Read Ebook: A Walk through Leicester being a Guide to Strangers by Watts Susannah

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"Within this hour it will be dinner-time, Till that I'll view the manners of the town, Peruse its traders, gaze upon its buildings, And then return and sleep within mine inn."

SHAKESPEARE.

LEICESTER, PRINTED BY T. COMBE, AND SOLD BY T. HURST, PATER-NOSTER-ROW, LONDON, 1804.

ADDRESS.

INHABITANTS OF LEICESTER.

To the traveller who may wish to visit whatever is deemed most worthy of notice in the town of Leicester, the following sketch is devoted. And as the highly cultivated state of topographical knowledge renders superficial remark unpardonable in local description, we shall endeavor to produce, at the various objects of our visit, such information and reflections as a conductor, not wholly uninformed, may be expected to offer to the curious and intelligent, while he guides him through a large, commercial, and, we trust, a respectable town; the capital of a province which can honestly boast, that by its rich pasturage, its flocks and herds, it supplies England with the blessings of agricultural fertility; and by the industry of its frame-work-knitters, affords an article that quickens and extends the operations of commerce.

We now request our good-humoured stranger to accept of such our guidance; whether he be the tourist, whose object of inquiry is general information--or the man of reflection, who, wherever he goes, whether in crouded towns or solitary fields, finds something to engage his meditation--or the mercantile rider, who, when the business of his commissions is transacted, quits his lonely parlour for a stroll through the streets--we shall endeavor to bring before his eye as much of interest as our scenes will afford: and as for the diligent antiquary, we assure him we will make the most of our Roman remains; and we hope he will not quarrel with the rough forest stones of our streets, when we promise him they shall conduct him to the smoother pavement of Roman mosaic.

What may have been the name of the town we are about to traverse, before the establishment of the Romans, cannot be ascertained; for the Britons had no written monuments, and it cannot be expected that tradition should have survived the revolutions, which, since that period, have taken place in this island. King Leir, and whatever surmises may have been founded on the similarity between his name and the present name of the place, may safely be left to those who are more fond of the flights of conjecture than the solid arguments of truth.

Such is, most probably, the true etymology of the name of the place we are now proceeding to survey; for which purpose we will suppose the visitor to set forward from the Three Crowns Inn, along a strait wide street, called

GALLOWTREE-GATE,

, from its having formerly led to the place of execution, the left side of which is the scite of the antient city walls.

At the bottom of this street, a building, formerly the assembly-room, but now converted to purposes of trade, with a piazza, under which is a machine for weighing coals, forms the centre of five considerable streets. The

HUMBERSTONE-GATE,

Southward from the Humberstone-Gate to the Goltre-Gate, very considerable additions, consisting of several streets, have lately been made to the town.

Advancing forward, the visitor, on passing the weighing machine, enters the

BELGRAVE-GATE,

Hadrian Trajanus Augustus, Emperor & Caesar, the son of the most illustrious Trajan Parthicus, In the 4th year of his reign, and his 3d consulate. From Ratae 2 miles.

The situation in which this stone is at present placed, has often been thought improper; for it is undoubtedly exposed to injuries from the wantonness of play, and is so little conspicuous from its place in the obelisk, that nothing appears necessarily to attract the attention of the stranger. A situation more private, though not wholly so, would be more proper; such a one as the garden of the Infirmary would afford: it would there have all the publicity the curious could wish, and all the security the antiquary could desire.

Our visitor, continuing his walk along this street, which, as he probably will know, is on the great road from the metropolis to the north-west part of the kingdom, arrives at a scene of busy traffic. Here, among numbers of newly-erected dwellings is the public and principal wharf on the navigable canal, near which is an iron foundery. This canal was formed, in consequence of a bill passed in 1791, for the purpose of opening a communication with the Loughborough canal, and through that, with the various navigations, united to the Trent. The line of the canal from Leicester to Loughborough is near sixteen miles in extent, and serves to supply Leicester with coal, lime, and the greater part of all the other heavy articles, which the consumption of a place, containing sixteen thousand inhabitants, requires.

The rates of tonnage, according to the act, from Loughborough to Leicester, are--

For coals 1s. 2d. per ton. Iron, timber, &c. 2s. 6d.

