A Trip Abroad | Page 9

down the other stairs when the lower level is opened for boats to pass up and down the river. While in Scotland, I twice crossed the great Forth Bridge, which is more than a mile and a half long and was erected at a cost of above fifteen millions of dollars. There are ten spans in the south approach, eight in the north approach, and two central spans each seventeen hundred feet long. The loftiest part of the structure is three hundred and sixty-one feet above high-water mark.
The Albert Memorial is perhaps the finest monument seen on the whole trip. The Victoria and Albert Museum contains the original Singer sewing-machine, and a printing-press supposed to have been used by Benjamin Franklin, and many other interesting things. The Natural History Museum also contains much to attract the visitor's attention. Here I saw the skeleton of a mastodon about ten feet tall and twenty feet long; also the tusks of an extinct species of Indian elephant, which were nine feet and nine inches long. There is also an elephant tusk on exhibition ten feet long and weighing two hundred and eighty pounds.
Madam Tussaud's exhibition of wax figures and relics is both interesting and instructive, and well repays one for the time and expense of a visit. Several American Presidents are represented in life-size figures, along with Kings and others who have been prominent in the affairs of men. In the Napoleon room are three of the great warrior's carriages, the one used at Waterloo being in the number. London Tower is a series of strong buildings, which have in turn served as a fortress, a palace, and a prison. I saw the site of Anne Boleyn's execution, but that which had the most interest for me was the room containing the crown jewels. They are kept in a glass case ten or twelve feet in diameter, in a small, circular room. Outside of the case there is an iron cage surrounded by a network of wire. The King's crown is at the top of the collection, which contains other crowns, scepters, swords, and different costly articles. This crown, which was first made in 1838 for Queen Victoria, was enlarged for Edward, the present King. It contains two thousand eight hundred and eighteen diamonds, two hundred and ninety-seven pearls, and many other jewels. One of the scepters is supposed to contain a part of the cross of Christ, but the supposition had no weight with me. One of the attendants told me the value of the whole collection was estimated at four million pounds, and that it would probably bring five times that much if sold at auction. As the English pound is worth about four dollars and eighty-seven cents, this little room contains a vast treasure--worth upwards of a hundred million dollars.
I will only mention Nelson's monument in Trafalgar Square, the Parliament Buildings, St. Paul's Cathedral, Kew Gardens, Hampton Court Palace, and the Zoological Gardens. I also visited the Bank of England, which "stands on ground valued at two hundred and fifty dollars per square foot. If the bank should ever find itself pressed for money, it could sell its site for thirty-two million seven hundred and seventy thousand dollars." It is a low building that is not noted for its beauty. If it were located in New York, probably one of the tall buildings characteristic of that city would be erected on the site.
The British Museum occupied my time for hours, and I shall not undertake to give a catalogue of the things I saw there, but will mention a few of them. There are manuscripts of early writers in the English tongue, including a copy of Beowulf, the oldest poem in the language; autograph works of Daniel De Foe, Ben Jonson, and others; the original articles of agreement between John Milton and Samuel Symmons relating to the sale of the copyright of "a poem entitled 'Paradise Lost.'" There was a small stone inscribed in Phoenician, with the name of Nehemiah, the son of Macaiah, and pieces of rock that were brought from the great temple of Diana at Ephesus; a fragment of the Koran; objects illustrating Buddhism in India; books printed by William Caxton, who printed the first book in English; and Greek vases dating back to 600 B.C. In the first verse of the twentieth chapter of Isaiah we have mention of "Sargon, the king of Assyria." For centuries this was all the history the world had of this king, who reigned more than seven hundred years before Christ. Within recent times his history has been dug up in making excavations in the east, and I saw one of his inscribed bricks and two very large, human-headed, winged bulls from a doorway of his palace.
The carvings from the palace