his day the name
of a common kind of knife. The increasing demand for articles of
cutlery, and their multiplied variety have gradually enlarged the
population of Sheffield to 42,157 in 1821; since which it has
considerably increased, and may, in 1829, be estimated at 50,000. In
1821, it contained 8,726 houses, and perhaps 500 have been built since,
chiefly villas to the westward, while the compact town is about one mile
by half a mile. The principal streets are well built, and there are
three old churches, and two new ones lately finished, besides another
now building.

"Sheffield presents at this time the extraordinary spectacle of an
immense town expanded from a village, without any additional
arrangements for its government beyond what it originally possessed as a
village. There is no corporation, not even a resident magistrate, and
yet all live in peace, decorum, and advantageous mutual intercourse."

_Religion._

"Order is a moral result of religion in Sheffield. No town in the
kingdom more universally exhibits the external forms of devotion, and in
none are there perhaps a greater number of serious devotees. The largest
erections in Sheffield are those for the service of religion, and they
are numerous. Besides six old and new churches, adapted to accommodate
from 10,000 to 12,000 persons, there are seventeen chapels for the
various denominations of Dissenters, capable of affording sitting room
for 12,000 or 15,000 more. Except the Unitarian Chapel, and perhaps the
Catholic one, the doctrines preached in all the others, are what, in
London, and at Oxford and Cambridge, would generally be called _Ultra_.

"A spectacle highly characteristic of Sheffield, and exemplifying, at
the same time the harmony of the several sects, is the juxtaposition of
four several chapels, observable on one side of a main street; while
nearly adjoining is the church of St. Paul. There are thus every Sunday,
in simultaneous local devotion, the ceremonial Catholics, the moral
Unitarians, the metaphysical Calvinists, the serious disciples of John
Wesley, and the spiritual members of the establishment.

"The whole of the places of worship afford accommodation for about
12,000 Methodists and Dissenters, and about 9,500 of the Church
Establishment. So that, if half go twice a day, and half once, 30,000 of
the 50,000 inhabitants attend places of worship every Sunday."

_Public Institutions._

"There are the following institutions for