Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/228

 appellation "Christis Crofte" was given to this extensive portion of South Lancashire, and it is celebrated as a place of security in troublesome times, probably from its being comparatively wild and uninhabited—

THE THREE RIVERS AT MYTTON. Hodder, which divides Lancashire from Yorkshire for a considerable portion of its course, joins the Ribble at Winkley, in Aighton, and winds along a beautiful vale, forming the southern boundary of the parish of Mytton. The Calder, issuing from the deep hollows of Whalley and Read, meets the Ribble at Hacking, a short distance below Mytton Church. The confluence of these three rivers gives additional breadth and depth to the main stream, and at times disastrous floods are the consequence. This has given rise to a distich which has in it something of a depreciatory character:—

Another version is—

It has been conjectured that Mytton = Myd-town = Myt-ton, from its being situated, as it were, in the midst of the three rivers.