MANCHESTER

MANCHESTER,

THE second town of the empire in point of population, and the most important on account of its manufactures, is situate almost at the south-eastern extremity of the county of Lancaster, and is distant 186 miles N.W. by N. from London. The site of the original town was early occupied by a fort, which the Celts, migrating from the Continent, and gradually spreading from the north, planted at Castle Field, upon the bank of the River Irwell. Whitaker, the learned historian of the ancient town, gives this station the name of "Mancenion, or the Place of Tents." Possession was taken of it by the Romans about a century after its formation (A.D. 72), and they continued masters of it during three centuries, until their final departure from the island. Several of the great Roman roads, traces of which still remain, centred at this point. The fort subsequently fell into the hands of the Pictish invaders, but after a lengthened struggle, was wrested from them by the Saxons, who repaired the damage to the "Aldport Town," brought the people into due subjection to the lord or thegn, whose baronial hall covered the space of the existing Chetham's College, and built the churches of St Mary and St Michael. "Manigceastre," as Hollingworth styles the town, was occupied by the Danes about the year 870; and little is known of its succeeding history until, in the apportionment of territory made by the Norman conqueror, Manchester was assigned to William of Poictou, from whom the lordship of the manor has descended by marriage, hereditary succession, or purchase, through the families of Grelley, De la Warre, West, and De Lacey, to "Mossley of the Hough," whose successor, Sir Oswald Mossley, Bart., was the possessor of the manorial rights and property; but on corporate powers and privileges being obtained by Manchester in 1840, these rights, and much valuable property, were sold by him to the new corporation. The Grelleys, De la Warres, and Wests, sat as barons in Parliament; and Thomas de Grelley granted in 1301 a "great charter of Manchester," which, however, has no existing validity.

The Reformation was violently opposed in Manchester; Collyer, the warden of the "College of the Blessed Virgin," Bradford, and Pendlebury, were zealots in the religious controversies it excited; and Bradford died a martyr. In Elizabeth's reign, Persons and Campion, the noted Jesuits, plotted in these districts; and from Ancoat's Lane,

now a densely peopled quarter of the town, one of the Martin Marprelate presses sent forth its stirring missives. The clergy were said to be so hostile to the progress of the Reformation, that the "college" was dissolved in the reign of Edward VI.; in Elizabeth's reign a commissioner's court to promote the Reformation was established; and the most severe measures were taken against recusants, who swarmed in the dungeons of Manchester. In 1584 some were executed, one at Manchester, and their heads exposed on the "college." In the "great rebellion," Manchester took a very prominent part, the anti-monarchical party having the ascendancy. A brawl, which arose between the followers of Lord Strange (afterwards the ill-fated Earl of Derby) and the inhabitants, was magnified into a great battle, and proclaimed in the metropolis as "the beginning of civil war in England, or terrible news from the north;" Lord Strange being impeached by the Lower House for his conduct in the affair. Subsequently the town was formally besieged by his lordship's forces, but they were driven off; and the troops which had been levied for the defence of the place were engaged in various expeditions, one of which was the noted attack on Lathom House. When the warfare had ceased in England, sequestrators were sent down, who alienated the revenues of the college; presbyteries were established throughout the whole of Lancashire; Manchester was the central point of one "classical division," and the provincial synod met there. In these troubled times the warden Heyrick, a man of eminent endowments, acted a distinguished part.

Passing over another long interval, the people of Manchester are found espousing the cause of the Chevalier St George, for their devotion to whom five of the inhabitants were executed in the town. In 1745 they again stood forth in favour of the young Prince Charles; one of the localities in which the plans for his invasion of the monarchy were concocted being in the immediate vicinity, at Jackson's Ferry, near Didisbury. In the summer previous to his public appearance in Scotland, the prince secretly visited Manchester, and was entertained for a considerable time at Ancoat's Hall, the seat of Sir Oswald Mossley, the lord of the manor. The Pretender's forces entered the town on the 28th and 29th of November. They did not receive a very cordial welcome; and when they marched forward by Maclesfield towards Derby, the prince had en-

Manchester listed from the inhabitants only about 300 followers, and these chiefly of the lower order. In his subsequent precipitate retreat through Manchester, his reception was less agreeable than before. The "Manchester regiment" were left to garrison Carlisle, which place speedily surrendered to the Duke of Cumberland, and they were made prisoners. Many were sent abroad; some of the leaders suffered decapitation, and their heads were exhibited on the top of the Manchester Exchange.

