Sarrum and Its County

Sarrum lies along the river Sarr where it becomes navigable, some forty miles south and west of Cambridge, on the seam where the pasture country meets the coal and iron beneath it. The council’s official census recognises about forty thousand locals. Company, lodging, factor and rail books account for perhaps five thousand outsiders in an ordinary season. Neither figure is a count of the city. Beneath and around the rated streets lies what Sarrum itself calls the rubble: people in the Cinders, low Hollowgate, temporary rows, cellars, sheds, the Cut and made ground who stand on no civic roll. Ellis Mow’s conservative arithmetic once made the whole city eighty thousand; the mission rooms now hold that the rubble alone may exceed that number. A great part of that hidden population is Afflicted, especially in the low wards and below ground, but no proportion can be trusted because the count that would answer the question has never been permitted. Sarrum therefore has no wall and no gates; no cathedral, cloister, university, castle or keep; and no court beyond a county assize that sits four times in a year and goes away again.