dispersion of population is still largely maintained, for, unlike so
many other counties, Hertfordshire has not within its borders a single
large town. The larger among them, _i.e._, Watford, St. Albans, Hitchin,
Hertford and Bishop's Stortford, are not collectively equal in
population to even such towns as Bolton, Halifax or Croydon. Another
feature to be noted is that, owing to the county's proximity to London,
it is now the home of persons of many nations and tongues, and only in
the smaller villages between the railroads are there left any traits of
local character or peculiarities of idiom. It is hardly necessary to say
that this conglomeration of peoples is common to all the home counties,
though mostly so, as I venture to think, in Hertfordshire and Surrey.
The Essex peasant is still strongly differentiated from his neighbours.

Grose, writing towards the end of the eighteenth century, stated that
the population of Hertfordshire was 95,000. They must have been well
dispersed, for he tells us that the county contained at that period 949
villages; by the word "village," however, he seems to mean any separate
community, including small hamlets. Some interesting figures are to be
found in Tymms's _Compendium of the History of the Home Circuit_. He
states that in 1821 the county contained 129,714 inhabitants, comprising
26,170 families and living in 23,687 houses. Of these families no fewer
than 13,485 were engaged in agriculture. From the same source I quote
the following figures relating to the year 1821:--

Houses. Inhabitants.
Hemel Hempstead 1,012 5,193
Watford 940 4,713
Hitchin 915 4,486
St. Albans 735 4,472
Cheshunt 847 4,376