74 BROMSGROVE.

siderable, but as machinery superseded this, and there were not enterprise and capital in the locality to introduce machinery, the clothing trade went away. Moreover, as at Worcester, the linens got into disrepute, as goods of an inferior make were sent here for bleaching and then sold as Bromsgrove make. There were only five or six nail masters at the beginning of this century, and not more than 500 persons engaged in the trade; whereas at present, as before stated, there are fourteen times that number. Many years ago the trade was so prosperous that, owing to the demand being good, an inferior article was made. The customers of course became dissatisfied, and a machine was invented which cut every part of the nail at once out of a solid sheet of iron. This occasioned a great alteration in the condition of the trade, and the French and Germans successfully competing led to a change for the worse. The nailers as a class are destitute of education, owing to the early age at which the children go to work. It may therefore not occasion surprise that their mistaken views of the relations between employers and workpeople have occasionally led to disturbances and distress. Three or four years ago they "struck," and have exhibited symptoms of uneasiness ever since.

But it is high time that we noticed the church - a fine old edifice at the western end of the town, ascended by sixty-two steps. Unless the visitor knew the previous state of this building, as I knew it fifteen or twenty years ago, he could form no estimate of the change which has been wrought in it by an expenditure of £6,000 and the supervision of Mr. Scott, the celebrated architect. Probably no church in the diocese was in a more abominable condition, but now all is changed. The prevailing styles are Early English and Perpendicular, somewhat severely plain. There are splendid monuments of the Shrewsbury (Talbot) family, of Bishop Hall, Judge Lyttelton, &c. A hagioscope and a small old lectern, with Jewell's works attached to it, are preserved. East window of stained glass, by Lavers and Barraud. The