In this part, which we call High Suffolk, there are not so many families of gentry or nobility placed as in the other side of the country. But it is observed that though their seats are not so frequent here, their estates are; and the pleasure of West Suffolk is much of it supported by the wealth of High Suffolk, for the richness of the lands and application of the people to all kinds of improvement is scarce credible; also the farmers are so very considerable and their farms and dairies so large that it is very frequent for a farmer to have £1,000 stock upon his farm in cows only.
From High Suffolk I passed the Waveney into Norfolk, near Schole Inn. In my passage I saw at Redgrave (the seat of the family) a most exquisite monument of Sir John Holt, Knight, late Lord Chief Justice of the King’s Bench several years, and one of the most eminent lawyers of his time. One of the heirs of the family is now building a fine seat about a mile on the south side of Ipswich, near the road.
The epitaph or inscription on this monument is as follows:—
M. S. D. Johannis Holt, _Equitis Aur_. _Totius Angliæ in Banco Regis_ _per_ 21 _Annos continuos_ Capitalis Justitiarii _Gulielmo Regi Annæqur Reginæ_ _Consiliarii perpetui_: _Libertatis ac Legum Anglicarum_ _Assertoris_, _Vindicis_, _Custodis_, _Vigilis Acris & intrepidi_, _Rolandus Frater Uncius & Hæres_ _Optime de se Merito_ _posuit_, _Die Martis Vto_. 1709. _Sublatus est_ _ex Oculis nostris_ _Natus_ 30 _Decembris_, _Anno_ 1642.
When we come into Norfolk, we see a face of diligence spread over the whole country; the vast manufactures carried on (in chief) by the Norwich weavers employs all the country round in spinning yarn for them; besides many thousand packs of yarn which they receive from other countries, even from as far as Yorkshire and Westmoreland, of which I shall speak in its place.
This side of Norfolk is very populous, and thronged with great and spacious market-towns, more and larger than any other part of England so far from London, except Devonshire, and the West Riding of Yorkshire; for example, between the frontiers of Suffolk and the city of Norwich on this side, which is not above 22 miles in breadth, are the following market-towns, viz.:—