Rides on Railways Part 23

Orchard trees are now supplied by the landlords, free of cost, to all willing to take charge of them.

It will be very difficult to induce these people to change their old slovenly style of farming, for their chief pride is in their weaving, which is excellent, and many of them are in possession of properties held for two and three generations without change. But the system of encouraging the good, and getting rid of the lazy, will work a reformation in time, especially as there are some very good examples on the estate. For instance, Benjamin Johnson, who, paying the highest rent per acre, has creditably brought up ten children on nine acres of land, without other employment.

Middleton is a district especially suited for small farms, so much so that it has been determined to divide one or two of the larger ones.

Altogether it is a very primitive curious place, with several originals among the tenantry, and some beautiful natural scenery, among whom a morning may be spent with profit and pleasure.

With the town and building land an equally comprehensive system has been adopted.

The defects of the existing buildings are to be cured as soon as, and in the best manner, that circ.u.mstances will admit; while all new houses are to be built and drained on a fixed plan, and all roadside cottages to have at least a quarter of an acre of ground for a garden.

It will take some years to work out complete results; it is, however, gratifying to see a landowner placing himself in the hands of competent advisers, planning not for the profits of the hour, but for the future, for the permanent health, happiness, and prosperity of all dwelling on his property.

The pecuniary results promise to be highly satisfactory; it is already evident that increased rents will be accompanied by increased prosperity, and it is thought in the neighbourhood that in the next ten years, the property will, from the judicious expenditure of 30,000 pounds, be worth at least 300,000 pounds.

So much for employing a scientific and practical agriculturist as land agent, instead of a fas.h.i.+onable London attorney. {193}

YORKs.h.i.+RE.

From Manchester to Leeds is a journey of forty-five miles, and about two hours. We should like to describe Yorks.h.i.+re, one of the few counties to which men are proud to belong. We never hear any one say, with conscious pride, "I am a Hamps.h.i.+reman or an Ess.e.x man, or even a Lancas.h.i.+reman," while there are some counties of which the natives are positively ashamed.

But we have neither time nor s.p.a.ce to say anything about those things of which a Yorks.h.i.+reman has reason to be proud--of the hills, the woods, the dales, the romantic streams,--above all, of the lovely Wharfe, of the fat plains, the great woods, the miles of black coal mines, where we have heard the little boys driving their horses and singing hymns, sounding like angels in the infernal regions, the rare good sheep, the Teeswater cattle, that gave us short-horns, of horses, well known wherever the best are valued, be it racer, hunter, or proud-prancing carriage horse; hounds that it takes a Yorks.h.i.+re horse to live with; and huntsmen, whom to hear tally-away and see ride out of cover makes the heart of man leap as at the sound of a trumpet; foxes stanch and wily, worthy of the hounds; and then of those famous dalesmen farmers, tall, broad-shouldered, with bullet heads, and keen grey eyes, rosy bloom, high cheek bones, foxy whiskers, full white-teethed, laughing mouths, hard riders, hard drinkers, keen bargainers, capital fellows; and besides those the slips, grafts, and thinnings from the farms, who in factories, counting-houses, and shops, show something of the powerful Yorks.h.i.+re stamp. Everything is great in Yorks.h.i.+re, even their rogues are on a large scale; in Spain, men of the same calibre would be prime ministers and grandees of the first cla.s.s; in France, under a monarchy, a portfolio, and the use of the telegraph, with no end of ribands, would have been the least reward. Here the honours stop short between two dukes, as supporters arm in arm; but still we are obliged to own that no one but a Yorks.h.i.+reman could have so bent all the wild beasts of Belgravia and Mayfair, from the Countess Gazelle to the Ducal Elephant, to his purpose, as an ex-king did. Our task will be confined on the present occasion to a sketch of Huddersfield and Leeds, centres of the woollen manufacture, which forms the third great staple of English manufactures, and of Sheffield, famed for keen blades.

