TEL 



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TEL 



Telford executed some important harbour-works at 

 Aberdeen and Dundee ; but his most striking performance 

 of this class is the St. Katherine Docks, London. Owing 

 to the very limited space which could be obtained, it was 

 necessary to construct these docks of irregular forms, and to 

 adopt unusual arrangements respecting the warehouses ; 

 and these arrangements, combined witli the admirable 

 machinery employed, have reduced the time requisite for 

 unloading a vessel in an astonishing degree.* There are two 

 docks, communicating with the river by a tide-lock 180 feet 

 long and 45 feet wide, with three pair of gates, so that 

 either one very large or two smaller vessels may pass the 

 lock at one time : and steam-engines are provided, capable 

 of filling the locks in a few minutes by pumping water 

 from the middle of the river, so that vessels are enabled to 

 pass in and out of the docks with great rapidity so long as 

 there is a sufficient depth of water to receive them outside 

 the lock. The cast-iron turn-bridge over this lock is an 

 excellent specimen of that kind of machinery, being easily 

 worked by two persons at each end, although it supports a 

 carriage-way 24 feet wide. These docks were constructed 

 much more quickly than is usual for works of such magni- 

 tude, and more quickly than the engineer could fully approve, 

 although he admitted the urgency of the case as a justifica- 

 tion of a course against which he could not but enter his 

 protest. One of the very latest engagements of Telford 

 u:i> the survey of Dover harbour, undertaken, in January, 

 1834, at the request of the duke of Wellington, us warden 

 of the Cinque Ports, with a \ii",v to the adoption of 

 measures to check the accumulation of shingle at the 

 entrance. 



In addition to the works which he executed himself, 

 Telford was frequently applied to for his judgment upon 

 important schemes, and in this way he made many reports 

 to parliament. For many years he was employed to re- 

 port upon all public works of engineering character for 

 which loans were required of the Exchequer Loan Com- 

 missioners. Among his reports are several of considerable 

 interest, especially upon proposed canals between London 

 and Birmingham, and between the Knglish and Bristol 

 Channels, and on the supply of water to the metropolis, 

 one of the last objects to which he devoted his atten- 

 tion. For some years before his death he had gradually 

 declined as much as possible forming new engagements, 

 and had made preparations for the publication of such 

 a selection from hi* papers as might leave on record 

 an authentic account of the important works in which 

 for more than half a century he had been engaged. 

 Having made arrangements with his executors for the 

 completion of his work in case he should not live to finish 

 it, he set about it with ardour, and had many of the plates 

 completed, the manuscript in a very forward state, and 

 arrangements made respecting the paper, type, &c. before 

 his death. The book was not published until 1838, chiefly 

 owing to the illness and death of Mr. Turrell.the engraver, 

 and the difficulty of getting the plates completed. It 

 forms a thick 4to. volume, entitled 'Life of Thomas Tel- 

 ford, civil engineer, written by himself; containing a de- 

 scriptive Narrative of his Professional Labours ;' and it 

 contains a preface and supplement, by the editor, Mr. 

 Hickman. and a very copious appendix of illustrative re- 

 and other documents. The plates, eighty-three in 

 number, constitute a companion volume, in large folio, to 

 which is prefixed a line portrait of Telford, engraved by 

 W. Haddon, from a picture by S. Lane. From this work 

 the materials of the preceding notice of his principal works 

 are chiefly derived ; and from the supplementary notice, by- 

 Mr. Hickman, and some other sources, are collected the 

 following additional biographical particulars. 



Before leaving his native district, Telford acquired some 

 distinction as a poet. He wrote in the homely style of 

 Ramsay and Fergusson, and contributed small pieces to 

 Huddiman's ' Weekly Magazine,' under tin: signature of 

 ' Eskdale Tarn.' He wrote a short poem, entitled ' Ksk- 

 dale,' descriptive of the scenes of his early years, which was 

 originally published in a provincial miscellany, sub- 

 ited at Shrewsbury, at the request of his 

 friends, and afterwards incited in the appendix to his Life. 