The later history of the inhabitants is of a more loyal character. They were very active in the American contest, the war of the French revolution, and the more recent struggle with Napoleon, raising many regiments of volunteers, and otherwise affording their aid very freely. The first Sir Robert Peel, then residing near Bury, but who was virtually a Manchester manufacturer, his establishment being in that town, contributed money, and raised a troop of volunteers; and in the year 1798, Peel and Yates subscribed £10,000 to the "voluntary contribution for the defence of the country." From this period to the close of the war in 1815, the people of Lancashire suffered from dear food, high taxes, and by the abstraction of able-bodied men who enlisted for soldiers; and when peace was restored, the corn laws, and the redundancy of labour consequent upon the disbanding of the army, led to a continuance of distress, as also of dissatisfaction. The distress thus engendered, and the political ferment of the times, gave rise, in August 1819, to the noted "Peterloo" affair, in which a countless mass of people, having assembled for the alleged object of petitioning the House of Commons for a reform of Parliament, and the repeal of the corn laws, was dispersed by the yeomanry and the troops of the line. The Radicalism of these times has since cooled down into a more mitigated species of Liberalism. In 1830-31 many very numerous meetings were held in favour of the Reform Bill; and when it became a law, the electors returned as their representatives to Parliament the Right Honourable C. Poulett Thomson, then vice-president of the Board of Trade, and Mark Philips, Esq., both gentlemen of liberal politics. Manchester had previously sent representatives in early times. In the year 1866 the Sheriff of Lancashire, being required to cause the return of burgesses to Parliament from boroughs of sufficient importance to require representation, reported there was no city or borough in the county willing to accept the burdensome honour, "by reason of their inability, low condition, or poverty." But in Cromwell's time, July 1654, Manchester sent Mr Charles Worsley, and in the next year Mr R. Ratcliffe, to represent her interests.

Manchester has been a place of trade from a very early period. In the most remote antiquity the people traded with the Greeks of Marseilles, and with other foreigners, through Ribchester, then a considerable port on the Ribble, which river is now no longer navigable so far inland. In the reign of Henry VIII. a law was enacted to remove the right of sanctuary from Manchester to Chester, on the ground that it caused the resort hither of idle and dissolute persons, to the injury of the "trade, both in linens and woollens," for which the place was "distinguished," and which gave employment to "many artificers and poor folks," whose masters, "by their strict and true dealing," caused "the resort of many strangers from Ireland and elsewhere, with linen, yarn, wool, and other necessary wares for making of cloth, to be sold there." Camden speaks of the town as "of great account for certain woollen clothes there wrought;" and in the year 1650 the people are described as "the most industrious in the northern parts of the kingdom." The disturbances in France and the Netherlands had tended not a little to the growth of manufactures in the town, by causing the settlement of French and Flemish-artisans in Lancashire. Early in the last century it was mentioned as

a remarkable fact, that in Manchester and Bolton alone goods to the amount of £600,000 were annually manufactured. The trade appears, in fact, to have attained to as large a growth as was possible in the then confined state of mechanical knowledge. It was not until an impulse was given to invention, and that splendid series of machines was produced, of which the effects have been so amazing, that Manchester became really a place of commercial eminence and great resort.

The first of these inventions, in point of date, was the water-frame, of which Arkwright, in 1769, claimed to be the originator. In 1770 the spinning-jenny of James Hargreaves was first heard of; and in 1779 Crompton's mule-jenny was invented; while the "throstle" became an important modification and improvement of the water-frame. In 1785 Arkwright took out a patent for improved carding, drawing, and roving machines. The steam-engine of Watt dates about the same time, although there were sundry modifications of it both before and afterwards. The power-loom, for which Cartwright took out his last patent in 1787, but which underwent many changes before it could be considered as a practical machine, completes the list of early discoveries. There were, of course, various inventions subordinate to these. In the beginning of the present century, a machine was constructed which outvie'd all others in importance; it was the self-acting mule, the invention of Messrs Sharp, Roberts, and Company, of Manchester. Their last patent was taken out in 1830, and there are several millions of spindles at work on the principle of spinning yarn almost independently of human labour. Smith of Deanston, and other inventors, have subsequently contrived self-acting mules, and now the self-acting principle of spinning is fully established, and is applied universally to coarse yarns.

The history of this invention is fraught with instruction to the working-classes. Attention was first directed to the possibility of contriving a self-acting mule, in consequence of the frequency of "turns-out" amongst the spinners, and the intolerable domination which they were enabled to exercise, from the circumstance of a comparatively small class of workmen having it in their power at any moment to suspend the whole trade of cotton-spinning. One "spinner" had three or four young hands immediately dependent upon himself; he had also four or five virtually dependent on him, inasmuch as they being occupied in preparing the raw cotton for him to spin, if he took a fit of idleness or insubordination, the preliminary processes were of course suspended. In the same way, if the spinners as a body became idle, the weavers, and eventually the bleachers, spinners, and printers, were brought to a stand; in fact, the whole cotton trade was locked up, and misery and privation were the immediate and wide-spread results. These considerations induced master spinners to call into play the talent of ingenious men, for the purpose of constructing such machines as would give more stability and regularity to the processes of spinning. The self-acting principle has the virtue of being easily grafted on the older fashioned mules, a third of the value of which is sacrificed in so transforming them.

