under the direction of Mr. Telford, and in the following year parliamentary sanction was obtained under the title of 'An Act for making and maintaining a navigable Canal from the Peak Forest Canal in tile township of Marple, in the county palatine of Chester, to join the Canal Navigation from the Trent to the Mersey, at or near Hardings Wood Lock, in the township of Talk, or Talk-on-the-Hill, in the county of Stafford.' By this act the company were incorporated by the name of "The Company of Proprietors of the Macclesfield Canal."
The work, designed for the passage of narrow vessels of 7 feet wide, commences near the northern extremity of the summit level of the Peak Forest Canal, in the township of Marple, and passes upon that level through a very undulating part of the county of Chester, crossing at a considerable elevation several vallies whose streams afford it supplies of water; leaving Lime Hall on the east and Macclesfield on the west, it proceeds to the turnpike-road from Buxton to Congleton, having completed a distance of seventeen miles and a half; it then descends by locks to its lowest level, crossing the River Dane on the east of Congleton, and after pursuing a south-west direction to the Trent and Mersey Navigation, enters the summit level of that canal, making the total fall 113 feet 9 inches, and its total length twenty-nine miles, four furlongs and eleven poles.
The original estimate was £295,000, and the proprietors are empowered to raise by shares £300,000; should this be inadequate, they may raise a further sum of £100,000, on mortgage of the tolls.
By the act they are restricted from taking any water out of the summit levels of the Peak Forest Canal and of the Trent and Mersey, except under certain limitations. The canal is to be supplied with water from certain rivers, brooks, rivulets and water-courses, &c. but without injury to any mills thereon; and for the purpose of defining when the water shall be taken out, Mr. Nicholas Brown, of Wakefield, and Mr. Thomas Brown, of Manchester, civil engineers, are to determine under what state of the rivers, brooks, &c. the surplus water may be taken without injury to the mill-property thereon. Five reservoirs are to be constructed for the supply of the eanal, and the following are fixed as tonnage rates.