Quantity of the articles brought by this canal:

We shall immediately, along a lane, called Arch-deacon's Lane, about the middle of which is a Meeting house, with a small burial ground, belonging to the General Baptists, guide our stranger to

ST. MARGARET'S CHURCH.

This structure is rendered venerable by its tower, whose pinnacles and trefoil-work, with the niche, or tabernacle, on the corner of the south wall of the church, would have even shown it, had not its date been confirmed by Bishop Alnwicke's register, 1441, to have been the work of the era of the regular gothic. From this tower, a ring of ten bells, well known for their excellence, sound in frequent peals of harmony along the meadow and river below.

This, when the other churches of Leicester were given to the abbey by Robert Bossu, was annexed as a prebend to the cathedral of Lincoln, by the bishops of that diocese to whom it then belonged. The right of presentation is vested in the person holding the prebend, and the parish, with the neighbouring dependent parish of Knighton, is exempted from the jurisdiction of the Arch-deacon of Leicester. The inside of the church is handsome; the nave and side aisles are supported by gothic arches, whose beauty and symmetry are not concealed by aukward galleries. The organ was erected by the parishioners in 1773.

Several elegant modern monuments adorn the walls, and in the north aisle is the alabaster tomb of Bishop Penny, many years abbot of the neighbouring monastery of St Mary de Pratis. In the church-yard the military trophies of a black tomb commemorate Andrew Lord Rollo. This nobleman was an instance of the attraction which a martial life affords to an elevated mind, for he entered the service at the age of forty, when generally the habits and inclinations of life are so fixed, as scarcely to admit any change. After many years of severe and dangerous services, he died at Leicester, as the inscription informs us, on his way to Bristol, for the recovery of his health, 1765.

It is to be observed of this and the other churches in this place, that the entrance is by a descent of several steps; a circumstance proving incontestibly, that the ground without has been considerably raised, since no reason could induce the founders of these sacred edifices to sink the floors beyond the natural level; nor is the surface of the church-yards alone, higher than the floors of the churches; so caused by the continued interment of the dead: but the general level of the pavements of the streets is also higher; from which it must be inferred, that the ground on which the present houses are built has been every where raised, and that very considerably. That the rubbish produced by buildings, and particularly the consumption of fuel, should produce this effect, is what any one may readily believe; and the Bishop of Llandaff calculates in his Chemical Essays, that the quantity of coal consumed annually in London, would raise an area of ten miles square, a full inch.

But notwithstanding it may safely be affirmed that a much greater quantity of fuel is at present consumed, and more rubbish produced annually in Leicester, than at any other period whatever, yet the seeming paradox may easily be proved, that little, if any alteration in the level of the town is made now. For the demand of all the refuse of the yards for the purposes of agriculture, and the ordinary attention paid to sweeping the streets, prevent any accumulation of soil: the change of level then, of which our churches afford such indubitable proofs, can only have taken place when the streets were unpaved, and made the receptacle of every kind of offal from the houses; and when the yards, uncleared for the purposes of improved agriculture, were choaked by accumulated filth; the whole almost ever yielding in abundance those noxious steams, the loathsome parent of pestilences, which, in former days, frequently proved the scourges of our larger towns, and too often spread their contagion to the villages. Hence the entrance into our churches, among other good sentiments, may excite in the reflective mind a gratitude for the improved comforts the inhabitants of large towns now enjoy; and the same circumstances may also call forth the exertions of benevolence to promote still greater cleanliness, and to remove from the habitations of man those effects of filthiness, which, in proportion to their extent, are always offensive, and sometimes fatal.

Westward from this church-yard, extends a street strait and wide, but meanly built, called

SANVY-GATE.

The stranger, having visited St. Margaret's Church, may proceed up the

CHURCH-GATE,

SWINE MARKET,

From this street we arrive at a spot still called the

EAST-GATES,

tho the gates of the ancient town were, some years ago, taken down to render the passage more commodious. In the massy wood of these gates were found balls of a large size, which probably had lodged there ever since the assault made upon the town by king Charles's forces in 1695, when according to a note in the pocket-book of one Simmonds, a quarter-master in the King's army, which is now preserved in the Harleian library, "Col. Bard's Tertia fell on with scaling ladders, some near a flanker, and others scaled the horne work before the draw-bridge on the east side."

