Part 68
It is supposed that the first bridge of London was built between the years 993 and 1016; it was of wood. There is a vulgar tradition, that the foundation of the old stone bridge was laid upon wool-packs: this report is imagined to have arisen from a tax laid upon wool towards its construction. The first stone-bridge began in 1176, and finished in 1209, was much injured by a fire in the Borough, in 1212, and three thousand people perished. On St. George’s day, 1395, there was a great justing upon it, between David, earl of Crawford, of Scotland, and lord Wells of England. It had a drawbridge for the passage of ships with provisions to Queenhithe, with houses upon it, mostly tenanted by pin and needle-makers: there was a chapel on the bridge, and a tower, whereon the heads of unfortunate partisans were placed: an old map of the city, in 1597, represents a terrible cluster; in 1598, Hentzner the German traveller, counted above thirty poles with heads. Upon this bridge was placed the head of the great chancellor, sir Thomas More, which was blown off the pole into the Thames and found by a waterman, who gave it to his daughter; she kept it during life as a relic, and directed at her death it should be placed in her arms and buried with her.
Howel, the author of “Londinopolis,” in a paraphrase of some lines by Sannazarius, has this--
_Encomium on London-bridge._
When Neptune from his billows London spy’d, Brought proudly thither by a high spring-tide, As thro’ a floating wood he steer’d along. And dancing castles cluster’d in a throng; When he beheld a mighty bridge give law Unto his surges, and their fury awe; When such a shelf of cataracts did roar, As if the Thames with Nile had chang’d her shore; When he such massy walls, such towers did eye, Such posts, such irons, upon his back to lye; When such vast arches he observ’d, that might Nineteen Rialtos make for depth and height; When the Cerulean god these things survey’d, He shook his trident, and, astonish’d, said, “Let the whole earth now all the wonders count, This bridge of wonders is the paramount.”
Thus has commenced, under the most favourable auspices, a structure which is calculated to secure from danger the domestic commerce of the port of London. That such a work has not long since been executed, is attributable more to the financial difficulties under which the corporation of London has been labouring for the last quarter of a century, than to any doubts of its being either expedient or necessary. A similar design to that which is now in course of execution, was in contemplation more than thirty years ago; and we believe that many of the first architects of the day sent in plans for the removal of the old bridge, and the construction of a new bridge in its place. A want of funds to complete such an undertaking compelled the projectors of it, to abandon it for a time; but the improved condition of the finances of the corporation, the increasing commerce of the city of London with the internal parts of the country, the growing prosperity of the nation at large, and we may also add, a more general conviction derived from longer experience, that the present bridge was a nuisance which deserved to be abated, induced them to resume it, and to resume it with a zeal proportionate to the magnitude of the object which they had in view. Application was made to parliament for the grant of a sum of money to a purpose which, when considered with regard either to local or to national interests, was of great importance. That application was met with a spirit of liberality which conferred as much honour upon the party who received, as upon the party who gave, the bounty. The first results of it were beheld in the operations of _to-day_; the further results are in the bosom of time; but from the spirit with which the work has been commenced, we have no doubt but they will tend no less to the benefit, than the glory, of the citizens of London.[169]
There is something peculiarly imposing and impressive in ceremonies of this description, as they are usually conducted, and we certainly do not recollect any previous spectacle of a similar nature, which can be said to have surpassed in general interest, grandeur of purpose, or splendid effect, than that just recorded.
