OR, Excursions in the County: COMPRISING A BRIEF HISTORICAL AND TOPOGRAPHICAL DELINEATION TOGETHER WITH DESCRIPTIONS OF THE RESIDENCES OF THE Remains of Antiquity, AND EVERY OTHER INTERESTING OBJECT OF CURIOSITY. FORMING A COMPLETE GUIDE FOR THE TRAVELLER AND TOURIST. ILLUSTRATED WITH ONE HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS, INCLUD- IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. 1. BIB WITHAM AND MALDON: PRINTED BY AND FOR P. YOUNGMAN. Gough Addo Norjot 8° 1091 PREFACE. In completing the Excursions through this county, an obligation, next to the acknowledgment of the assistance which the Editor has received from the resident gentlemen and antiquaries, is the congratulation due to the spirit of amelioration which has evidently made advances unprecedented in former times, not only in architecture, but in agriculture and other arts, which concern the comforts and conveniences of life. By a singular coincidence, these pursuits are happily united in some of the proprietors of those princely residences that distinguish the county of Norfolk. Next to the acknowledged improvements in agriculture, it seems an observation, stating that "Norfolk is one of the counties where the greatest deficiency of water carriage exists," will not long be founded: fortunately the proprietary near Diss have announced the intention of mnking their river navigable, which, in connexion with similar improvements in the two neighbouring counties, must be highly advantageous in its results, whether the former navigation should or should not be continued from Thetford to Norwich, and from thence to Cromer, where a respectable fishery is already established, and from which the neighbouring parts of the country are supplied b VOL. I. down as low as Cambridge. There can be little doubt that the increase of aquatic communications will add to the fruitfulness and beauty of a soil, that, with the highly ornamented remains of Gothic grandeur, exhibits so many specimens of the more light and chaste beauties derived from the models of Greece and Rome. London, May 1, 1819. THE EDITOR. |