Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/139

 no THE HISTORY Book I. with a ftrong crop of furzes and briars, aud being three yards in breadth as well as eight or nine in length* The name of Stany or Stony ftreet would najturally indijce one to imagine, that the road which was fo denominated mull have been regularly paved. And fo it certainly was* In the firft field which it enters belonging to the Hope-Hall eftate, aud in the difcovery which the plough made of it ibme years ago, it was found to be paved with large boulders. And the ftnall piece of it which was laid open by the fpade at Black rode ap- peared to be a regular pavement, firmly jointed together aad compofed of heavy ftones. Such was the road that led to the 'Roman ftation at Black- rode, But were (hall we iix the a&ual fite of the ftation ? The town, as it feems, having been very early deftroyed, the traces of its antient dignity are almoft entirely erased, and exift only at prefent in the feint retrofpeft of traditionary hiftory and in the vague generalities of a winter's tale. The town, as it feems, having been entirely deraoliflied, and afterwards built upon a different fite, almoft all the veftiges of its Roman maffters have be?n long obliterated by the hand of time, and ever* the very exiftence of them forgotten in the chronicles of tradition. la this ftate of uncertainty, the attention of an antiquarian is . naturally engaged at firft by the name of Caftte-Croft :at the fouth- eaftern extremity of the village, by the tradition of a caftle upon it, and by the evident remains of ditches around it. But this can never have been the area of a Roman ftatioi;. This is mere- ly an area of half an acre in extent. And the ftation can never have been on this fide of the village at all. It muft afl'uredly have been on the other and upon the lofty bank of the river. There, and there only, is that particular in the fite which the Romans generally fecured in the pofition df a ftation, the con- currence of a brook with the river, and a commodious lingula of ground betwixt both. There, and there only, are thofe greater particulars in the fite which the Romans more generally fecured in the pofition of a ftation, the convenience of a ftredm and the advantage of a bank, that the one might afford a re- i gular i