Strange as it may seem, Norwich was, at this time, in a more flourishing state as regards trade than it has ever since been known. Wages were not high, but employment was universal. On April 25th, 1796, fine flour having risen to 70s. a sack, a mob attacked several bakers’ shops in the city. The magistrates and inhabitants assembled and proceeded to the places against which the attacks of the populace were directed, but the mob did not disperse till after the riot act had been read and three persons apprehended. On May 17th, a dreadful affray took place near Bishop Bridge, between the soldiers of the Northumberland and Warwickshire regiments of Militia. Several were terribly bruised and others wounded with bayonets before their officers could part them. Education was, at this time, at a very low ebb, and the clergy neglected the poor. Few schools were yet opened for their children, who grew up in ignorance and vice. Working-men spent their hard-earned money in drunkenness, or indulged in the most brutal sports, such as prize-fighting or cock-fighting. They were also demoralised by bribery and treating at contested elections. In fact, ward elections were so frequent that the city was kept in a perpetual state of agitation and turmoil. We can now form no notion of the misery, poverty, and vice, which these local elections inflicted on the city. It was often said that a single ward election did more harm than all the sermons in all the churches and chapels did good. These local contests at length prevented capital being employed in manufacturers, and made politics the first object of all the influential citizens, who, if they were not, strove to become, members of the old corporation, not from any consideration of public duty, not to promote the welfare of the citizens, but to serve their own political or personal interests. There is abundant evidence that the prosperity of the city, and private friendships, were alike poisoned by the party spirit, engendered by frequent ward elections; at the same time the moral character of the whole working population was greatly deteriorated, and the working classes themselves greatly depraved. Nonconformity in the 18th Century.