JANUARY—Several attempts made to fire carpet manufactories in Kidderminster. The trade of the town in a deplorable condition; 779 heads of families receiving out-door relief weekly. FEBRUARY 1—Colonel Davies moved, in the House of Commons, for a committee of inquiry on the glove trade. He stated that not one-third of the number of gloves were made in Worcester that there were formerly, when 120 masters each manufactured 100 dozen a week. He attributed this distress and loss of trade entirely to the free trade in French gloves. Mr. Poulett Thomson contended, on behalf of Government, that the general manufacture of gloves in this country had increased, for the kid skins imported in the last five years had been 3,679,000, to 2,600,000 in the five years prior to the duty being taken off gloves. The distress he believed to be owing to the late increase in the importation of skins, to the use of Berlin gloves instead of kid, and to overtrading. The numbers were—against the committee, 223; for it, 168: majority against the motion, 55. FEBRUARY 28—A petition from the operative glovers of Worcester, having 2,206 signatures, and praying that the “system, falsely called free trade,” may be abandoned, forwarded to the Earl of Coventry for presentation. APRIL 2—The freedom of the city presented to the Earl of Plymouth and Lieutenant Colonel Elrington by the hand of the recorder, the Earl of Coventry. To the former, principally in approval of his raising the Yeomanry corps; and to the latter, for his public services in the east. Colonel Elrington presented the Corporation with arms and armour, taken by him from pirates in the Persian Gulf. APRIL 5—At a dinner given at the Guildhall, Dr. Malden in the chair, a very handsome service of plate was presented to the Mayor, Henry Clifton, Esq., in remembrance of the vigilance and energy he had shown in repressing the Worcester riots. APRIL 17—On the memorable second reading of the Reform Bill in the House of Lords, by a majority of nine, the Earl of Coventry, Lord Northwick (both of whom had voted against the former bill), Earl Somers, Lord Foley, Lord Lyttelton, and the Bishop of Worcester voted in its favour; and Earls Plymouth and Beauchamp and the Bishop of Rochester against it. MAY 23—The Mayor of Worcester, Henry Clifton, Esq., was presented at _levée_ by the Bishop of Worcester, and thanked by His Majesty for the “important services he had rendered on a late occasion.”