It is at all times agreeable to a philosophical mind, and an understanding which busies itself, not only with the surface and present state of things, but also with their substance and remote tendencies, to contemplate the exercise of human power, and the triumphs of human ingenuity, whether developed in physical or mental efforts, in the pursuit of objects which comprehend a mixture of both. And perhaps, it is in a good degree attributable to this secret impulse of our nature, which operates in some degree upon all, however silent and imperceptible in its operation, that the mass of mankind are accustomed to take such an eager interest in ceremonials like the present. It is true, that show, and preparation, and bustle, and the excitement consequent upon these, are the immediate and apparent motives; but it does not therefore follow that the other reasons are inefficient, or that because they are less prominent and apparent, they are therefore inoperative. The erection of a bridge, without reference to the immediate object or the extent of its design, is _per se_ a triumph of art over nature--a conquering of one of these obstacles, which the latter, even in her most bountiful and propitious designs, delights to present to man, as if for the purpose of calling his powers into exercise, and affording him the quantity of excitement necessary to the happiness of a sentient being. But if we do not entertain these sentiments, and give them utterance in so many words, we nevertheless feel and act upon them. We delight to attend spectacles like the present, where the first germ of a stupendous work is to be prepared. We look round on the complicated apparatus, and the seemingly discordant and unorganized beams and blocks of wood and granite, and then we think of the simple structure, the harmonious and complete whole to which these confused elements will give birth. Such a structure is pregnant with a multitude of almost indefinable thoughts and anticipations. We bethink ourselves of the stream of human life, which, some five years hence, will flow over the new London-bridge as thickly, and almost with as little cessation, as the waters of the Thames below: and then we reflect upon the tide of hopes and fears which that human stream will carry in its bosom! One of our first reflections will necessarily be of its adaptation to trade and commerce, of which it will then constitute a new and immense conduit. Trade, and science, and learning, and war, (Providence long avert it!) will at various periods pass across it. Next we consider what will be the immediate and individual destiny of the structure:--is it to moulder away after the lapse of many ages, under the slow but effectual influence of time, or to suffer dilapidation suddenly from the operation of some natural convulsion? Will it fall before the wrath or wilfulness of man, or is it to be displaced by new improvements and discoveries, in like manner as its old and many-arched neighbour makes way for it--and as _that_ once superseded its narrower and shop-covered predecessor? These are questions which the imaginative man may ask himself; but who is to answer? However, even the man of business may be well excused in indulging some speculations such as these, upon the occasion of the erection of a structure, which is to constitute a new artery to and fro in the mighty heart of London--a fresh vein through which that commerce, which is the life-blood of our national prosperity and greatness will have to flow.[170]
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This is one of those public occurrences which may be considered as an event in a man’s life, and an epoch in the city’s history--a sort of station in one’s worldly journey, from which we measure our distances and dates. To witness the manner and the moment, in which is laid the first single resting stone of a grand national structure--the very origin of the existence of a massive and magnificent pile, which will require years to complete, and ages to destroy, has an elevating and sublime effect on the mind.
Great public works are the truest signs of a nation’s prosperity and power; originally its grandest ornaments, and ultimately the strongest proofs of its existence. Its religion, language, arts, sciences, government, and history, may be swept into nothingness; but yet its national buildings will remain entire through the lapse of successive ages--after their very founders are forgotten--after their local history has become a mere matter of conjecture. The columns of Palmyra stand over the ashes of their framers, in a desert as well of history as of sand. The palaces of imperial Rome are still existing, though her religion, her very language, is dead; and the history of the man-wrought miracles of Egypt, had been looked at but as the very dreamings of philosophy long before Napoleon said to his Egyptian army--“From the summits of these pyramids, forty centuries are looking down upon you.”
Of all public edifices, a bridge is the most necessary, the most generally and frequently useful--open at all hours and to all persons. It was probably the very first public building. Some conjecture, that the first hint of it was taken from an uprooted tree lying across a narrow current. What a difference between that first natural bridge, and the perfection of pontifical architecture--the vast, solid, and splendid Waterloo--the _monumentum si quæras_ of John Rennie. We feel pleasure in learning, that the new London-bridge has been designed by the same distinguished architect. It falls to the lot of the son to consummate the plans of the father--we hope with equal success, and with similar benefits, as well to the conductor as to the public.
