And yield a good price at market; as
also for live chickens in the dear seasons, of all which a very
great number are brought in this manner to London, and more
prodigiously out of this country than any other part of England,
which is the reason of my speaking of it here.
In this part, which we call High Suffolk, there are not so many
families of gentry or nobility placed as in the other side of the
country. But it is observed that though their seats are not so
frequent here, their estates are; and the pleasure of West Suffolk
is much of it supported by the wealth of High Suffolk, for the
richness of the lands and application of the people to all kinds of
improvement is scarce credible; also the farmers are so very
considerable and their farms and dairies so large that it is very
frequent for a farmer to have 1,000 pounds stock upon his farm in
cows only.
NORFOLK
From High Suffolk I passed the Waveney into Norfolk, near Schole
Inn. In my passage I saw at Redgrave (the seat of the family) a
most exquisite monument of Sir John Holt, Knight, late Lord Chief
Justice of the King's Bench several years, and one of the most
eminent lawyers of his time. One of the heirs of the family is now
building a fine seat about a mile on the south side of Ipswich,
near the road.
The epitaph or inscription on this monument is as follows:-
M. S.
D. Johannis Holt, Equitis Aur.
Totius Anglioe in Banco Regis
per 21 Annos continuos
Capitalis Justitiarii
Gulielmo Regi Annoequr Reginae
Consiliarii perpetui:
Libertatis ac Legum Anglicarum
Assertoris, Vindicis, Custodis,
Vigilis Acris & intrepidi,
Rolandus Frater Uncius & Hoeres
Optime de se Merito
posuit,
Die Martis Vto. 1709. Sublatus est
ex Oculis nostris
Natus 30 Decembris, Anno 1642.
When we come into Norfolk, we see a face of diligence spread over
the whole country; the vast manufactures carried on (in chief) by
the Norwich weavers employs all the country round in spinning yarn
for them; besides many thousand packs of yarn which they receive
from other countries, even from as far as Yorkshire and
Westmoreland, of which I shall speak in its place.
This side of Norfolk is very populous, and thronged with great and
spacious market-towns, more and larger than any other part of
England so far from London, except Devonshire, and the West Riding
of Yorkshire; for example, between the frontiers of Suffolk and the
city of Norwich on this side, which is not above 22 miles in
breadth, are the following market-towns, viz.:-
Thetford, Hingham, Harleston,
Diss, West Dereham, E. Dereham,
Harling, Attleborough, Watton,
Bucknam, Windham, Loddon, etc.
Most of these towns are very populous and large; but that which is
most remarkable is, that the whole country round them is so
interspersed with villages, and those villages so large, and so
full of people, that they are equal to market-towns in other
countries; in a word, they render this eastern part of Norfolk
exceeding full of inhabitants.
An eminent weaver of Norwich gave me a scheme of their trade on
this occasion, by which, calculating from the number of looms at
that time employed in the city of Norwich only, besides those
employed in other towns in the same county, he made it appear very
plain, that there were 120,000 people employed in the woollen and
silk and wool manufactures of that city only; not that the people
all lived in the city, though Norwich is a very large and populous
city too: but, I say, they were employed for spinning the yarn
used for such goods as were all made in that city. This account is
curious enough, and very exact, but it is too long for the compass
of this work.
This shows the wonderful extent of the Norwich manufacture, or
stuff-weaving trade, by which so many thousands of families are
maintained. Their trade, indeed, felt a very sensible decay, and
the cries of the poor began to be very loud, when the wearing of
painted calicoes was grown to such a height in England, as was seen
about two or three years ago; but an Act of Parliament having been
obtained, though not without great struggle, in the years 1720 and
1721, for prohibiting the use and wearing of calicoes, the stuff
trade revived incredibly; and as I passed this part of the country
in the year 1723, the manufacturers assured me that there was not,
in all the eastern and middle part of Norfolk, any hand unemployed,
if they would work; and that the very children, after four or five
years of age, could every one earn their own bread. But I return
to speak of the villages and towns in the rest of the county; I
shall come to the city of Norwich by itself.
This throng of villages continues through all the east part of the
country, which is of the greatest extent, and where the manufacture
is chiefly carried on. If any part of it be waste and thin of
inhabitants, it is the west part, drawing a line from about Brand,
or Brandon, south, to Walsinghan, north. This part of the country
indeed is full of open plains, and somewhat sandy and barren, and
feeds great flocks of good sheep; but put it all together, the
county of Norfolk has the most people in the least tract of land of
any county in England, except about London, and Exon, and the West
Riding of Yorkshire, as above.
Add to this, that there is no single county in England, except as
above, that can boast of three towns so populous, so rich, and so
famous for trade and navigation, as in this county.