 Another pleading fragment of his composition is given at 

 the end of the first volume of Dr. Curne's ' Life and Works 

 of Burns,' published at Liverpool in 1800 : it is an extract 



S<. for mi 

 No. I,V. nf I,. i 

 I- ' 



mint, a nnri-r on 'The Doc!<,' forming 



from a poetical epistle sent by Telford, when at Shrews- 

 bury, to the Ayrshire poet, recommending him to take up 

 other subjects of a serious nature, similar to the ' Cottar's 

 Saturday Night.' He taught himself Latin, French, Ita- 

 lian, and German, so as to read them all with facility, and 

 to converse readily in French ; and he has left valuable 

 contributions to engineering literature, in the articles Ar- 

 chitecture, Bridge, Civil Architecture, and Inland Naviga- 

 tion, in Brewster's 'Edinburgh Encyclopaedia,' in which 

 work Mr. Rickman says he was a shareholder. He was 

 well acquainted with algebra, but he held mathematical 

 investigation in rather low estimation. In his early years 

 he appears to have been tinctured with democratic opinions ; 

 but after seeing the excesses of the French revolution, he 

 always studiously avoided conversing on political subjects. 

 In all the relations of life he commanded respect and 

 esteem ; and he was particularly remarkable for his facility 

 of access to the deserving, and especially for his ready 

 communication of professional information to foreigners ; 

 a circumstance which, added to his connection with the 

 Gotha canal and some other continental works, procured 

 for him the highest respect on the continent of Europe. 

 The Russian government frequently applied to him for 

 advice respecting the construction of roads and canals ; 

 and the sixty-seventh plate in his atlas represents the 

 details of a road designed by him from Warsaw to the 

 Russian frontier. The emperor Alexander of Russia 

 acknowledged his sense of his sen-ices on one occasion, 

 in 1808, by sending him a diamond ring with a suitable 

 inscription. Although he was not connected with the 

 Institution of Civil Engineers at its formation, he accepted 

 their invitation in 1820, and became their president ; 

 and from that time he was unremitting in his attention to 

 the duties of the office, having become, by his partial re- 

 tirement from .business, a pretty regular resident in the 

 metropolis. He ardently loved his profession, and was, 

 observes Mr. Rickman, so energetic in any task before him, 

 that all other motives became subordinate to it. He never 

 married, and hardly had a fixed habitation until a late 

 period of life. He was of athletic form, and reached the 

 age of seventy without any serious illness; but in 1827 he 

 was afflicted with a severe and painful disorder, after which 

 he became subject to bilious attacks, under one of which 

 he died, on the 2nd of September,. 1834, at. his residence in 

 Abingdon Street, Westminster, at the age of seventy-seven. 

 He was buried in Westminster Abbey. The acquisition of 

 property was always a secondary consideration with Tel- 

 ford ; and in certain cases, especially of abortive specula- 

 tions, he was ingenious in finding arguments for giving his 

 assistance gratuitously. Even in increasing his charges as 

 his reputation and experience increased the value of his 

 services, he seems to have been actuated chiefly by a sense 

 of what was due to others in his profession, whose remu- 

 neration was in some degree dependent upon his own. 

 After his mother's death he had few family connections to 

 provide for, and he had a great objection to raising any 

 individual above his station in life, which is stated by his 

 biographer as his reason for not leaving his property to re- 

 lations. His will, printed in the appendix to his ' Life,' pro- 

 vides for the payment of handsome legacies to many per- 

 sonal friends ; of 2000/. to provide annual premiums to be 

 given by the Institution of Civil Engineers; and of 1000/. 

 each in trust to the ministers of Westerkirk and Langholm, 

 for the purchase of books for the parish libraries. His 

 scientific books, prints, drawings, &c.,are bequeathed to 

 the Institution of Civil Engineers. Telford became a 

 fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1803, and of 

 that of England in 1827. 



(Life, edited by Rickman ; Chambers'.-* fv.-ittti.ih Biogra- 

 phical Dictionary ; Annual Biography, vol. xix.) 



TKLINGA or TELUGU LANGUAGE. [HINDUSTAN, 

 ]). 22!).] 



TELL, WILLIAM, a simple countryman of the village 

 of Burglen near Altorf in Switzerland, who lived towards the 

 end of the thirteenth and during the first half of the fourteenth 

 century. His early life is unknown, and his name would 

 probably never have been heard of in history, if the tyranny 

 of the Austrians had not called him from his obscurity. 

 At the beginning of the fourteenth century, when Albert I. 

 of Austria was endeavouring to suppress the spirit of free- 

 dnm and independence in the three Waldstadte, Uri, 

 Sc.hwyz, and Unterwalden, and was using every means to 

 add them to his family estates, he sent bailiffs 'Lamlvogte) 



