The dedicatee is Elizabeth, Duchess of Devonshire. Written in heroic couplets, this work by Cotton was one of the first landscape poems of a movement which only became significant under Queen Anne.

Charles Cotton published this satirical poem just five years after Thomas Hobbes' own "Wonders of the Peak" poem was translated into English. Cotton's poem recalls a visit to the 'Devil's Arse', nowadays known as Peak Cavern, in Castleton.

Cotton is also known for contributing a treatise on fly fishing for trout in the second edition of Izaak Walton's famous book, "The Compleat Angler".