<p>The Orkneys, a group of almost 70 islands and islets, lay about eight miles off the eastern end of the northern coast of the Scottish mainland, separated from Caithness by the Pentland Firth. There were three main groups of islands: the South Isles, which included Hoy and South Ronaldsay; Pomona, or the Mainland, on which was situated the capital Kirkwall, a royal burgh; and the North Isles of Shapinsay, Eday, Stronsay, Sandray, Westray and North Ronaldsay, among others. Stromness, which was also on the Mainland, was a burgh of barony.

<p>The East Fife Burghs (as they were usually called) were small fishing settlements strung over a distance of about six miles along the northern shore of the Firth of Forth at its widest point, in the East Neuk of Fife. Pittenweem, the most westerly, contained some ‘good houses’ in 1831, when its population was 1,317. It had a council of 24, who were nearly all residents.<fn> <em>Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland</em> (1895), v. 207-9; <em>PP</em> (1823), xv. 702; (1831-2), xlii. 75; (1836), xxiii.

<p>Totnes, a market town situated on the western bank of the navigable River Dart, midway between Plymouth and Exeter, lay at the heart of a ‘rich agricultural district’ known as the South Hams. It consisted principally of ‘one good street nearly three-quarters of a mile in length’, which led to the river where a bridge, rebuilt in 1828, connected the town to the ‘handsome eastern suburb’ of Bridgetown, in the neighbouring parish of Berry Pomeroy.

<p>Wilton, ‘pleasantly situated in the widest part of the vale of the Wiley’, was only nominally the county town of Wiltshire, having become ‘a small, decayed place’.<fn>Sir R.C. Hoare, <em>Wilts</em>. Branch and Dole, 55; <em>Spectator</em>, 1 Jan. 1831.</fn> Its cloth production and even its famed carpet manufactures, whose ‘brilliancy of colour, variety of pattern and boldness of design are equalled by few and exceeded by none’, had substantially declined.<fn> <em>The Times</em>, 16 May 1823; Wilts.

<p>Taunton, ‘a populous and respectable market town’, situated on the River Tone in a ‘fertile and salubrious valley’, was ‘one of the principal towns’ in the county. Largely through the efforts of the Market House Society, which had obtained private Acts of Parliament in 1768 and 1817, the central streets were ‘spacious, well-paved, and lighted with gas’, giving a general appearance of prosperity, and the town had attracted a number of ‘genteel families’ of independent fortune.

<p>Hedon, the market town for Holderness, lay eight miles east of Hull and very much in its shadow. It consisted chiefly of one street and was described in 1833 as ‘very mean’, with ‘very little appearance of trade or business’.<fn>E. Baines, <em>Hist. Yorks</em>. (1823), ii. 214-16; <em>PP</em> (1835), xxv. 1541.</fn> The corporation comprised a mayor, nine other aldermen and two bailiffs. The parliamentary franchise was in the freemen, who qualified by birth or apprenticeship.

<p>Addressing the electors in 1826, Abel Rous Dottin recalled his first visit to Southampton some 30 years earlier, when</p> <blockquote>it was, compared with its present appearance, little better than a village. Now, it was one of the most elegant towns in England; its commerce had improved; it was brilliantly lit with gas ...

<p>Tamworth, which lay partly in Staffordshire and partly in Warwickshire, had ‘extensive wharfs and warehouses on the canal’, two large wool stapling establishments and numerous corn and cotton mills, including that of the Peel family on the River Tame.<fn> <em>PP</em> (1831-2), xl. 13; <em>Pigot’s Commercial Dir</em>. (1828-9), 736; <em>Staffs. Dir</em>.

<p>‘This Wiltshire is a horrible county’, wrote William Cobbett† after passing through Cricklade in 1821: ‘fine fields and pastures all around, and yet the cultivators of those fields so miserable’.<fn><em>Cobbett’s Rural Rides</em> ed. G.D.H. and M. Cole, i. 15.</fn> It was nominally divided into northern and southern districts by a line running to the south of Devizes.

<p>A market town and seaport situated on the banks of the tidal River Parrett, in a plain of ‘very rich and productive’ agricultural land, Bridgwater was described in 1822 as ‘large, populous [and] flourishing ... a place of extensive trade [and] a great thoroughfare’. The Parrett divided the town into two, the western part being ‘larger and better built’ than the eastern, known as Eastover. Bridgwater’s role as an important distribution centre for the South West of England was boosted by the opening of the link, via Taunton, with the Grand Western Canal in 1827.