HUDDERSFIELD, twenty-six miles from Manchester, is the first important town, on a road studded with stations, from which busy weavers and spinners are continually pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing. It is situated in a naturally barren district, where previously to 1811 the inhabitants chiefly lived on oaten cake, and has been raised to a high degree of prosperity by the extension of the manufactures, a position on the high road between Manchester and Leeds, intersected by a ca.n.a.l, uniting the east and west, or inland navigation, and more recently by railroads, which connect it with all the manufacturing towns of the north. An ample supply of water-power, with coal and building stone, have contributed to this prosperity, of which advantage has been taken to improve the streets, thoroughfares, and public buildings. The use of a light yellow building stone for the houses has a very pleasant appearance after the bricks of Manchester and Liverpool.

The Huddersfield Ca.n.a.l, which connects the Humber and Mersey, is a very extraordinary piece of work. It is carried through and over a backbone of hills by stairs of more than thirty locks in nine miles, and a tunnel three miles in length. At one place it is 222 yards below the surface, and at another 656.5 feet above the level of the sea.

When we examine such works, so profitable to the community, so unprofitable to the projectors, how can we doubt the capability of our country to hold its own in any commercial race? Men make a country, not accidents of soil or climate, mines or forests. For centuries California and Central America have been in the hands of an Iberian race, fallow. A few months of Anglo-Saxon rule, and land and sea are boiling with fervid elements of cultivation, commerce, and civilization. With time the dregs will disappear, and churches and schools, cornfields and fulling-mills, will supersede grizzly bears and wandering Indians.

All the land in Huddersfield belongs to the Ramsden family, by whom the Cloth Hall was erected. Six hundred manufacturers attend this hall every Tuesday.

The princ.i.p.al manufactures are of broad and narrow cloths, serges, kerseymeres, cords, and fancy goods of shawls and waistcoatings, composed of mixed cotton, silk, and wool.

The neighbourhood of Huddersfield was the centre of the Luddite outbreak, when a large number of persons engaged in the cloth manufacture, conceiving that they were injured by the use of certain inventions for dressing cloth, banded together, traversed the country at night, searching for and carrying off fire-arms, and attacking and destroying the manufactories of persons supposed to use the obnoxious machines.

Great alarm was excited, some expected nothing less than a general insurrection; at length the rioters were attacked, dispersed, a large number arrested, tried, and seventeen hanged. Since that period not one but scores of mechanical improvements have been introduced into the woollen manufacture without occasioning disturbance, and with benefit in increased employment to the working cla.s.ses.

The case of the Luddites was one of the few on which Lord Byron spoke in the Upper House, and Horace Smith sang for Fitzgerald . . .

"What makes the price of beer and Luddites rise?

What fills the butchers' shops with large blue flies?"

The population is about 30,000, and returns one member to the House of Commons.

About half a mile from the town is Lockwood Spa, of strongly sulphurous waters, for which a set of handsome buildings have been provided.

LEEDS.

LEEDS, seventeen miles from Huddersfield, is the centre of five railways, by which it has direct connection with Hull, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, on the east, and Carlisle on the west coast, Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby, and Birmingham, in the Midland counties, possesses one of the finest central railway stations in the kingdom, and has also the advantage of being in the centre of inland navigation (a great advantage for the transport of heavy goods), as it communicates with the eastern seas by the Aire and Calder navigation to the Humber, and westward by the Leeds and Liverpool to the Mersey. The town stands on a hill, which rises from the banks of the river Aire. Leeds has claims to antiquity, but few remains. When Domesday Book was compiled it appears to have been an agricultural district.

Wakefield was formerly the more important town. Lord Clarendon, in 1642, speaks of Leeds, Halifax, and Bradford, "as three very rich and populous towns, depending wholly upon clothing."

The first charter was granted to Leeds by Charles I., and the second by Charles II., on pet.i.tion of the clothworkers, merchants, and others, "to protect them from the great abuses, defects and deceits, discovered and practised by fraudulent persons in the making, selling, and dyeing of woollen cloths."

The princ.i.p.al manufacture of Leeds is woollen cloth. Formerly the trade was carried on by five or six thousand small master clothiers, who employed their own families, and some thirty or forty thousand servants, and also carried on small farms. But the extension of the factory system has somewhat diminished their numbers. There are still, however, in connection with Leeds, several small clothing villages, in which the first stages of the operation are carried on, in spinning, weaving, and fulling.

