Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/213

 i.S+ THEH1STORY .Book I, of a caftrum which was certainly defigned only for the heats of fummer, the Romans as naturally diverted the waters of the Irkc into the channel of the trench. Ah Opening was made' in the rocky margin of the Irke, which remains very vifibl'e to the prefent period, the angles of the rock appearing rounded away,* the chafm extending four or five yards in width, and a fewer of * the town being now laid into the cavity. And three or four yards lower in the channel of the Irke the marks of the divert-' mg dam remain equally viiible in the bank. ''The rock appears cut away for five or fix yards in breadth and three quarters of a yard in depth, in order to receive one end of the dam into it,' and to fix the whole frame fecure ^gainft the violence of the obftru&ed current. And the channel of the fofle.was funk confiderably below the prefent level of it even in its deepefV part about the weftern termination, the ground a little "to the weft of the Hanging-bridge having been recently found to be merely adventitious for the depth of nine or ten yards, and the plane of the rock below xippearing ftrongly furrowed with the wheels of the carts that Sri feme later ages have palled by this du£t from Salford towards the Hanging-ditch. This was the pleafmg impregnable fite of the fummer-camp of the Romans, lined with tall impracticable precipices behind; covered with a fofle enormoufly deep and broad before, and in- fblated by the three lively currents of water around it. Where for more than eight fticceflive centuries thfe public devotions of the town have been regularly preferred to Heaven, where for more than twenty fucceffive generations the plain forefathers of the town have been regularly repofited in peace, the Romans once kept their fummer-refidence, and enjoyed the fanning breezes of the weft and north. Where the bold barons of Manchefter fpread out the hospitable board in a rude magnificence of luxury, or difplayed the inftru&ive mimicry of war in a train of military exercifes ; where the fellows of the college fludied filently in their nefpe&ive apartments, or walked converfing in their com- mon gallery ; and where young indigence now daily receives the Judicious dole of charity, and folds his little hands in gratitude f to