LEICESTERSHIRE

LEICESTERSHIRE, an English inland county. It is bounded on the north by Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire; on the west by the latter county and Warwickshire; on the south by Northamptonshire, and on the east by Rutlandshire and Lincolnshire. It is of a triangular form, and few of its limits are marked by nature, as the rivers Soar and Trent form only a part of its northern boundary, and the river Anker a smaller portion of its western frontier. Its greatest length, from north to south, is 45 miles, and its greatest breadth, from east to west, 35 miles. Its area contains 816 square miles.

Divisions
and Popula-
tion.

It is divided into six hundreds, containing 10 market towns, 196 parishes, and 30,649 dwelling-houses. By the census of 1811, the number of inhabitants appeared to be 150,419, viz. 73,366 males, and 77,053 females. The deaths, the year preceding, were, 1366 males, and 1370 females. The baptisms of the same year were 2034 males, and 2024 females; the marriages, 1206. The number of families was 31,480; those employed in agriculture were 11,700; those in trade and manufactures 17,027, and those of neither description 2753.

The towns whose inhabitants exceed 1500 are the following:

Face of the
Country.

The county of Leicester may be described generally as a level district, whose undulations are very gentle, and exhibiting but few interesting prospects. The exceptions to this remark are the Charnwood Hills, on the northern part of the county, which rise in an insulated mass, and from the summit of which the rest of the county appears extended in a well-wooded but even surface under the feet. The most lofty prominence of this range of hills (commonly denominated the Forest, though it is destitute of trees) is Bardonhill, whose top is 850 feet above the level of the sea. The vale of Belvoir, in which the castle of the Duke of Rutland stands, displays much beauty

of a soft, rather than a romantic and picturesque character.

Rivers and
Canals.

None of the rivers of this county are considerable streams, nor any of them calculated for the conveyance of commodities except the Soar, for a short distance, but they are abundant, and contribute to increase the beauty and fertility of the district. Their names are, the Anker, Avon, Blackbrook, Deane, Eye, Scalford, Sence, Snite, Soar, Swift, Trent, Willand, and Wreke. The intercourse of the county, both in its own different districts and with the surrounding parts of the kingdom, is amply provided for by several navigable canals. One of these connects the town of Leicester with the Grand Junction Canal, in Northamptonshire; another communicates by Loughborough with the river Trent; another from the coal mines near Ashby-de-la-Zouch, passes by Hinckley, and proceeds into Warwickshire; and one is designed to connect Melton-Mowbray with the centre of Rutlandshire.

Soil, and
Agricultural
Productions.

Though the soil is various, yet, in general, it may be classed under the denominations of either clay or loam, for there are very few portions of it that are calcareous, sandy, or gravelly. The best soil is on the hills, and generally the valleys are a cold clay, very wet in the winter, and with the turf so tender as scarcely to bear the treading of sheep in that season. The soil is naturally productive of the best and most abundant crops of grass, and better fitted for feeding cattle than for arable culture. In consequence of this quality, a very small portion is under the plough, but those parts produce most excellent wheat, oats, and beans; the latter have great celebrity. There are few open fields now remaining, and the quantity of waste land is very small. The productions of the soil are principally from the sheep and cows. Mr Bakewell, whose fame in improving the breeds of all cattle is generally known, has been the means of stocking this county first, and afterwards many other parts of England, with a race of sheep produced by various crosses, that by many farmers is now preferred to every other, and universally known by the name of the new Leicesters. They unite perfect symmetry of shape with the smallest possible quantity of bone and offal, and their wool is both fine and abundant. The horned cattle were, in like manner, improved by the lessons of this skilful breeder; and no part of England exceeds Leicestershire either in its beef or in the produce of the dairy. The cheese commonly made is in great request through all the north of England, and the kind called Silton, from having been first sold in that town, though made near Melton-Mowbray, is perhaps the richest in the world.

The process of making it was long kept a secret in a few villages, but is now universally known. Its richness arises from one-half the milk being skimmed, and the cream taken from that added to the other milk, so that the cheese have double the usual quantity of cream in their composition. Bakewell improved, also, the breed of horses to a great extent. In this line there was less room for any extraordinary progress; but his black horses, of the cart kind, originating principally from mares which he brought from Flanders, enabled him to introduce the method of ploughing with two horses abreast, by which much labour in agriculture is saved.