We now advance along the

HIGH-STREET,

From hence we enter a street, which was formerly upon the great north road; it leads to Ashby-de-la-zouch, and changing its denomination at different places, intersects the town from the southern extremity, where stands the Infirmary, to the North Bridge, a space of a mile and one eighth; where it is crossed by High-Street and St. Nicholas' Street, it takes the name of

HIGH-CROSS-STREET,

from a plain doric pillar bearing the name of High Cross, and which formed some years ago one of the supporters of a light temple looking building of the same name, that served as a shelter to the country people who here hold a small market on Wednesdays and Fridays for the sale of butter, eggs, &c. Here the members of parliament are proclaimed, and here also may be seen on Michaelmas day, the grotesque ceremony of the poor men of Trinity Hospital, arrayed like ancient Knights, having rusty helmets on their heads and breast-plates fastened over their black taberdes proclaiming the fair.

This prison, to which the county bridewell is now added, was erected, upon the scite of the old goal, some years after the benevolent Howard visited Leicester, and is built with solitary cells after the plan recommended by that celebrated philanthropist.

The mention of a character so widely expanding beyond the customary sphere of human action irresistibly arrests the attention of the heart that glows into admiration at striking examples of virtue, and of the head that feels interest in tracing the motives which influence the conduct of man.

Antiquaries have spoken of this bedstead as belonging to the king rather than to the master of the house; and this opinion has been thought favoured by the circumstance of a large sum in gold coin, partly of Richard's reign, accidentally discovered in its double bottom. The bedstead is of oak, highly ornamented with carved work, and is now, in the possession of Tho. Babington Esq. M.P. There seems but little reason to suppose that a Royal General while attending the march of his Army, should unnecessarily encrease his baggage by so cumbrous a piece of furniture, or that a Sovereign, guarded by nearly all the military force of the Nation, should find it expedient to hide his gold like a private unprotected person. The bedstead therefore, it may safely be inferred, belonged, not to a monarch, but to the master of a good inn; and the money was secreted in it by some person anxious to secure his property from the dangers threatened by times of civil distraction.

The next observable object in the High Cross Street, is the TOWN GOAL. It is a commodious building, with a handsome stone front, and built after the plan of Howard--the Architect, Mr. W. Firmadge.

In taking down the old Goal for the erection of the present edifice, in the year 1792, incorporated with the walls of the cells were discovered the remains of the chapel of St John, supposed to have been destroyed during the contests between Henry the Second and his Son. A regular stone arch belonging to this chapel, of a circular form, with ornaments of cheveron work, was carefully taken from among the ruins of the old goal, and preserved by that industrious Antiquary and Historian of Leicester, Mr. Throsby.

The small Hospital of St. John, to which this chapel belonged, joins the prison; it supports six Widows who subsist on a very scanty stipend arising from various annual donations. Bent's Hospital, being the ground floor of the same building, supports four Widows on an endowment equally small.

The admirers of this art, so much practised by the Romans as a decoration of their magnificent buildings, an art which has survived so long as to have obtained an established manufactory in modern Rome, will ascertain the pavement in question to be one of the first specimens of antient mosaic, and will, with gratified attention, here behold form and shade called up from that unmanageable material, a piece of baked earth.

The commonly received opinion of these pavements having been the floors of baths, as founded on the circumstance of their being discovered three or four feet under the surface of the earth, is not conclusive; for the soil has been raised by accidental accumulation; and had not this been the case, the depth of three or four feet would not have been sufficient for a Bath as it could not have allowed room for submersion. Neither does the vault with a floor and walls of tesselated work, and pipes in the roof, discovered near Leicester in the reign of James the first, the memory alone of which is preserved by our indefatigable topographer, Mr. Nichols, render such an opinion in any respect more certain; but that some of them were floors of sitting rooms may be justly inferred, from the flues constructed under them for the purpose of conveying heat.

Of the prevalence of alms-giving in Leicester, this parish, together with the rest, bears full testimony, in a long list of benefactors, from the Royal Grant of Charles the first of forty acres of land in Leicester forest, to poor housekeepers, to the donor of the penny wheaten Loaf. From the returns to Parliament in the present reign, when accounts were made of all the charitable donations in the kingdom, it appears that there are donations in the parishes of Leicester, in land and money mostly vested in the trust of the Corporation and by them distributed, to the annual amount of upwards of 800l.--see Nichols.--

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