Large quant.i.ties of worsted goods are brought to Leeds to be finished and dyed, which have been purchased, in an undyed state, at Bradford and Halifax.

The dye-houses and dressing-shops of Leeds are very extensive. Goods purchased in a rough state in the Cloth Halls and Piece Halls are taken there to be finished. There are also extensive mills for spinning flax for linen, canvas-sailing, thread, and manufactures of gla.s.s and earthenware. In connection with Messrs. Marshall's flax factory, the same firm are carrying on extensive experiments near Hull in growing flax.

Cloth Halls.--Previous to 1711, the cloth market was held in the open street.

In 1755, the present Halls were erected, and in them the merchants purchase the half manufactured article from the country manufacturers.

The Coloured Cloth Hall is a quadrangular building, 127.5 yards long, and 66 broad, divided into six departments called streets. Each street contains two rows of stands, and each stand measures 22 inches in front, and is inscribed with the name of the clothier to whom it belongs. The original cost was 3 pounds 3s. This price advanced to 24 pounds at the beginning of the present century; but it has now fallen below its original value--not owing to a decrease in the quant.i.ty of manufactured goods, but owing to the prevalence of the factory system--in which the whole operation is performed, from sorting the piece to packing the cloth fit for the tailor's shelves--over the domestic system of manufacturing. An additional story, erected on the north side of the Coloured Cloth Hall, is used chiefly for the sale of ladies' cloths in their undyed state. The White Cloth Hall is nearly as large as the Coloured Cloth Hall, and on the same plan. The markets are held on Tuesdays and Sat.u.r.days, on which days alone the merchants are permitted to buy in the Halls. The time of the sale is in the forenoon, and commences by the ringing of a bell, when each manufacturer is at his stand, the merchants go in, and the sales commence. At the end of an hour the bell warns the buyers and sellers that the market is about to close, and in another quarter of an hour the bell rings a third time, and the business of the day is terminated. The White Cloth Hall opens immediately after the other is closed, and the transactions are carried on in a similar manner.

The public buildings of Leeds are not externally imposing, and it is, without exception, one of the most disagreeable-looking towns in England--worse than Manchester; it has also the reputation of being very unhealthy to certain const.i.tutions from the prevalence of dye-works.

The wealthy and employing cla.s.ses in Leeds (we know no better term) have a reputation for charity, and good management of charitable inst.i.tutions.

Howard the philanthropist visited the workhouse, and praised the management, at a period when to deserve such praise was rare. The subscriptions to public charities are large, and there is an ancient fund for pious uses, said to amount to upwards of 5000 pounds a-year, managed by a close self-elected corporation, about the distribution of which they do not consider themselves bound to give any detailed information. Dr. Hook, the Vicar of Leeds, has organized a system of house-to-house visitation, for the purpose of affording aid, in poverty and sickness, to the deserving and religious, and educational instruction to all, which has effected a great deal of good, and would have done more, had not well known circ.u.mstances shaken the confidence of the Leeds public in the honesty of some of the teachers. All parties agree, however differing in opinions, that Dr. Hook himself is a most excellent, charitable, self-sacrificing man.

A New Grammar School--first founded in 1552 by the Rev. Sir William Sheafield, and since endowed by several other persons--is lodged in a building of ample size, with residence for the head master, and enjoys an income of 2000 pounds a-year; and there are four Exhibitions of 70 pounds a-year to Magdalen College, Cambridge, tenable till degree of M.A. has been taken; one Exhibition of 100 pounds a-year, tenable for five years, at Queen's College, Oxford, open to a candidate from Leeds school; and four of 50 pounds each, at Oxford or Cambridge, for four years. There were 174 scholars in 1850. It is open to the sons of all residents in Leeds, without any fee to the masters, who are liberally paid. The elements of mathematics are taught. The Charity Commissioners reported it to be satisfactorily and ably conducted.

The Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society, the Leeds Literary Inst.i.tution, and the Leeds Mechanics Inst.i.tute, are all respectable in their cla.s.s. The Mechanics Inst.i.tute forms the centre of a union of Yorks.h.i.+re a.s.sociations of the same kind.

