London to John O* Groat's. 283 



and there stands the blackened, crumbling ruin to this 

 day, as a silent but grim reproach to the People for 

 letting their angry passions rise to such destructive 

 excitement on political questions. 



Hosiery and lace are the two great manufacturing 

 interests of Nottingham, and the tons of these articles 

 it turns out yearly for the world are astonishing in 

 number and value. A single London house employs 

 3,000 hands in the town and immediate vicinity upon 

 hosiery alone for its establishment. Lace now seems 

 to lead the way, and there are whole streets of factories 

 and warehouses busy with its manufacture and sale. 

 Perhaps no fabric in the world ever tested the inge- 

 nuity and value of machinery like this. The cost 

 has been reduced, from the old handworking to the 

 present process, from three dollars to three cents a 

 yard ! I think no machinery yet invented has been 

 endowed with more delicate functions of human reason 

 and genius than that employed upon the flower-work 

 of this subtle drapery. Until I saw it with my own 

 eyes, I had concluded that the machinery invented 

 or employed in America for setting card-teeth was 

 the most astute, and as nearly approaching the faculties 

 of the human mind in its apparent thought-power, 

 as it was reverent and safe to carry anything made 

 of iron and steel, or made by man at all. To con- 



