shimmer of habitableness was a fire upon the hearth. Theft and
prostitution form the chief means of subsistence of this population.
No one seemed to take the trouble to cleanse this Augean stable, this
Pandemonium, this tangle of crime, filth, and pestilence in the centre
of the second city of the kingdom. An extended examination of the
lowest districts of other cities never revealed anything half so bad,
either in intensity of moral and physical infection, nor in
comparative density of population. In this quarter most of the houses
have been declared by the Court of Guild ruinous and unfit for
habitation, but precisely these are the most densely populated,
because, according to the law, no rent can be demanded for them."

The great manufacturing district in the centre of the British Islands,
the thickly peopled stretch of West Yorkshire and South Lancashire, with
its numerous factory towns, yields nothing to the other great
manufacturing centres. The woollen district of the West Riding of
Yorkshire is a charming region, a beautiful green hill country, whose
elevations grow more rugged towards the West until they reach their
highest point in the bold ridge of Blackstone Edge, the watershed between
the Irish Sea and the German Ocean. The valleys of the Aire, along which
stretches Leeds, and of the Calder, through which the Manchester-Leeds
railway runs, are among the most attractive in England, and are strewn in
all directions with the factories, villages, and towns. The houses of
rough grey stone look so neat and clean in comparison with the blackened
brick buildings of Lancashire, that it is a pleasure to look at them. But
on coming into the towns themselves, one finds little to rejoice over.
Leeds lies as the _Artisan_ describes it, and as I found confirmed upon
examination: "on a gentle slope that descends into the valley of the
Aire. This stream flows through the city for about a mile-and-a-half and
is exposed to violent floods during thaws or heavy rain. The higher