The Cambridge Meeting , 1894 . 
457 
on Stourbridge fair for their supply, so the counties of Suffolk, Norfolk, 
Cambridge, Huntingdon, Northampton, Lincoln, Leicester, .Rutland, and 
even to Stafford, Warwick, and Worcestershire, bought most if not all of 
their hops at Stourbridge fair. 
These are the reasons why so great a quantity of hops are seen at this 
fair, as that it is incredible, considering, too, how remote from this fair the 
growth of them is as above. 
This is likewise a testimony of the prodigious resort of the trading people 
of all parts of England to this fair ; the quantity of hops that have been 
sold at one of these fairs is diversely reported, and some affirm it to be so 
great, that I dare not copy after them ; but without doubt it is a surprising 
account, especially in a cheap year. 
The next article brought thither is wool, and this of several sorts, but 
principally fleece wool, out of Lincolnshire, where the longest staple is found ; 
the sheep of those countries being of the largest breed. 
The buyer's of this wool are chiefly indeed the manufacturers of Norfolk 
and Suffolk and Essex, and it is a prodigious quantity they buy. 
Here I saw what I have not observed in any other county of England, 
namely, a pocket of wool. This seems to be first called so in mockery, this 
pocket being so big, that it loads a whole waggon, and reaches beyond the 
most extreme parts of it hanging over both before and behind, and these 
ordinarily weigh a ton or twenty-five hundredweight of wool, all in one bag. 
The quantity of wool only, which has been sold at this place at one fair, 
has been said to amount to fifty or sixty thousand pounds in value, some say 
a great deal more. 
By these articles a stranger may make some guess at the immense trade 
carried on at this place; what prodigious quantities of goods are bought 
and sold here, and what a confluence of people are seen here from all parts 
of England. 
I might go on here to speak of several other sorts of English manu- 
factures which are brought hither to be sold; as all sorts of wrought-iron 
and brass-ware from Birmingham ; edged tools, knives, &c., from Sheffield ; 
glass wares and stockings from Nottingham and Leicester ; and an infinite 
throng of other things of smaller value every morning. 
To attend this fair, and the prodigious conflux of people which come to 
it, there are sometimes no less than fifty hackney coaches which come from 
London, and ply night and morning to carry the people to and from Cam- 
bridge ; for there the gross of the people lodge ; nay, which is still more 
strange, there are wherries brought from London on waggons to ply upon 
the little river Cam, and to row people up and down from the town, and 
from the fair as occasion presents. 
It is not to be wondered at, if the town of Cambridge cannot receive, or 
entertain the numbers of people that come to this fair ; not Cambridge only, 
but all the towns round are full ; nay, the very barns and stables are turned 
into inns, and made as fit as they can to lodge the meaner sort of people : as 
for the people in the fair, they all universally eat, drink, and sleep in their 
booths and tents ; and the said booths are so intermingled with taverns, coffee- 
houses, drinking-houses, eating-houses, cook-shops, &c., and all in tents too ; 
and so many butchers and higglers from all the neighbouring counties come 
into the fair every morning with beef, mutton, fowls, butter, bread, cheese, 
eggs, and such things, and go with them from tent to tent, from door to 
door, that there is no want of any provisions of any kind, either dressed or 
undressed. 
In a word, the fair is like a well-fortified city, and there is the least 
disorder and confusion, I believe, that can be seen anywhere with so great 
a concourse of people. 