The manufacture of most eminence in this county is that of Hosiery, which gives employment more or less constant to two-thirds of its inhabitants. The quantity of stockings made here is prodigious, and supplies the greater part of the British dominions, as well as many other parts of the world, with those of an inferior and middling quality. The first frames were invented about 1590, but the first introduced in Leicestershire was used at Hinckley, in 1640. Since that period, many improvements in the machinery of them have been made. At each step in advance, the apprehension of diminishing the labour has occasioned riots and tumults among the workmen, which have been continued to the present time, and recently has embodied them under the denomination of Luddites, to the terror of the peaceful inhabitants, some of whom have transferred their capitals and machinery to less turbulent districts. The only other manufactures of consideration are, an extensive one of cotton-spinning and weaving, at Loughborough, and some small ones, of stuffs, at Market Harborough.

In the north-west part of the county there are extensive mines of valuable coal, which supply the inhabitants of the surrounding districts. With them terminate the mines in the direction of the German Ocean to the southward. At Bredon, on the confines, the singular rock, called Bredon Hill, is composed of a most valuable kind of limestone, which forms an excellent cement in water, and which was used for building the pier of Ramsgate.

The Roman roads are still visible in many parts of the county, though in many instances they have been covered by the more recent highways. The Watling Street road, the Fossway, and the Via Davana, traversed the county, and have been traced with great accuracy by antiquarians. At Radcliffe, on the Wreke, is an ancient tumulus, generally attributed to the Celts, 350 feet long, and 120 broad. At Leicester, which was a Roman station, are still visible the remains of the architecture of that people, in what is called the Jewny wall, consisting of a mass of stones, brick work, and dilapidated arches, built in alternate courses of brick in three layers, and of stone. Near the town is the vestige of a British Cursus, according to some antiquarians, or of a Roman camp, according to others. At different and distant periods a great number of coins have been discovered, with the names of Titus, Trajan, Dioclesian, Constantine, Constantius, Hadrian, and other Roman emperors. Other Roman antiquities have been found at Rothley, at Wanlip, at Market Har-

borough, at Burrow, and at Cathorpe. The Gothic remains are considerable; those of the Abbey of Leicester, of the Nunnery of Grace Dieu, Ulvestoft Priory, Laund Priory, the Castle of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, the churches of Hinckley and Melton-Mowbray, and the chapel of Market Harborough, all reward the inspection of the antiquarian.

In the church of Lutherworth, the pulpit and part of the vestments of the great reformer Wickliffe are still preserved. He was buried there in 1387; but, in 1428, his bones were taken up and burnt, and the ashes thrown into the river, by order of the Council of Sienna. Leicestershire has been the scene of two great military events, which have been the means of transferring the government of England. The first the battle of Bosworth, which terminated the reign and life of Richard III. in 1485, and the other the battle of Naseby in 1645, which led to the death of Charles I., and the subsequent elevation of Oliver Cromwell.

Leicestershire returns but four members to Parliament, viz. two for the county, and two for the borough of Leicester.

The noblemen and gentlemen's seats are very numerous: the most remarkable are, Belvoir Castle, Duke of Rutland; Beaumanoir Park, W. Herrick, Esq.; Buckminster, Sir William Manners; Staunton Harold, Lord Ferrers; Kirkby Park, Sir R. Milbank; Normanton Hall, George Pochin, Esq.; Rothley Temple, T. Babbington, Esq.; Stapleford, Earl of Harborough; Stoughton Grange, G. A. L. Keck, Esq.; Donnington Park, Marquis Hastings; Gospal Hall, Honourable R. Curzon; Stewards Hay, Earl of Stamford.

See Nicholls's History of Leicestershire; and Parliamentary Population Papers. (w. w.)

LEITRIM is a county in Ireland, in the province of Connaught, bounded on the north by the bay of Donegal and the county of Fermanagh, on the east and south-east by Cavan and Longford, and on the south and west by Roscommon and Sligo. It is about 58 English miles long, and from 7 to 20 broad, and contains 604 English square miles, or 386,560 English acres, divided into five baronies, and seventeen parishes. Half this area or more consists of bog, waste, and water. The centre of the county is in north latitude 55°, and west longitude 7°.

