LONDON. 



187 



of all tlie many buildings of London there are none capable of conveying 

 a higber notion of its might than the seventeen bridges which span the Thames 

 between Hammersmith and the Tower. Some of these are built of granite, 

 others of iron ; they all vary in aspect, and are sometimes of superb propor- 

 tions. Eight of them are met with between Westminster Palace and the 

 Pool, or Port of London, a distance of less than 2 miles by the river, and 

 three of these vibrate almost incessantly beneath the weight of passing railway 

 trains. Until quite recently it was impossible to admire these bridges without 

 embarking in a steamer ; but the Thames has now been "regulated" for a con- 

 siderable portion of its course, and superb quays have taken the place of fetid 

 banks of mud, left dry by each receding tide. The Victoria Embankment now 

 stretches for 6,640 feet from Westminster to Blackfriars Bridge. Its river wall, 

 of solid granite, rises 40 feet above low water, and rests upon a foundation 



Fier. 



SoMEESET House .wd the Victoria Embankment. 



descending to a depth of from 16 to 40 feet. Public gardens and rows of trees 

 occupy a considerable part of it, and gladden the e^-es which formerly turned away 

 with disgust from wretched hovels and narrow alleys, washed by the turgid 

 waters of the Thames. Upon this embankment stands " Cleopatra's Needle," 

 one of the forty-two obelisks known to exist in the world. It was brought 

 thither from Alexandria. Thanks to the use of hydraulic rams, twenty-four 

 men were enabled to raise this monument ; whilst Lebas, in 1836, employed 480 

 persons in the erection of the Obelisk of Luxor ; and Fontana, in 1586, required 

 the services of 960 men and 75 horses to poise the Needle on the Piazza di San 

 Pietro at Pome. 



Above London Bridge numerous bridges facilitate the intercourse between the 

 two banks of the river, but lower down the Port begins, with its warehouses, jetties, 

 landing-stages, and cranes. It has not hitherto been found feasible to throw a 