Old London-bridge, for which the new one is intended as a more commodious substitute, was the first that connected the Surrey and Middlesex banks. It was built originally of wood, about 800 years ago, and rebuilt of stone in the reign of king John, 1209, just two years after the chief civic officer assumed the name of mayor. Until the middle of the last century, it was crowded with houses, which made it very inconvenient to the passengers. The narrowness and inequality of its arches, have caused it to be compared to “a thick wall, pierced with small uneven holes, through which the water, dammed up by this clumsy fabric, rushes, or rather leaps, with a velocity extremely dangerous to boats and barges.” Of its nineteen arches, none except the centre, which was formed by throwing two into one, is more than twenty feet wide. This is but the width of each of the piers of Waterloo-bridge. It is the most crowded thoroughfare in London, and, in this point, exceeds Charing-cross, which, according to Dr. Johnson, was overflowed by the full tide of human existence. It has been calculated, that there daily pass over London-bridge 90,000 foot passengers; 800 waggons; 300 carts and drays; 1,300 coaches; 500 gigs and tax carts; and 800 saddle horses. The importance of this great point of communication, and the necessity of rendering it adequate to the purposes of its construction, are proved, by the numbers to whom it affords a daily passage at present, and, still more, by the probable increase of the numbers hereafter. The present bridge having been for some years considered destitute of the proper facilities of transition for passengers as well as for vessels, an Act of Parliament, passed in 1823, for building a new one, on a scale and plan equal to the other modern improvements of the metropolis. The first pile of the works was driven on the west side of the present bridge, in March, 1824, and the first coffer-dam having been lately finished, the ceremony of laying the first stone of the new bridge, has been happily and auspiciously completed.[171]
MRS. BARBAULD.
The decease of this literary and excellent lady in the spring of 1825, occasioned a friend to the _Every-Day Book_ to transmit the following fugitive poem for insertion. It is not collected in any of the works published by Mrs. Barbauld during her lifetime; this, and the rectitude of spirit in the production itself, may justify its being recorded within these pages.
_To her honoured Friends_
of the families of
MARTINEAU AND TAYLOR
_These lines are inscribed_
By their affectionate
A. L. BARBAULD
~On the Death~
OF
MRS. MARTINEAU.
Ye who around this venerated bier In pious anguish pour the tender tear, Mourn not!--Tis Virtue’s triumph, Nature’s doom, When honoured Age, slow bending to the tomb, Earth’s vain enjoyments past, her transient woes, Tastes the long sabbath of well-earned repose. No blossom here, in vernal beauty shed, No lover lies, warm from the nuptial bed; Here rests _the full of days_,--each task fulfilled, Each wish accomplished, and each passion stilled. You raised her languid head, caught her last breath, And cheered with looks of love the couch of death.
Yet mourn!--for sweet the filial sorrows flow, When fond affection prompts the gush of woe; No bitter drop, ’midst Nature’s kind relief, Sheds gall into the fountain of your grief; No tears you shed for patient love abused, And counsel scorned, and kind restraints refused. Not yours the pang the conscious bosom wrings, When late remorse inflicts her fruitless stings. Living you honoured her, you mourn for, dead; Her God you worship, and her path you tread.
Your sighs shall aid reflection’s serious hour, And cherished virtues bless the kindly shower: On the loved theme your lips unblamed shall dwell; Your lives, more eloquent, her worth shall tell. --Long may that worth, fair Virtue’s heritage, From race to race descend, from age to age! Still purer with transmitted lustre shine The treasured birthright of the spreading line!
For me, as o’er the frequent grave I bend, And pensive down the vale of years descend; Companions, Parents, Kindred called to mourn, Dropt from my side, or from my bosom torn; A boding voice, methinks, in Fancy’s ear Speaks from the tomb, and cries “Thy friends are here!”