The river Shannon, which enters Leitrim on the north-east from Cavan, about five miles from its source, and soon after flows into Lough Allen, forms, after issuing from that lake on the south, the boundary with Roscommon, on the south-west, till it leaves this county at the village of Rusky. From Carrick on Shannon to Rusky the country is well wooded, fertile, and exceedingly pleasant; but from the southern side of Lough Allen to the northern boundaries, throughout its whole breadth, the greater part of the surface is occupied with mountains, and presents, though not without several exceptions, a very rugged and sterile appearance. The Shannon is the only river of any note; another, the Abhain-Naille, is remarkable for having its source in the lake Killowmawn, situated on the summit of a mountain, called Leacka, into which no streams flow

Leitrim. The principal lake is Lough Allen, near the middle of the western boundary, about nine miles long, and seven miles broad. Lough Melvin and Lough Gill, though much smaller, deserve to be noticed for the beauty of the scenery on their banks, and the former for its wooded islands and ruins. In these lakes, and also in the Shannon and most of the rivulets, various sorts of fish, the perch in particular, are in great abundance.

Minerals. There are large tracts of a dark fertile soil incumbent on limestone in the low grounds, but the hills are for the most part covered with a coarse unproductive clay mixed with gravel, and very retentive of water. Below this clay, slate of different colours sometimes occurs. Ironstone, in some places alternating with limestone, is very common; and it was formerly worked to some extent. Coal is found in the mountain Slieb-an-Erin, on the east side of Lough Allen, and has been raised in quantities for some years, but it is not of a good quality, and is employed only in foundries. Pipe-clay and ochre appear in the beds of the rivulets that descend from this mountain. Lead and copper are known to exist in several places; and there is a great variety of clays and marls. Mineral springs, both chalybeate and sulphureous, are not unfrequent, and have been used with very beneficial effects.

Estates and Farms. About the beginning of the eighteenth century, Leitrim is said to have been almost a continued forest. There is now little wood in it, and no considerable plantations. The proprietors, however, have of late paid some attention to this method of improvement, and several large nurseries have been established for the sale of forest and other trees.

This county is in general divided into large estates, and nearly all the great proprietors are absentees. The leases are commonly for three lives or thirty-one years. Agriculture is here in a very low state. The tillage farms are small, seldom exceeding fifty or sixty acres, and these are almost always subdivided among a number of tenants. The plough is very little used. The most common implement is the loy, a kind of spade eighteen inches long, about four inches broad at the bottom, and five or six inches at the top, where it is furnished with a wooden handle about five feet long. The first two crops are potatoes, which are followed by flax, and then oats for one or more years. Clovers and other green crops are unknown in the practice of the tenantry. The county raises grain and potatoes sufficient for its own consumption, but exports very little of either. Its cattle have been much improved by the introduction of English breeds, to which some of those now bred and reared in it are said to be not inferior. There are no considerable dairies, yet a good deal of butter is made throughout the district, and some of this is sent to the market of Sligo. The sheep are of the native race, small, and but few in number.

Population. In 1802, the number of families multiplied by five, gave a population of 76,630, in which, according to Wakefield, the Catholics are as thirty to one. The principal towns are Carrick on Shannon, Carrigallen, Mohill, Ballinamore, and Manor Hamilton, none of which contains more than a few hundred inhabitants. Leitrim, from which the county takes its name, has

been for many years of still less importance, though it is pleasantly situated on the Shannon. There are several bleachfields, and some coarse potteries; and a number of people are employed in weaving. But the linen made here, as well as the coarse woollen goods, is chiefly for the use of the inhabitants themselves. The houses of the lower classes are of the worst description; even the more recently erected farm buildings, including a little barn and cow-house, do not cost more than £10 or £12. Turf is their only fuel, and potatoes and oaten bread the chief articles of food, meat being used on extraordinary occasions only; but the people are said to be comfortably clothed. In 1802, wages were only from 4d. to 6d. a-day for cottars, and 6½d. with breakfast and dinner, for occasional labourers, and these rates have not been much altered since. The price of potatoes is from 1½d. to 3d., and of oatmeal from 1s. to 1s. 9d. per stone. Even among the old people the English language is in general use. Leitrim county sends two members to Parliament. See Macparlan's Agricultural Survey of Leitrim, and the general works quoted under the former Irish counties. (A.)