But the mere discovery of the early machines was of little benefit to the country, so long as they could be restricted in their use at the caprice of the patentee. Accordingly, through the instrumentality of Mr Peel, an association of master manufacturers was formed, and a subscription to take proceedings for setting aside Arkwright's patents was entered into, upon the principle of each spinner paying a shilling per spindle for as many as he used. The original subscription list is still in existence; the number of spindles subscribed for was about 20,000, being not more than a fourth of the number now employed by many large manufacturers. In 1781 and 1785 Arkwright's patents were annulled, and the cotton trade took a gigantic stride. The

Manchester exports, which in 1701 were only to the value of £23,253, and in 1780 only £355,060, had risen in 1781 to £1,101,457, and in 1800 to £5,406,501; but gradually expanding, the whole exports of the cotton industry amounted in 1856 to upwards of £38,000,000. The import of raw cotton, which in 1751 was only 2,976,610 lb. weight, was in 1780 upwards of 6,700,000; in 1790, 31,500,000; in 1800, 56,000,000 lb.; and in 1856, 1,000,021,021,000 lb. weight. In 1787 it was estimated that there were in Lancashire 41 cotton factories, in Derbyshire 22, and in Nottinghamshire 17. In 1790 the number had increased; and in 1817 Mr Kennedy of Manchester calculated that there were 110,763 persons employed in cotton-spinning, and 20,768 horses' power. In 1832 Messrs Greg of Manchester made a fresh estimate, giving the number of operatives employed in the cotton-spinning and weaving mills only of Great Britain, 160,000. In the year 1782 a great panic was excited in Manchester by the announcement that 7012 bags of cotton had been imported between December and April.

In 1788 a meeting was held in Manchester to consider the great depression under which the cotton manufacture was labouring from the "immense importation" of Indian goods; and shortly afterwards the cotton manufacturers of Lancashire, in conjunction with those of Scotland, appointed deputies to obtain an interview with the king's ministers, and solicit permission to erect themselves into a company of traders, with privileges similar to those enjoyed by the East India Company. At this time it was estimated that the cotton manufacture employed 159,000 men, 90,000 women, and 101,000 children,—an exaggerated number. In truth, until the passing of the Factory Act, and the appointment of inspectors and superintendents under its authority, there were no means of ascertaining the number of hands employed either in the whole country or in districts. The number of hands employed in Manchester in 1836 was as follows:—

The following is a Return of the Hands not included in the above Townships, which, added to the above, will give the Complete Numbers for the Parish of Manchester:—

Numberless manufacturers had works on the borders of Manchester, Cheshire, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, and Staffordshire, whilst their warehouses were situate, and all their transactions centred, in Manchester.

The following is a summary of mills in the county of Lancaster, and the number of steam-engines and water-wheels, with the horse-power and the number of hands employed in the year 1835:—

The number of power-looms employed was as follows:—

In addition to these, Mr Trimmer and M. Bates returned the following from their respective superintendencies:—

Of which about 485 were in the parish of Manchester.

Manchester. Weekly Earnings of Workers in Cotton Factories, Manchester and Neighbourhood, 1857, for sixty hours' labour.

Various local circumstances have combined to scatter the cotton trade over Lancashire, Cheshire, and Derbyshire. Thus, for example, Preston has become a large depot of the cotton manufacture, the price of labour and local considerations uniting in its favour; Lancaster, for the same reason, is also rising into manufacturing importance.

The subjoined table shows the difference in the price of labour at Manchester and Glasgow, the great centres of the cotton trade in England and Scotland, in 1833:—

Amongst other subjects to which the factory commissioners directed their attention, the health of factory operatives occupied, of course, much of their time, and various modes of test and comparison were adopted. Dr Mitchell, one of the medical witnesses examined, made the subjoined estimate of the amount of sickness yearly amongst various classes of operatives:—

A number of children were also measured, and the result was as under:—

The commissioners also inquired into the state of education amongst manufacturing operatives, and gave the result of an examination of 50,000 work-people as follow:—

Upon this subject a more elaborate and careful investigation was made in 1834 and 1835 by the Manchester Statistical Society, from which it appeared that there were in the borough of Manchester 43,304 children receiving education, or 21.65 per cent. of the population; and in the borough of Salford 12,885 children, or 23.4 per cent. Of these there were in Manchester 10,108, and in Salford 3131, who attended only day or evening schools; 10,011 in Manchester, and 3410 in Salford, who attended both day and Sunday schools; and 23,185 in Manchester, and 6344 in Salford, who attended only Sunday schools. It further appears that in Manchester two-thirds, and in Salford twenty-two and a half per cent., of the children between five and fifteen years of age were receiving instruction.

