And this is Birmingham! The place which I, in pleasant Kent and Surrey, had so often heard of, but had never seen. This is the town which, five years before, had vanquished the Conqueror of the Great Napoleon! This is the place which, for the first time in his life, had compelled the great Duke of Wellington to capitulate! This is the home of those who, headed by Attwood, had compelled the Duke and his army--the House of Lords--to submit, and to pass the memorable Reform Bill of 1832! My destination was at the top of Bull Street, where my apartments were ready, and a walk to that spot completed an eventful day for me. I had come down on a special business matter, but I remained six months, and a few years later came again and settled down in Birmingham. My impressions of the place during those six months are fresh upon my memory now; and, if I write them down, may be interesting to some of the three hundred thousand people now in Birmingham, who know nothing of its aspect then. Bull Street was then the principal street in Birmingham for retail business, and it contained some very excellent shops. Most of the then existing names have disappeared, but a few remain. Mr. Suffield, to whose courtesy I am indebted for the loan of the rare print from which the frontispiece to this little book is copied, then occupied the premises near the bottom of the street, which he still retains. Mr. Adkins, the druggist, carried on the business established almost a century ago. He is now the oldest inhabitant of Bull Street, having been born in the house he still occupies before the commencement of the present century. Mr. Gargory--still hale, vigorous, and hearty, although rapidly approaching his eightieth year--then tenanted the shop next below Mr. Keirle, the fishmonger. His present shop and that of Mr. Harris, the dyer, occupy the site of the then Quakers' Meeting House, which was a long, barn-like building, standing lengthwise to the street, and not having a window on that side to break the dreary expanse of brickwork. Mr. Benson was in those days as celebrated for beef and civility as he is now. Mr. Page had just opened the shawl shop still carried on by his widow. Near the Coach Yard was the shop of Mr. Hudson, the bookseller, whose son still carries on the business established by his father in 1821. In 1837, Mr. Hudson, Sen., was the publisher of a very well conducted liberal paper called _The Philanthropist_. The paper only existed some four or five years. It deserved a better fate. Next door to Mr. Hudson's was the shop of the father of the present Messrs. Southall. All these places have been materially altered, but the wine and spirit stores of Mrs. Peters, at the corner of Temple Row, are to-day, I think, exactly what they were forty years ago. The Brothers Cadbury--a name now celebrated all over the world--were then, as will be seen by reference to the frontispiece, shopkeepers in Bull Street, the one as a silk mercer, the other as a tea dealer.