In the streets of Leyden are several very handsome bookseller’s shops, particularly Murray’s in the Braadstraat, where there are many valuable publications, and particularly a fine collection of the classics, which are sold at very reasonable prices. The press of Leyden, in the time of Elzevirs, presented some of the most elegant specimens of typography, in the many correct and beautiful editions which they have given of the most renowned authors of antiquity. In beauty, variety, and profusion, the Leyden press rivalled, and in many instances surpassed, that of the Hague and Amsterdam; but since the period of the above bibliopolists, it has gradually decayed. It may be easily imagined, that with the change which has taken place in the political relations of Holland, the liberty of the press is not what it used to be at Leyden, which was once celebrated for its Gazette, a rival in reputation of that of Brussels: the former was distinguished for its partiality to the Stadtholder, and his well known attachments to the English cabinet; and the latter for supporting the true interests of the country. The editors and proprietors of the Leyden Gazette fled with precipitation, on the irruption of the French into Holland; and the paper which is now issued from Leyden, is of course the organ of the new government, and but little enlivened with political discussion. The staple trade of Leyden, the woollen manufactory, has suffered very severely from the establishment of extensive looms in various parts of Germany, from the last and present war with England, and from the superiority of the manufactures of Yorkshire, which are in such high estimation in America and Asia, that Dutch merchants trading to those countries, found it more advantageous to send out English cloths. The coarse cloths of Holland had formerly a brisk market amongst the East and West India Companies: but from the above cause thousands of manufacturers have been obliged to renounce their looms, and divert their skill and industry to other sources of support; and in all human probability the woollen manufactures of Leyden will never revive.