The total quantity of yarn spun in England in 1835 was 248,814,531 lb. Mr Burn estimated the number of spindles employed in producing it at 11,152,990; and, calculating the capital in the usual way, namely, at 17s. 6d. per spindle, it would appear that £9,758,864 was the amount embarked in the cotton spinning. From the same excellent source is derived an estimate of the value of the goods manufactured, and the yarn and thread spun in 1835.

¹ Evidence was given by three surgeons at Bolton and a physician at Stayley Bridge, to the effect that the high temperature of mills is not injurious, if there be proper ventilation; that scrofula is not frequent; that asthma and bronchitis are generated in the card-rooms; that pulmonary complaints are of most frequent occurrence amongst factory operatives; but that they are not more liable to sickness than out-door labourers. It is an established fact, that operatives in factories had an exemption from cholera when it raged in Manchester, which was not experienced by other classes.

In addition to the cotton manufacture, Manchester has likewise a considerable and rapidly increasing trade in silk-throwing and weaving. The mill of Mr Vernon Royle, celebrated throughout England for its thrown silk was established in the years 1819-20, and was the first erected in the district. In 1819 there were in Manchester about 1000 weavers of mixed silk and cotton goods, and 50 of pure silk. In 1823 the number of the former had increased to 3000, and of the latter to 2500. In 1828 there were 4000 of the former class and 8000 of the latter; and in 1832 from 12,000 to 14,000 looms were employed in Manchester houses; and the throwing mills, 12 in number, but of which 2 were not then in operation, gave occupation to about 3600 hands. The state of the silk-throwing trade in 1835 was as follows:—

Summary of Silk Mills in Manchester and the County of Lancaster, 1836.

It was calculated that the Manchester throwsters produced about 8000 pounds of thrown silk weekly, but that the silk looms consumed not less than 24,000 pounds, 8000 pounds of which were derived from the Maclesfield throwsters, and the remainder from Congleton, Sandbach, Newcastle, &c., very little foreign thrown being used in Manchester. The silk manufacturers having their principal establishments in Manchester, were estimated to employ not less than 18,500 looms in the weaving of pure or mixed silk goods; and, taking the usual trade average of four persons to a loom, the silk trade of the district, in all its branches, employed

not less than 70,000 persons. By the returns already quoted, it will be seen that throughout Lancashire only 366 power-loom were employed in silk, of which number 306 were in Manchester, and sixty in the adjoining parish of Eccles.

The foregoing statistical information, illustrative of the great industry identified with Manchester and its tributaries of trade, extending from the earliest records chiefly to the year 1836, is retained as historical evidence of the period referred to. From that time to the present (1857) a remarkable steadiness in trade and commerce has prevailed, though distinguished by a most extraordinary increase in production, and consequently by greatly extended business ramifications. The repeal of the corn laws in 1846 gave an impulse to the cotton trade beyond all previous precedent. Employment has since been uniform and abundant. Wages have not been reduced, but on the contrary the earnings of work-people have been generally increased, and especially by the constant and unfluctuating employment afforded them. Bread has been moderately cheap; sugar, tea, coffee, and other necessaries and luxuries, have been abundant, and sold at prices so reasonable that their consumption has vastly extended; and though animal food, with butter, cheese, and milk, may be regarded as comparatively dear, yet to increased demand and consumption may be justly attributed the higher prices which are now paid for these latter articles. The general comforts of the labouring classes have, during the last ten years, been fully equal to any aggregate enjoyment ever previously experienced by them. In factories the hours of labour are by acts of Parliament essentially restricted to sixty per week, and are confined, allowing time for meals, between six in the morning and six in the evening, for five days, whilst at two o'clock p.m. on Saturdays the week's work terminates; the average labour of each day for the whole week being ten hours. This principle of limited labour is by voluntary efforts rapidly extending; bankers, merchants, and traders are closing their establishments at earlier hours than formerly; and there is a general tendency to devote Saturday afternoons to recreation. Wages are now, in the cotton trade, paid very extensively on Fridays, to enable the workers and their families to expend their earnings conveniently and judiciously. With the progress, therefore, of the industry of Manchester, opportunities are afforded to the superior

Manchester. and working classes for recreative amusements, whereby their physical health may be invigorated, and, by the increase of libraries and instructive institutions, their mental faculties may be improved and developed.

Many new manufactures have been introduced into the neighbourhood of Manchester. The production of the textile fabrics in all their combinations of cotton, of silk, of woolen, and of flax, has greatly increased; and mixed materials in various goods have thus formed new fields for industry, and called forth the exercise of skill, taste, and ingenuity in results alike fanciful and attractive. Messrs Houldsworth have, with great advantage, skilfully applied mechanical embroidery to all the fabrications of the manufacturer. Glass-works have been established; and the conversion of iron into steel has become an important addition to the now multifarious sources of employment in this

district. With these increased sources of employment, labour finds a steady market. But from the cotton industry chiefly flow the profits which recompense the toil of the labourer, and enhance the capital of the manufacturer and merchant. Manchester is unquestionably the metropolis of this vast industry. Not only in this increasing city are there extensive spinning mills and manufactories, but it has become the general market for almost the whole trade; palatial structures of great magnitude have been erected in it as warehouses; manufacturers have entered largely into mercantile operations; and the merchants finding the mere freighting of vessels inadequate to their business, have in many instances become shipowners. To illustrate the progress of this trade, the following tables, showing the imports and consumption of cotton, have been prepared:—

Table of Imports of Cotton into the United Kingdom.

