[Illustration: BRIGGATE, LOOKING NORTH.]
About nine miles north of Wakefield is the great commercial capital of
Yorkshire and centre of the cloth-trade. Leeds, built in the valley of
the river Aire. Twelve hundred years ago this region, embracing the
valleys of the Aire and the Calder, was the independent kingdom of
Loidis. It was soon overrun and conquered, however, by the Anglian
hosts, and ultimately the conquerors built here the monastery that in
Bede's time was presided over by the abbot Thrydwulf. This stood on the
site of the present parish church, and in the eighth century it was
called "the monastery at Leeta." It stood at the crossing of two
important Roman roads in the midst of a forest. This was the beginning
of the great city, for soon a hamlet gathered around the monastery,
though long since the woods, and indeed all green things, were driven
away from Leeds. The village was laid waste by William the Conqueror,
and at the time of the Domesday Book it was one of one hundred and fifty
manors held by Baron Ilbert de Lacy, whose possessions stretched halfway
across Yorkshire. He built a castle at Leeds, which was afterwards a
prison of Richard II., but has long since disappeared. In 1530, Leland
described Leeds as "a pretty market-town, as large as Bradford, but not
so quick as it." Charles I. incorporated it, and the cloth-market was
then of some importance. In the Civil War it was taken by the Royalists,
and afterwards retaken by Fairfax for the Parliament in a short, sharp
struggle, in which a clergyman named Scholfield distinguished himself by
his valor, and "by his triumphant psalm-singing" as work after work was
captured from the enemy. Flemish workmen brought cloth-making into this
part of Yorkshire as early as the reign of Edward III., and two
centuries ago the cloth-makers prospered so much that they held a market
twice a week at Leeds on a long, narrow bridge crossing the Aire. They
laid their cloth on the battlements of the bridge and on benches below,
and the country clothiers could buy for four cents from the innkeepers
"a pot of ale, a noggin of porridge, and a trencher of boiled or roast
beef." This substantial supply was known as the "brigg (bridge)-shot,"
and from the bridge ran the street known as the Briggate, which has
since developed into one of the finest avenues of the city.
[Illustration: ST JOHN'S CHURCH]
Leeds began to grow in the last century, when it became the chief mart
of the woollen clothiers, while the worsted-trade gathered about
Bradford. These still remain the centres of the two great divisions of
the woollen industry, which is the characteristic business of Yorkshire.
The factories began then to appear at Leeds, and in the present century
the city has made astonishing advances, growing from fifty-three
thousand population in 1801 until it exceeds three hundred thousand now.
The great cloth-mart to-day is for miles a region of tall chimneys and
barrack-like edifices, within which steadily roars machinery that
represents some of the most ingenious skill of the human race. Within
this hive of busy industry there still linger some memorials of the past
among its hundreds of cloth-mills. Turning out of the broad Briggate
into the quiet street of St. John, we come to the church built there by
the piety of the wealthy clothier John Harrison, and consecrated in
1634. St. John's Church, which he built and presented to the town
because the older parish church could scarce hold half the inhabitants,
consists of a long nave and chancel, with a south aisle. It is of Gothic
architecture, and much of the ancient woodwork, including the pulpit,
remains. Arabesques moulded in white plaster fill the panels between the
main roof-beams. This interesting church has undergone little historical
change excepting the recent rebuilding of the tower. John Harrison is
entombed in the church. The old parish church in Kirkgate has been
within a few years entirely rebuilt. The other churches of Leeds, like
this one, are all modern, and it also has an imposing Town Hall, opened
by the queen in 1858, in which are held the annual musical festivals,
which have attained much importance. A statue of the Duke of Wellington
stands in the open square in front. The two Cloth Halls of Leeds, the
Mixed Cloth Hall and the White Cloth Hall, where the business of selling
was at first carried on, are now little used, the trade being conducted
directly between the manufacturer and the clothier. Some of the mills
are of enormous size, and they include every operation from the raw
material to the finished fabric. But, with all their ingenious
machinery, the cloth-weavers have not yet been able to supersede the use
of the teasel, by which the loose fibres of wool are raised to the
surface to form, when cut and sheared, the pile or nap. These teasels,
which are largely grown in Yorkshire, are fastened into a cylinder, and
at least three thousand of them will be consumed in "teasling" a piece
of cloth forty yards long.