way to Chester, we
pass Vale Royal Abbey, the seat of the Cholmondeley family, pronounced
Chumleigh, whose head was created in 1821 Lord Delamere.

[VALE ROYAL VIADUCT: ill20.jpg]

The Abbey lies in a valley sheltered by old trees, the remains of a great
forest; wood-covered hills rise behind it, closing in the vale; below runs
the Weaver, "that famous flood," whose praises were sung by Michael Drayton
in his Polyolbion. In this instance, as in many others, the "monks of old"
showed their taste in choosing one of the most beautiful and fertile sites in
the county for