great number of forges and mills are connected with its stream. After a course of above twenty miles, it empties itself into the Severn, immediately below Stourport. In 1661, an act was obtained for the purpose of rendering the Stour navigable, and in 1666, a person named Yarrington was sent to Holland to learn the art of inland navigation; upon his return, he made the Stour navigable between Kidderminster and Stourbridge, but there was then so little want of such a communication, that the river was soon choked up, and the boats allowed to rot as being useless.
The Severn, during the summer, is a very shallow stream, but the channel is deep, and the banks are high, on account of its running generally through a light sandy soil. It is navigated, however, at all times of the year, (except when the season is very dry,) from Bristol to Shrewsbury, and even to Welsh Pool; the tide is not generally felt higher than Upton. A horse towing-path has been made within a few years from Gloucester to Shrewsbury. The Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal, to which the town owes its rise, and the immediate neighbourhood its prosperity, was completed in the year 1771, and in 1775 a bridge was built over the Severn, connecting the town with the parish of Areley Kings, by which means a new line of communication was opened between the manufacturing towns and those agricultural districts upon which they depended for their supply of corn, cattle, hops and fruit.
By these means, the town enjoys a perfect facility of communication with all parts of the kingdom, and forms an entrépot for the agricultural produce of
