important trade, giving employment to a large proportion of the population of particular districts is now diffused over the whole of the United Kingdom, and consequently in Oldham and other localities where large numbers of people were congregated together, and were dependant upon this trade for support, a great amount of suffering has been experienced, and large numbers of them have been reduced to absolute pauperism. The London hatters turned their attention to the new trade much earlier than the people here, and had completely got possession of the field, before the prejudices of the Lancashire hatters would allow them to have the least connection with it; indeed it was only when their own trade was destroyed, and their occupation, like Othello's, was completely gone, that they could reconcile themselves to the acquirement of an art which had so manifestly supplanted their own. It is true that silk hats were made in Oldham from about the year 1827, but until within the last twelve or fourteen years these attempts were extremely imperfect, and were on a very limited scale. In Denton efforts were made to com- mence their manufacture about 1820 or 1821, but they were strenuously resisted by the operatives, who went so far as to strike against any manufacturer who persisted, after their remonstrance, in making them. Their introduction into this town may be dated from about the year 1841, in the early part of which there occurred one of those unhappy differences between employer and employed which, by completely stopping production, very frequently permanently injures the trade of the locality in which they happen. During the strike, which was general throughout the district, and lasted throughout the whole spring (the busiest season of the year], silk hats made greater advances in popular favour than they had ever done before, and when the unfortunate dispute was terminated, both masters and men discovered that the trade had sustained a blow from the effects of which it will take a long time to recover, and it is doubtful whether it will ever regain its

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