Three newspapers are published in Leeds, of large circulation, representing three shades of political opinion.

The Leeds Mercury--which has, we believe, the largest circulation of any provincial paper--was founded, and carried on for a long life, by the late Mr.

Edward Baines, who represented his native town in the first reformed parliament, and for some years afterwards--a very extraordinary man, who, from a humble station, by his own talents made his way to wealth and influence. He was the author of the standard work on the cotton trade, as well as several valuable local histories. The Mercury is still carried on by his family. One son is the proprietor of a Liverpool paper, and another, the Right Honourable Matthew Talbot Baines, represents Hull, and is President of the Poor-Law Board.

Among the celebrated natives of Leeds, were Sir Thomas Denison, whose life began like Whittington's; John Smeaton, the engineer of Eddystone Lighthouse, the first who placed civil engineering in the rank of a science; the two Reverend Milners (Joseph, and Isaac, Dean of Carlisle), great polemical giants in their day, authors of "The History of the Church of Christ;" Dr.

Priestly, inventor of the pneumatic apparatus still used by chemists, and discoverer of oxygen and several other gases; David Hartley, the metaphysician whom Coleridge so much admired that he called his son after him; and Edward Fairfax, the translator of Ta.s.so. Nor must we forget Ralph Th.o.r.esby, author of "Ducatus Leodiensis, or the Topography of the Town and Parish of Leeds"--a valuable and curious book, published in 1715; and of "Vicaria Leodiensis, a History of the Church of Leeds," published in 1724.

Wool Growing, and Woollen Manufactures.--Yorks.h.i.+re is the ancient seat of a great woollen manufacture, founded on the coa.r.s.e wools of its native hills; but coal and cheap conveyance, with the stimulus mechanical inventions have applied in the neighbouring counties to cotton, have given Yorks.h.i.+re such advantages over many ancient seats of manufacture, that it has transplanted and increased a considerable portion of the fine cloth trade formerly carried on in the west of England alone, besides engrafting and erecting a variety of other and new kinds of textiles, in which wool or hair have some very slight part.

It is quite certain that woollen garments were among the first manufactured among barbarous tribes. We have seen this year, in the Exhibition in Hyde Park, specimens of white felted cloth from India, equal, if not superior, to anything that we can manufacture for strength and durability, which must have been made with the rude tools, of the form which has been in use for probably at least two thousand years.

English coa.r.s.e wools have been celebrated, and in demand among foreign nations, from the earliest periods of our history. In the time of William the Conqueror, an inundation in the Netherlands drove many clothiers over, and William of Malmesbury tells us that the king welcomed them, and placed them first in Carlisle, where there are still manufactories, and then in the western counties, where they could find what was indispensable for their trade--streams for was.h.i.+ng and plenty of wood for boiling their vats. Very early the manufacturers applied to restrain the exportation of English wool.

In the time of Edward I., we find a duty of twenty s.h.i.+llings to forty s.h.i.+llings per bag on importation. Edward III. prohibited the export of wool, at the same time he took his taxes and subsidies in wool, which became a favourite medium of taxation with our monarchs, and sent his wool abroad for sale. Under his reign, Flemish weavers were encouraged to settle here and improve the manufacture, which became spread all over England thus--Norfolk fustians, Suffolk baize, Ess.e.x serges and says, Kent broadcloth, Devon kerseys, Gloucesters.h.i.+re cloth, Worcesters.h.i.+re cloth, Wales friezes, Westmoreland cloth, Yorks.h.i.+re cloth, Somersets.h.i.+re serges, Hamps.h.i.+re, Berks.h.i.+re, and Suss.e.x cloth: districts from a great number of which woollen manufactures have now disappeared. We have Parliamentary records of the mutual absurdities by which the woollen manufacturers, on the one hand, sought to obtain a monopoly of British wool, and the wool growers endeavoured to secure the exclusive right to supply the raw material. Act after act was laid upon everything connected with wool, so that it is only extraordinary that, under such restrictive trammeling, the trade survived at all.

"Odious! In woollen! 'twould a saint provoke!