The great manufacturing towns, such as Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham,
and Sheffield are now, were nowhere to be found in the England of
Queen Anne; but their day was coming. London was the great centre of
the silk trade, and after it came Norwich, Coventry, Derby, and
Nottingham. The cotton industry of Manchester and the surrounding
towns in South Lancashire was making a start, while Leeds, Bradford,
and Halifax, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, were just beginning to
give their attention to the cloth trade on a larger scale. The trade
with other countries was growing rapidly, Bristol being, next to
London, the chief port. Hull, Liverpool, Southampton, and Newcastle
were still small places. It is to be noted that the earliest notions
of what we now call _free trade_ are to be traced back to the days of
the later Stuart sovereigns. Bolingbroke made certain proposals in
that direction, but his plans were rejected by the Whigs.
Stage-coaches began to run, the earliest being those between London
and York, and between London and Exeter. A vast improvement in the
high-roads soon came in consequence. The first General Post Office for
the whole kingdom dates back to the reign of Queen Anne.
CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF PRINCIPAL EVENTS
1702 (February 20).
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