the assailants were hanged
and others transported. The Royal Exchange is a massive structure in the
Italian style, with a fine portico, dome, and towers; the hall within
is said to be probably the largest room in England, having a width of
ceiling, without supports, of one hundred and twenty feet. Here on
cotton-market days assemble the buyers and sellers from all the towns in
Lancashire, and they do an enormous traffic. The new Town-Hall is also a
fine building, where the departments of the city government are
accommodated, and where they have an apartment dear to every
Englishman's heart--"a kitchen capable of preparing a banquet for eight
hundred persons." The warehouses of Manchester are famous for their size
and solidity, and could Arkwright come back and see what his
cotton-spinning machinery has produced, he would be amazed. It was in
Manchester that the famous Dr. Dalton, the founder of the atomic theory
in chemistry, lived; he was a devout Quaker, like so many of the
townspeople, but unfortunately was color-blind; he appeared on one
occasion in a scarlet waistcoat, and when taken to task declared it
seemed to him a very quiet, unobtrusive color, just like his own coat.
Several fine parks grace the suburbs of Manchester, and King Cotton has
made this thriving community the second city in England, while for miles
along the beautifully shaded roads that lead into the suburbs the
opulent merchants and manufacturers have built their ornamental villas.

[Illustration: THE ROYAL EXCHANGE, MANCHESTER.]

FURNESS AND STONYHURST

[Illustration: FURNESS ABBEY.]

The irregularly-shaped district of Lancashire partly cut off from the
remainder of the county by an arm of the Irish Sea is known as Furness.
It is a wild and rugged region, best known from the famous Furness Abbey
and its port of Barrow-in-Furness, one of the most remarkable examples
in England of quick city growth. Forty years ago this was an
insignificant fishing village; now Barrow has magnificent docks and a
fine harbor protected by the natural breakwater of Walney Island, great
iron-foundries and the largest jute-manufactory in the world; while it
has recently also became a favorite port for iron shipbuilding. About
two miles distant, and in a romantic glen called the Valley of Deadly
Nightshade, not far from the sea, is one of the finest examples of
mediaeval church-architecture in England, the ruins of Furness Abbey,
founded in the twelfth century by