Table of Consumption of Cotton in the United Kingdom.

The following valuable table will show manufacturing progress and results:—

Estimate of the Sums accruing to the Trade in Cotton Manufactures during the years from 1847 to 1856, to pay for expenses of Fuel, Machinery, Drugs for Dyeing, Printing, Bleaching; Interest of Capital, and every kind of Wages, Profits, &c.,—after deducting the Actual Cost of the Raw Material.

Of the exact extent of the cotton industry in all its branches no statistics exist. From returns made to government, and from the computations of experienced cotton spin-

ners, the number of spindles in mule and throstle machinery cannot be fewer than 28,000,000; to prepare for which an immense number of scutchers, carding engines, bobbin and

fly frames, and other auxiliary machines, are indispensable. The number of weaving looms, by hand and power, is beyond the means of estimation; but the spinning and weaving machines give no idea of the supplemental machinery, of the bleaching, printing, and dyeing works, and other aids of this important trade. In addition to the mills, steam-engines, and mechanism employed, there exist multitudes of cottages and dwellings connected with those establishments. And again, beyond these, the vast warehouses containing manufacturing stores, and those to receive and dispose of finished goods, represent in their occupied state an immense investment. But in approximating to an estimate of the fixed and floating capital invested in this now national industry, the shipping required to convey to our shores the requisite raw materials, and that necessary for dispersing the manufactured products, should be remembered. The working of mines, the traffic in minerals, and the banking operations for this trade, are important items; and the actual employment of mercantile capital will altogether indicate a sum of extraordinary magnitude. So that, in naming one hundred millions of pounds sterling as the total amount of fixed and floating capital employed in connection with the cotton manufacture, the truth will not be exceeded.

The trade and commerce of Manchester and the neighbourhood have been much promoted by the valuable services of the Chamber of Commerce. This institution was founded in 1820, and from its commencement has been a consistent opponent of the corn laws, and of monopolies of every kind. It was the first public body to repudiate protection for manufactures—to call for the abolition of every species of differential duties, and for the repeal of the navigation laws. All questions, however, of a purely political complexion, are strictly forbidden to be entertained, either at the meetings of the board of directors, or at a general meeting of the members. The steady and firm course which it has pursued has earned for it a respect and consideration not surpassed—probably not equalled—by any similar association in existence. Its proceedings attract attention in every commercial community throughout the world. Previously to the repeal of the corn laws the chamber had contended for their entire abolition; but there arose another association, named the Commercial Association, which pleaded only for a fixed duty upon foreign corn, though now happily both these institutions are guided by free-trade principles.

The Anti-Corn-Law League, which so essentially contributed to the recognition of free trade as the basis of domestic and international commercial legislation, was called into existence in this city in 1838, and amongst its early, constant, and most distinguished promoters, have been Sir John Bowring, Richard Cobden, John Bright, George Wilson, J. B. Smith, C. P. Villiers, and the late Sir William Moleworth; but, as a confederation, it ramified over the whole United Kingdom. For the single purpose of overthrowing all obstacles to the free import of corn, its council wisely rejected all overtures which would have diverted its exertions to political or other objects; and greatly to the honour and sagacity of the leaders of the council, the propositions made by the Chartist to induce a common organization to be formed between these two bodies, to procure radical changes in the constitution of the country, were not entertained. At length, in 1846, the legislature, either from truthful conviction of the injustice of those laws, or impelled by the fear of denying the almost unanimous call of the people, finally erased them and the principle of protection from the statutes of the realm. To that eminent statesman, Sir Robert Peel, the people of this manufacturing district, and of the United Kingdom, owe a debt of gratitude for the patriotism and courage which he evinced in assisting to annihilate class legislation; nor will this

example be lost upon those who direct the destinies of other nations. With the fundamental changes thus effected in the economical laws of this country, the people at large have enjoyed more prosperity than at any previous time; they have become more attached to their institutions, and their loyalty to their sovereign has never before been exceeded.

Happily, with the extension of trade and commerce in Manchester, there has been developed a desire to promote educational, social, physical, and sanitary improvements. Many attempts have originated here to obtain a national system of elementary instruction for the young, but hitherto without success. The diminution in the hours of labour generally affords more time for self-improvement and kindly intercourse amongst work-people. By the establishment of public parks—the gifts of the rich to the poor—such as the Queen's, Peel's, and Philip's, healthful exercise is more amply afforded, and a link of sympathy between the people and their benefactors is hereby secured. A sanitary association has also been formed.

