**Leeds**, a town of the west riding of Yorkshire, 196 miles from London, has a magnificent stone bridge over the river Aire to the suburbs. It was incorporated by King Charles I. with a chief alderman, nine burgesses, and 20 assistants; and by Charles II. with a mayor, 12 aldermen, and 24 assistants. It has been a long time famous for the woollen manufacture, and is one of the largest and most flourishing towns in the county, yet had but one church till the reign of Charles I. By means of inland navigation, it has communication with the rivers Mersey, Dee, Ribble, Ouse, Trent, Darwent, Severn, Humber, Thames, Avon, &c.; which navigation, including its windings, extends above 500 miles in the counties of Lincoln, Nottingham, Lancaster, Westmoreland, Chester, Stafford, Warwick, Leicester, Oxford, Worcester, &c. Here is a long street full of shops, and a hall for the sale of cloth, built in 1758. The merchants of this place, York, and Hull, ship them off at the latter port, for Holland, Hamburg, and the north. After ringing of the market-bell at six or seven in the morning, the chapmen come and match their patterns, when they treat for the cloth with a whisper, because the clothiers' standings are so near each other; and perhaps 20,000l. worth of cloth is sold in an hour's time. At half an hour after eight the bell rings again, when the clothiers make room for the linen-drapers, hardware men, shoemakers, fruiterers, &c. At the same time the flambles are well stored with all sorts of fish and flesh; and 500 horse loads of apples have been counted here in a day. There is a magnificent hall, where they also sell great quantities of white cloth; and here is a noble guildhall, with a fine marble statue of Queen Anne, erected about the year 1714. Its river being navigable by boats, they send other goods, besides their cloth, to Wakefield, York, and Hull, and furnish York with coals. There is a house called Red Hall, because it was the first brick building in the town, and King Charles I. had an apartment in it, which is ever since called the King's Chamber. There is another place called Tower Hill, on which there was once a tower; besides which, there was a castle which King Stephen besieged in his march to Scotland. Here was also a park, where are now inclosures. There is a workhouse here of free stone, where poor children are taught to mix wool, and perform other easy branches of that manufacture, and a part of it has been used many years as an hospital for the reception of the aged poor. Here are three almshouses, and two charity schools of blue coat boys to the number of 100. In the ceiling of St Peter's, its only parochial church, the delivery of the law to Moses is finely painted in fresco by Parmentier. It is a venerable free stone pile built in the cathedral fashion, and seems to have been the patchwork of several ages. The increase of building in Leeds in the year 1786, was nearly 400 houses. The population in 1801 amounted to 30,669. There is a Presbyterian meeting-house here, erected in 1691, called the new chapel, which is the stateliest, if not the oldest, of that denomination in the north of England; and in the town and its suburbs are several other meeting-houses, as is always observable in towns of great trade and manufacture. It is noted for some medicinal springs; one of which, called St Peter's, is very cold, and has been found very beneficial in rheumatisms, rickets, &c. Here is an hospital for relief of the poor who had been honest and industrious, endowed with 80l. a-year, besides 10l. a-year for a master to read prayers and instruct them; also a free school. Its markets are Tuesday and Saturdays, and the market-laws are more strictly observed here than anywhere. It has two fairs in the year. Leeds, though a large town, sends no members to parliament.

**Leek**, a town of Staffordshire in England, 155 miles from London. It lies among the barren moorlands, has a manufacture of buttons, a market on Wednesday, and seven fairs in the year. In the churchyard, at the south-east corner of the chancel, are the remains of a Danish cross, now upright, and 10 feet high from the ground, beneath which are three steps. In Blue hills in the neighbourhood are coal mines; and a salt stream comes from thence, which tinges the stones and earth through which it runs with a rusty colour, and, with the infusion of galls, turns as black as ink. Here are rocks of a most surprising height, without any turf or mould upon them.

**Leer**, in glass-making, a sort of third furnace, intended to anneal and cool by proper degrees the vessels when made. This properly comprehends two parts, the tower and leer. The tower is that part which lies directly above the melting furnace, with a partition between them of a foot thick, in the midst whereof there is a round hole, placed exactly over the furnace, through which the flame and heat pass into the tower; on the floor of this tower the vessels are set to anneal. There are two openings by which the vessels are put into this tower; and after standing there some time, they are put into iron pans, which by degrees are drawn out all along that part of this furnace, which is properly called the lees; which is five or six yards long, that the vessels may cool by degrees. This lees is continued to its tower and arched all along, and is about four feet wide, and high within. The glases are cool by that time they are brought to the mouth of this, which enters into a room where the glases are placed when taken out.