[Illustration: ROCHE ABBEY.]
After leaving Conisborough we lost sight of the River Don, which runs
through Mexborough; but we came in touch with it again where it was
joined by the River Rother, at Rotherham. Here we crossed over it by the
bridge, in the centre of which stood the decayed Chapel of our Lady. On
our way we had passed to our right Sprotborough, where in 664 King
Wulfhere when out hunting came to a cave at the side of the river where
a hermit named St. Ceadde or St. Chad dwelt, the country at that time
being "among sheep and distant mountains which looked more like
lurking-places for robbers and dens of wild beasts than dwellings of
men." There were many objects of interest on each side of our road,
including, a few miles to the left, Roche Abbey, the seat of the Earl of
Scarborough, and to the right Wentworth House, one of the largest
private houses in England, and the seat of Earl Fitzwilliam, the owner
of the far-famed Wharncliffe Crags, which are skirted by the waters of
the River Don.
It was in Wharncliffe Forest that Friar Tuck, the jolly chaplain of
Robin Hood, had his abode; and below the crags, in the bed of the River
Don, there was a rock that appeared to be worn by the friction of some
cylindrical body coiled about it.
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