Grateful for the services of the Duke of Wellington and of Sir Robert Peel, the inhabitants of Manchester have erected to their memories suitable statues, which are placed in the area of the Royal Infirmary. The former is represented by the sculptor Noble as a warrior and senator; and the latter by Calder Marshall as a statesman and patron of the arts of life. As if to prove that commerce still exists in alliance with the fine arts, there was opened in Manchester, in May 1857, an exhibition of the treasures of art, procured exclusively from the resources of the United Kingdom. The Queen and Prince Albert have graciously and generously contributed many of their gems of art, and personally have expressed their warmest solicitude for the success of the exhibition. Patrician and plebeian owners of works of art have rivalled each other in the richness and rarity of their contributions; and a more refining, elevating, and instructive source of gratification cannot be conceived than will probably be afforded by this unique gathering of the curious and beautiful stores of art.

The population of Manchester has had a most amazing growth. The town comprehends several townships, viz., Manchester, Chorlton-upon-Medlock, Cheetham, Ardwick, Hulme, Newton, Harpurhey, Bradford, and Beswick, which form the borough of Manchester; Salford, Pendleton, and Broughton, that of Salford; but they are physically, as well as politically and commercially, one town, though having separate local governments. Of the townships of Manchester and Salford, the population was as follows at the decennial periods:—

It is calculated that the population of Manchester, Salford, and their districts, is now not less than 500,000.

The township of Chorlton-upon-Medlock, now filled with factories, was not many years since a desert, and the population has sprung up in a way wholly unprecedented. It was, in 1801, 675 persons; in 1811, 2581; in 1821, 8209; in 1831, 20,569; in 1841, 77,107; and in 1851, 123,806. Property has increased in the same rapid ratio. In 1815 the annual value was L.19,830; in 1835 it was L.58,844. A similar augmentation has taken place in other townships. In Manchester in 1815 the annual value of property was only L.308,634; in 1835 it was L.573,085; and in 1856, L.891,228. In Salford it was, in 1815, L.49,048; in 1835, L.114,769; and in 1856, L.201,042. In Broughton (a township without manufactures) the annual value of

lands and buildings was, in 1815, only L.5082; in 1835, L.21,303. In Cheetham (also a township containing only private residences) the value was, in 1815, L.8524; in 1835, L.28,541; and since, these townships have proportionately increased.

Manchester ranks as the first manufacturing town in the empire, and in population it is second only to London. The county is divided into several hundreds, Manchester being situated in the centre of that of Salford, in which there has been an immense increase of population within the present century. The total annual value of property in Salford hundred was, in 1815, L.918,397, and in 1829, L.1,554,314. Of these amounts, L.488,053 at the former period, and L.751,200 at the latter, were comprised in the parish of Manchester, which is divided into thirty-two parishes.

In 1848 Manchester became a bishopric, and Dr James Prince Lee was nominated the first bishop. Under this learned and tolerant divine the church establishment has been judiciously fostered, and its usefulness has been greatly increased.

Manchester, as an old parish, has a parish church, said to have been erected by a Lord Delaware in 1422, out of two old churches built in 1300. It is a fine Gothic structure, 216 feet in length from east to west, and 120 feet in breadth, with a handsome tower. It is richly ornamented in the cathedral style, having on the exterior numerous grotesque figures projecting from the roof, in the taste of the age in which it was built. It has of late years been extensively repaired and beautified in conformity with the original design, and affords accommodation, by its great proportion of free seats, to a numerous congregation. It was made collegiate by the founder, who amply endowed it; and, by the increased value of the property, it became a rich ecclesiastical establishment, with a warden, four fellows, and two chaplains; but since the creation of the see of Manchester, the warden and fellows have been substituted by a dean and four canons, the latter now having each the care of a district church. The only churches more than seventy years old are, St Ann's, in the square of that name, consecrated in 1765; and St John's, in Byrom Street, opened in 1769. As the town has grown, more churches have been built, and others are now being built. The number of those edifices in which the established forms of worship are observed is now very considerable. They are all handsome, some of them elegant structures, and all in the interior are neatly and appropriately finished. As in other manufacturing towns, the number of those who dissent from the Established Church is very considerable. There are six congregations belonging to the Presbyterian Church, two to the United Presbyterian, and one to the Scotch Church; but the largest division is the adherents to the Roman Catholic Church, consisting for the most part of Irish immigrants employed in the lowest kinds of labour. They have seven places of worship, one of them, in Granby Row, opened in 1820, very handsome and costly, in the Gothic style; and in Salford has been erected a most splendid

ecclesiastical structure, which, in truth, may be regarded as a Roman Catholic cathedral. There are about thirty chapels belonging to Wesleyan Methodists of different shades of opinion; the Independents have nineteen places of worship, the Baptists eight, the Unitarians four; and there are several belonging to other smaller sects.

