Quarry Bank Mill at Styal near Wilmslow in Cheshire was one of the largest cotton mills in Europe, founded in 1784 by Samuel Greg. It is now a National Trust property. Before joining the family firm, Robert Hyde Greg (1795-1875), son of the founder, travelled in Scotland, then Spain and Portugal on a fact-finding mission, and then he did the Grand Tour covering France, Italy, Greece and the Ottoman Empire, all between 1814 and 1817. The manuscript journals of his travels survive and are now published for the first time, and they make fascinating reading. Greg was one of the first travellers to reach Iberia after the Napoleonic wars and he travelled as a representative of the firm, observing much which is now of interest to social and economic historians. His travels there were interrupted by the terrifying prospect of renewed conflict when Napoleon was restored to power. Cultural interests were more apparent on the Grand Tour, but Greg also makes intelligent social observations, surviving various adventures in the company of the Prince of Homburg. Throughout his travels he made drawings of what he saw, and many of these are also published here, together with contemporary illustrations from other sources.