Or if he thinks fit to view the market,
and see how the large shambles, called Cardinal Wolsey's Butchery,
are furnished with meat, and the rest of the market stocked with
other provisions, must acknowledge that it is not for a few people
that all those things are provided. A person very curious, and on
whose veracity I think I may depend, going through the market in
this town, told me, that he reckoned upwards of six hundred country
people on horseback and on foot, with baskets and other carriage,
who had all of them brought something or other to town to sell,
besides the butchers, and what came in carts and waggons.
It happened to be my lot to be once at this town at the time when a
very fine new ship, which was built there for some merchants of
London, was to be launched; and if I may give my guess at the
numbers of people which appeared on the shore, in the houses, and
on the river, I believe I am much within compass if I say there
were 20,000 people to see it; but this is only a guess, or they
might come a great way to see the sight, or the town may be
declined farther since that. But a view of the town is one of the
surest rules for a gross estimate.
It is true here is no settled manufacture. The French refugees
when they first came over to England began a little to take to this
place, and some merchants attempted to set up a linen manufacture
in their favour; but it has not met with so much success as was
expected, and at present I find very little of it.
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