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_Summer Evening’s Adventure in Wales._
Mr. Proger of Werndee, riding in the evening from Monmouth, with a friend who was on a visit to him, heavy rain came on, and they turned their horses a little out of the road towards Perthyer. “My cousin Powell,” said Mr. Proger, “will, I am sure, be ready to give us a night’s lodging.” At Perthyer all was still; the family were abed. Mr. Proger shouted aloud under his cousin Powell’s chamber-window. Mr. Powell soon heard him; and putting his head out, inquired, “In the name of wonder what means all this noise? Who is there?” “It is only your cousin Proger of Werndee, who is come to your hospitable door for shelter from the inclemency of the weather; and hopes you will be so kind as to give him, and a friend of his, a night’s lodging.” “What is it you, cousin Proger? You, and your friend shall be instantly admitted; but upon one condition, namely, that you will admit now, and never hereafter dispute, that I am the head of your family.” “What was that you said?” replied Mr. Proger. “Why, I say, that if you expect to pass the night in my house, you must admit that I am the head of your family.” “No, sir, I never will admit that--were it to rain swords and daggers, I would ride through them this night to Werndee, sooner than let down the consequence of my family by submitting to such an ignominious condition. Come up, Bald! come up!” “Stop a moment, cousin Proger; have you not often admitted, that the first earl of Pembroke (of the name of Herbert) was a younger son of Perthyer; and will you set yourself up above the earls of Pembroke?” “True it is I must give place to the earl of Pembroke, because he is a peer of the realm; but still, though a peer, he is of the youngest branch of my family, being descended from the fourth son of Werndee, who was your ancestor, and settled at Perthyer, whereas I am descended from the eldest son. Indeed, my cousin Jones of Lanarth is of a branch of the family elder than you are; and yet he never disputes my being the head of the family.” “Well, cousin Proger, I have nothing more to say: good night to you.”--“Stop a moment, Mr. Powell,” cried the stranger, “you see how it pours; do let _me_ in at least; _I_ will not dispute with you about our families.” “Pray, sir, what is your name, and where do you come from?” “My name is so and so; and I come from such a county.” “A Saxon of course; it would indeed be very curious, sir, were I to dispute with a Saxon about family. No, sir, you must suffer for the obstinacy of your friend, so good night to you both.”[172]
[168] Stow’s Survey, 1633, page 886.
[169] The Times.
[170] British Press.
[171] New Times.
[172] Williams’s Monmouth. App. 168.
~June 16.~
_Sts. Quirius_, or _Cyr_ and _Julitta_, Martyrs, A. D. 304. _St. John Francis Regis_, A. D. 1640. _Sts. Ferreolus_, or _Fargeau_, and _Ferrutius_, A. D. 211 or 212. _St. Aurelian_, Abp. A. D. 552.
CHRONOLOGY.
1722. John Churchill, the great duke of Marlborough, died at Windsor-lodge, in a state of idiocy. He was son of sir Winston Churchill, an English historian, and born at Ashe, in Devonshire, 1650. At twelve years of age he became page to the duke of York, afterwards James II.; at sixteen he entered the guards, and distinguished himself under Turenne. He was called the handsome Englishman, married Miss Jennings, (the celebrated duchess of Marlborough,) obtained distinguished rank and offices, suppressed the duke of Monmouth’s rebellion, and served king James with apparent fidelity in the wane of his fortune, while he faithlessly made court to the prince of Orange. His great military achievements, under king William and queen Anne, were rewarded by munificent public grants, and a public funeral in Westminster-abbey.
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FLORAL DIRECTORY.
Moss Privince Rose. _Rosa muscosa._ Dedicated to _St. Julitta_.
CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.
_To the Editor of the Every-Day Book._
Dear Sir,
A great deal has been lately attempted, by men of feeling minds, to prevent wanton cruelty towards animals; which (unhappily even in this enlightened age,) is but too prevalent.