As to the religion of the inhabitants, there are other ascertained facts of a more general nature. The church accommodation in Manchester and Salford consists of about 40,000 sittings, exclusively of the Scotch Kirk; that in the Wesleyan Methodist chapels of about 10,000; Roman Catholic and all other dissenting chapels of about 25,000 sittings. The Sunday schools in Manchester and Salford attached to the various religious communities, and the total numbers instructed by each, are as follows:—

Sunday-Schools in Manchester and Salford.

After London, Liverpool, and Dublin, the payments to the post-office in Manchester exceed those of any town in the kingdom. They were for the three years, 1832, 1833, and 1834, respectively, as follows:—L.53,510, 8s. 4d., L.56,287, 16s. 11d., and L.60,621, 12s. 6d. Since that period, the beneficial change effected in the postal arrangements of the United Kingdom, by the introduction of a universal penny postage, has rendered the money receipts of this office no adequate comparative standard for recording the progress of the correspondence generally resulting from the vast increase of trade and commerce in this city; yet in 1856 postage stamps sold at the Manchester post-office, and postages, &c., paid, amounted to L.75,043. The money-orders received and paid at this office in the same year amounted to L.570,506, 15s. 4d., thus proving the immense advantage of this banking auxiliary to the poor, as well as to all other classes of the community.

The state of the poor in Manchester, and throughout Lancashire generally, is remarkably comfortable and prosperous. A reference to the returns of the expenditure of poor's rate in Lancashire, and other counties, places this fact quite beyond dispute:—

In the township of Manchester, the expenditure exclusively for the poor (deducting the heavy payments to hundred and county rates, and for constables' accounts), was,—

And in this last year the in-door paupers cost 2s. 3d. per head, whilst the out-door had relief to the amount of 1s. 2½d. for each person so relieved.

The population is taken in the month of April; and as the making up of overseers' accounts takes place on the 25th of March, it was thought better in each instance to take the period nearest to the date of the census, which will account for the years being put in this way.

In the township of Chorlton-on-Medlock, almost exclusively a manufacturing suburb, the expenditure has been,—

A striking and most important difference appeared in the expenditure of another township (Broughton), in which were few or no manufactures to employ the poor; showing that the poor rates fell much heavier on an agricultural than on a manufacturing population:—

In connection with these statistics, which are intended to communicate, in as concise a form as possible, a correct view of the condition of the people of the principal manufacturing town of Great Britain, it is important to exhibit some data as to the state of crime in the district; and the following table affords that information in an authentic form.

Statement of the Number of Prisoners Tried and Convicted at the New Bailey Court-House, Salford, in the following Years:—

Taken into custody, 133,702
Discharged..... 59,826 } of which 49,056 were summarily convicted.
} 11,039 were tried and convicted.
} 13,761 were committed for trial.

The towns of Manchester and Salford consist of two boroughs, and are governed by two mayors and a number of aldermen and councillors. The two corporations have distinct municipal powers; but sometimes they co-operate for a great and common object. Manchester has recently supplied itself with excellent water from Woodhead in Derbyshire, and Salford participates in the great advantage of the acquisition. Manchester possesses large gas-works, which are important, inasmuch as the profits accruing from them are expended upon those improvements which tend so much to the health, the comfort, and the ornament of a densely peopled town.

The gigantic undertakings of the celebrated Duke of Bridgewater, who, and his engineer Brindley, may without exaggeration be styled the parents of canal navigation in England, had their centre in Manchester. In succeeding years the example so nobly set was rapidly followed, and Manchester has the advantage of a connection, as direct as canal and river navigation conjoined can afford, with Liverpool, Hull, Goole, London, Lancaster, and indeed all the great seaports and inland commercial towns. It is remarkable that this district should have been the first to manifest the immense importance of railway communication. The history of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, which was opened in 1830, is familiar to every one; and now (1856) Manchester has complete communication by railways with every part of the United Kingdom.

Manchester has been the birthplace, or abode, or central point of action, of many eminent men. In remoter times the names of Hugh Oldham, Bradford, Booker, Dee (the astrologer), Whitaker (the historian), Byrom (a poet, and the inventor of a system of short-hand), Worthington, Percival, Ogden, Hugh Manchester, Humphrey Chetham, Heyrick, Lord Delamere, Bancroft, Barlow, and Crabtree, hold a prominent place in the history of the town and its connections. Amongst the illustrious of modern days, the commercial metropolis may claim as her own the eccentric Duke of Bridgewater. Mr Thomas Henry, though not born in Manchester, spent his life there; and his attain-

