MANCHESTER. This most important town, the centre of the largest cotton-manu facturing operations in the world, is situated in a district which contains some excellent coal strata, a circumstance to which the place is in no small degree indebted for its prospe rity. It has the credit of having given an impulse to our means of internal communi cation, and has reaped an ample reward. The achievements of Brindley were prompted by the desire which the Duke of Bridgewater had of sending his coal from Worsley to Manches ter at a small expense; and Manchester now possesses the means of water-communication with almost every part of the country. In the railroad enterprises Manchester has held a prominent station. It furnished its full share of the capital employed in the formation of the Manchester and Liverpool Railway ; and it is now the centre of a system of railways radiating in six different directions. There are two magnificent viaducts across the town, for connecting the Liverpool line with the Yorkshire and the London lines.
The commercial spirit dates back to a very early period. At first the woollen was the only branch of trade, but since the middle of the last century the cotton business has nearly superseded the former fabric. The series of brilliant inventions and discoveries, applied, improved, or originated in the district of Manchester, which comprise the steam .engine, the spinning-jenny, the mule jenny, the fly frame, the tube-frame, the mule, &c., have proved most effective instruments in aiding the development of the cotton manufactures. Several hundred millions of pounds of cotton are brought into Manchester from Liverpool every year; and the cotton factories are by far the most important buildings in the town : there are more than two hundred of them within the precincts of the town and parish. Some of them are only spinning factories ; others are both spinning and weaving. Bleach works, dye-works, and print-works, all connec ted with the cotton manufacture, exist on a large scale in and near Manchester.
The processes of throwing and weaving silk were extensively carried on at Maccles field several years before they reached Manchester. The silk-mill of Mr. Vernon
Boyle, erected in 1810-20, was the firs, brought jP.tq operatiop in the latter teWn Since then the trade has rapidly increased l'rinting is another branch of the 4)4 chiefly, if not P:tehisiY947 carried pp at cheater. Dyeing of silk is also pursued, and in fact the town is 14e9.9111illg the centre pf transactions in the silk trade. Besides the manufactures in eflts, apcl woollens 21ancloSster earriee 9P karge tures in hats, umbrellas, and smell wares. Machinery of the finest kind ia eltSP made there to a large extent.
The wereheP$98 of lgAiWheSter are en A vast scale; they POUPAhl ?r-Pt. only the woven products of the factPrieS, hilt the (Ince of most pf the other cotton tOYftlA is brought 01 Manchester, Asa eentral Ochange CPT the Manufacturer and the dealer. I6 „vas calculated in 1E137, that qop,qqp tons of goods were carried by Pena 41971° from gP/w4er to the south, yearly; besides that which passed north, east, And west, and besides the railway goods' traffic. In 1801 the amount js yastly greater, especially in respect to railways.
Manchester, as a pen tre of the calico-pripapg trade, presents a fair geld for the exercise of taste in designing ; and a Schpql pf Design is gradually produeing inip.ortant results in the town. The report of the Schools of Design for 1150 states :—'The llfanchester school is in a flourishing condition. The greatest nuraberof pupils on the books at any former period was 219', reduced to PQ when the present master undertook the re-establish ment of the school. There are .09Pt 360, the average attendance being the full amount which the premises can ac,controodate, although additional space has lately beep taken into occupation. The students Axe Also pf a better class than at any former period. There is a large proportion 4,f 01,143, .anfil %bent P0 of the advanced students are actiyely engaged in the production ,of designs, principally ay pattern drauglitsreen: The report proceeds The school is tim.