The lower class of persons, to whom the care of the horse is intrusted, frequently possess less sense than those noble animals, which groan under their tyranny; we constantly find ignorant farriers, who think that a cure can only be effected, by most violent and painful remedies. It is to these brutal men, that the lameness of so many horses may be attributed; for, not understanding the beautiful and singular construction of the interior of a horse’s foot, by cutting away the hoof they contract the foot, and gradually prevent the elasticity so necessary: thus by repeated shoeing, the foot is cramped, as much so, as a man’s who would attempt to walk in a shoe considerably too tight for him. Lameness ensues, and these farriers pronounce the seat of lameness any where but where it actually exists; then comes firing and blistering, and every possible torture, and the poor animal lamed for life, long before his time, is consigned to the lowest drudgery, and subsequently to the dogs.
The inhuman rate at which horses are driven in stage coaches, conduces greatly to mortality; this consumption of animal life is, in some instances, one in three annually.
Soame Jenyns, whose works are well known, and who was himself a man of the finest feelings, in a paper _On Cruelty to Animals_, adverts to the disciples of Pythagoras, who held that the souls of men, and all other animals, existed in a state of perpetual transmigration, and that when by death they were dislodged from one corporeal habitation, they were immediately reinstated in another, happier or more miserable, according to their behaviour in the former. Soame Jenyns favours this doctrine of transmigration, “first, from its justice; secondly, from its utility; and lastly, from the difficulty we lie under to account for the sufferings of many innocent creatures without it.” He says, “If we look around us, we cannot but observe a great and wretched variety of this kind; numberless animals subjected by their own natures to many miseries, and by our cruelties to many more, _incapable of crimes_, and _consequently incapable of deserving them_, called into being, as far as we can discover, only to be miserable for the service or diversion of others less meritorious than themselves, without any possibility of preventing, deserving, or receiving recompense for their unhappy lot, if their whole existence is comprehended in the narrow and wretched circle of their present life.” He then proceeds to observe, that “the theory here inculcated, removes all these difficulties, and reconciles all these seemingly unjust dispensations, with the strictest justice. It informs us, that their sufferings may by no means be understood, but as the just punishments of their former behaviour, in a state, where by means of their vices, they may have escaped them. It teaches us, that the pursued and persecuted fox, was once probably some crafty and rapacious minister, who had purchased by his ill acquired wealth, that safety, which he cannot now procure by his flight; that the bull, baited with all the cruelties that human ingenuity, or human malevolence can invent, was once some relentless tyrant, who had inflicted all the tortures which he endures; that the poor bird, blinded, imprisoned, and at last starved to death in a cage, may have been some unforgiving creditor; and the widowed turtle, pining away life for the loss of her mate, some fashionable wife, rejoicing at the death of her husband, which her own ill-usage had occasioned. Never can the delicious repast of roasted lobsters excite my appetite, whilst the ideas of the tortures in which those innocent creatures have expired present themselves to my imagination. But when I consider that they must have once probably been Spaniards at Mexico, or Dutchmen at Amboyna, I fall to, with a good stomach and a good conscience. Never can I repose myself with satisfaction in a post chaise, whilst I look upon the starved, foundered, accelerated, and excoriated animals which draw it, as mere horses, condemned to such unmerited torments for my convenience, but I reflect, they must have undoubtedly existed in the fathers of the holy inquisition. I very well know that these sentiments will be treated as ludicrous by many of my readers, but they are in themselves just and serious, and carry with them the strongest probability of their truth. So strong is it, that I cannot but hope it will have some good effect on the conduct of those polite people, who are too sagacious, learned, and courageous to be kept in awe by the threats of hell and damnation; and I exhort every fine lady to consider, how wretched will be her condition, if after twenty or thirty years spent at cards, in elegant rooms, kept warm by good fires and soft carpets, she should at last be obliged to change places with one of her coach horses; and every fine gentleman to reflect, how much more wretched would be his, if after wasting his estate, his health, and his life in extravagance, indolence, and luxury, he should again revive in the situation of one of his creditors.”