Manchesterments as a chemist were brought into beneficial exercise upon the cotton manufacture of the country, in the discovery of most important improvements in the art of dyeing, through the operation of mordants, and by simplifying and applying practically to manufactures the discovery of M. Berthollet in regard to the qualities of oxymuriatic acid, a discovery by which the time occupied in the process of bleaching calicoes has been reduced from days to hours. The first Sir Robert Peel, though born near Blackburn, and a resident of Bury, had his manufacturing establishment in Manchester, and was probably the most extensive manufacturer of his day, excepting perhaps Sir Richard Arkwright. Dr Dalton also, though born in Cumberland, spent his life from the age of twenty-six or thereabouts in Manchester, whether he went originally from Kendal on his appointment to the post of professor of mathematics and natural philosophy at the Manchester New College,—an institution which was subsequently moved to York, but has found a resting-place in Manchester again. The doctor was many years president of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society through which many of his most valued discoveries have been communicated to the world. He died in 1844; and now in the infirmary area there is a beautiful bronze statue after Chantrey, to commemorate his discoveries and the esteem in which he was held by his friends and fellow-citizens.

The municipal government of the township of Manchester was formerly committed to a boroughreeve and two constables, who were elected at the court-leet of the lord of the manor, Sir Oswald Mosley, Bart. The boroughreeve exercised the power, without enjoying any of the external distinctions, usually pertaining to a mayor. There was an effective police establishment, under the direction of 240 commissioners elected by the occupants of tenements of a certain annual value; but the local government under the existing corporation is more satisfactory and efficient.

Manchester has a considerable number of associations for the cultivation of science and literature, and the promotion of education. The Royal Manchester Institution ranks first in importance, the inhabitants having expended about £30,000 in the erection of a noble edifice for periodical exhibitions of paintings, the delivery of lectures, &c., leaving themselves unhappily almost without the means of fulfilling the purposes for which the building was raised. In 1825 a Mechanics' Institution was opened under the presidency of Sir Benjamin Heywood, Bart.,—its area being 738 yards, and the cost £7000; and 25,000 students have derived the advantage afforded by this institution. Lord Morpeth distributed the prizes of 1833, and Lord Brougham was a visitor in 1835. This institution not being large enough, nor its rooms commodious, a new building was erected in 1855 to supersede the old one, and which was opened by an exhibition of great interest in 1856, under the patronage of Lord Palmerston.

The presidents of the Mechanics' Institution have been,—Sir Benjamin Heywood, Richard Cobden, H. Day, the Right Honourable the Earl of Ellesmere, J. A. Turner; and Oliver Heywood, the son of the first president, is the chairman at the present time (1857). Among the palpable benefits derived from this invaluable institution, the teaching of young females has been of conspicuous advantage. The area of the new building is 942 yards; and the cost of ground, building, and furnishing the several rooms for the use of the members, £24,000; in diminution of which, there will arise the proceeds of the old institution, valued at, for ground and building, £7000. The opening exhibition will leave a clear profit of £4300. It has been visited by 300,000 persons.

The numbers attending the several classes (Christmas 1856) were as follows:—

Female Day Classes.

Male Evening Classes.

There were also, at the above date, 148 members paying 21s. per annum, but not taking advantage of the classes, and 150 life members, having paid in past years £10, 10s. each.

Very many respectable men,—civil engineers, working mechanical engineers, managers of cotton mills, surveyors, and men holding important confidential offices as cashiers, corresponding clerks, &c., were educated in the classes of the institution.

An excellent natural history society is in a flourishing state; the town boasts a concert hall having an income of £2000 per annum; there are two schools of medicine, the elder of which (the Pine Street) has attained to considerable celebrity, and which obtained the patronage of King William IV.; and amongst the numerous public libraries is one to which free access is afforded, and which has a large and most valuable collection of books, ancient and modern. This is the library attached to that antique structure, Chetham's Hospital, or the College (now so called), an institution founded two centuries ago by the man whose name it bears, for the maintenance, education, and apprenticing of a number of boys, the offspring of poor parents. Very lately, however, another free library has been established by voluntary subscriptions, chiefly obtained by Sir John Potter, and it is maintained by a municipal rate collected under the act supported by Mr Ewart, M.P. In Salford, also, under the same act of Parliament, has been provided a museum and library, the access to which is likewise free. The Grammar School is another of the ancient foundations which do honour to the town; of late years its funds have so far increased as in 1855 to justify the erection of a second school, in which a course of general education may be gratuitously obtained, whilst the parent building is still devoted to the diffusion of classical knowledge. The school has the advantage of several "exhibitions." The inquiry into the public charities of England includes a very large return of charitable bequests still existent within the hundred of Salford, and of these Manchester has its full share. The town also supports, with a most liberal hand, medical institutions for the cure of almost every disease incident to humanity. At the head of these stands the Royal Infirmary, established in 1752. There are also a Ladies' Jubilee charity, a school for the deaf and dumb, and a blind asylum, which had its foundation in a bequest of £40,000, made several years ago by Mr Henshaw, a wealthy inhabitant of Oldham; the condition of its application to that benevolent object being, that no part of the sum should be