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Bedfordshire 

Published in 1839, Robson's Directory begins: "Bedfordshire is an inland county, and one of the smallest in England, bounded on the north by the counties of Northampton and Huntingdon, east by Cambridgeshire, south-east and south by Hertfordshire, and west by Buckinghamshire. Its greatest length is 38 miles from north to south, and the extreme breadth 22; in circuit it is about 145...  

The county offers but little attraction to the admirers of picturesque scenery, yet the general flatness of the surface is pleasingly varied by small hills traversing its entire breadth in three principal chains. The air is healthy, and the soil chiefly a deep clay, stiff and tenacious, but, by a due mixture of chalk and lime, susceptible of high cultivation... 

The streams are bordered by fine meadows, but the proportion of pasture land is not considerable. The Ouse intersects the county from west to east, separating it into two distinct but very unequal portions; the northern extremely fruitful and woody, the southern and larger less fertile, but under the most admirable cultivation, affording large supplies of wheat and barley..."

Family History, Genealogy and Local History Research Information for Bedfordshire