We were only 60,000 in my boyhood, whereas the citizens of Nottingham to-day number 250,000.
"A few years ago the city conferred its freedom upon me as a mark of appreciation and esteem.

To God be all the glory that He has helped His poor boy to live for Him, and made even his former enemies to honour him." But we all know what sort of influences exist in a city that is at once the capital of a county and a commercial centre.

The homes of the wealthy and comfortable are found at no great distance from the dwellings of the poor, while in the huge market-places are exhibitions weekly of all the contrasts between town and country life, between the extremest want and the most lavish plenty.
Seventy years ago, life in such a city was nearly as different from what it is to-day as the life of to-day in an American state capital is from that of a Chinese town.

Between the small circle of "old families" who still possessed widespread influence and the masses of the people there was a wide gap.

The few respectable charities, generally due to the piety of some long-departed citizen, marked out very strikingly a certain number of those who were considered "deserving poor," and helped to make every one less concerned about all the rest.