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CHAPTER XVIII. 



THE NOKTHEKN COUNTIES. 



THE northern region, the last to come under our notice 

 before quitting England proper, commences with Lanca- 

 shire and the West Eiding of Yorkshire. Here every- 

 thing is on a large scale. Lancashire has an area of 

 1,200,000 acres, and a population of upwards of 2,000,000, 

 which is nearly two per acre ! The southern part of the 

 county is the chief seat of manufactures, and the most 

 densely peopled ; the seaport town of Liverpool, and the 

 manufacturing city of Manchester, cover it with their 

 ramifications. 



If this is the most productive district in the world, it is 

 also the dullest. Let any one fancy an immense morass, 

 shut in between the sea on one side and mountains on the 

 other ; stiff clay land, with an impervious subsoil every- 

 where hostile to farming ; add to this a most gloomy 

 climate, continual rain, a constant cold sea- wind, besides a 

 thick smoke, shutting out what little light penetrates the 

 foggy atmosphere ; and, lastly, the ground, the inhabi- 

 tants, and their dwellings completely covered with a 

 coating of black dust fancy all this, and some idea may 

 be formed of this strange county, where the air and the 

 earth seem only one mixture of coal and water ! Such, 

 however, is the influence upon production of an inex- 

 haustible outlet, that these fields, so gloomy and forsaken, 



