The Sun.
London, England, 1864-07-21 00:00:00

The Thames Embankment.

When Parliament passed the bill for the embank-
ment of the north shore of the Thames, the in-
habitants of the metropolis, forming their estimate
of the probable progress of the undertaking on the
usual speed at which our public works advance,
were not at all sanguine that the present genera-
tion would be able to enjoy a walk by the banks of
the river from Westminster-bridge to Blackfriars.
They knew they were doomed to plant the acorn,
but they very much feared that they were i
not to see the oak. However, from what has
already been done in the formation of the Em-
bankment, the oldest amongst us may hope to see
our great river quite a different thing from what it
is now ; and there is every probability that ear-
-1 riages will be rolling along its margin from West-
minster to the city before the Houses of Parliament
are finished or the liens have taken their places on
the pedestal of the column in Trafalgar-square.
The idea of embanking the Thames is not a new
one. As a theory it is traced back to the days of
Sir Christopher Wren ; bnt the merit of giving
effect to it pertains to the Metropolitan Board of
Works. Some years ago a book was published
by a French author in favour of effluvium. He pro-
duced statistics to show that the nightmen of Paris
and other continental cities invariably escape cholera
when epidemic; but the British Legislature has for
a long time steadily refused to adopt that view,
and when some six or seven years ago the Thames
smelt so badly the great main drainage scheme to
relieve the river from the sewage of the metropolis
was adopted by both houses with scarcely any op.
position. The system decided upon was one of high
middle, and low level sewers; and it is to the prac_
tical inconvenience of constructing the low level
sewer on the south of the Thames that we owe the
embankment. Notwithstanding the great number
of people carried daily by the river steamers between
the east and west ends of the town, the traffic along
the Strand, Fleet-street, St. Paul's Chur,ehyard, and
Cheapside, even under ordinary circumstances, is
more than these thoroughfares can accommodate
with convenience and safety to the public, but the
confusion, 1035 of time, and actual danger occa-
sioned by the ripping up of one of those streets for
the purpose of leying down gas or water mains, or
cleansing the old and comparatively small zewe7s,
have long been a subject of complaint and remon-
strance. When therefore the Metropolitan Board
of Works had to set about constructing the low•
level sewer on the n side it at once occurred
to tnem neat to carry it unorth aer toe SLCCCLS JUDI, Ut4Lucka
would involve a diversion for many months of the
most considerable traffic of London ; and they
saw that an embankment of the Thames, while
adding immensely to the beauty of the me-
tiopolis and providing a new thoroughfare from
west to east, would afford them an opportu-
nity of constructing the north low-level sewer
without the slightest inconvenience to locomotion.
Aocordingly, they brought the matter under the
notice of Mr Cowper, the First Commissioner of
Works, who sncceeded in having the bill passed
under which the works along the river are now
being constructed.
The portion of the north shore of the Thames
which is now being embanked is that from West-
minster-bridge to Blackfriars-bridge. Already there
are embankments along nearly the whole of the
line between Westminster and Chelsea, but there is
not much prospect of seeing the portion of the
snore between Blackfriars-bride and London-bridge
embanked, owing to the great value of the wharves
and to the river being rather narrow between these
points. A bill has passed for the embankment of a
portion of the southern side, but its operation is
confined to the shore between Westminster and
Vauxhall bridges. Whether the southern bank
between Westminster and Blackfriars bridges will
be embanked is a question the consideration of
which has been reserved. Should it not be decided
in the affirmative, what the Board of Works is now
doing will be only a partial, though a splendid and
useful, work. There is to be a roadway 100 ft. in
width from Westminster to Blackfriars. Of this
about 70ft will be devoted to vehicles and the re.
maining 30ft to foot passengers. But the 100 ft
do not represent the entire space of reclaimed mud-
bank, which will vary in extent of area at different
points, in some the width being as much as 400 ft.
The total length of the Embankment is about 7,000 ft,
but it is divided by the bridges into three sections,
each of which will be viewed by itself. Indeed the
line of vision ceold scarcely be continued from one
section to tne other, for there is no doubt that the

first span of the Charing-cross Railway bridge,
with its cylindrical supports, will very much mar
the appearance of the Embankment at that point,
and destroy what would otherwise be a fine through
view from the river frontage at Whitehall. At
Westminster the roadway will rise at an elevation
of 1 in 80 to the level of the bridge, and will be set
back some 30 or 40ft from the face of the Embank-
ment wall. The intervening space is to be reserved
as a promenade and a steamboat pier, to which there
will be access from the bridge by a wide and impos-
ing flight of steps. There are not in any city in the
world more disgraceful makeshifts than the present
approaches to the steamboat piers on the Thames,
and most of the piers themselves. The latter are
used•up barges, with a sort of sentry box, styled a
ticket office, at one end—the former commence in
narrow lanes and end as they join on to the barges
in an extension of the contrivance used in shipping
cattle—a long and narrow pen open at both ends
and generally rickety. How these gangways and
piers have been suffered to continue so long, and
with such an immense and growing traffic on the
river, is a wonder. The Embankment will put an
end to them, and substitute handsome avenues, and,
in most instances, really convenient landing places.
Between Westminster and Hungerford Bridges
there will also be a pier for smaller craft. and at
Whitehall-gardens the elaborately sculptured
water-gate, after a design by Inigo Jones,
which now stands at the end of Buckingham-
street, will be re-erected. The public will not have
access to the entire space behind the roadway from
Westminster to Hungerford Bridges. The Duke of
Bucclench will obtain a considerable addition to his
garden, which, when the Embankment is con.
strutted, will come down to the roadway. Thus,
what is now a mud bank will form a portion of his
Grace's private grounds. Nearer to Huugerford.
bridge, however, the Board of Works will obtain
possession of a largo space which they intend to plant
and convert into a public recreation ground, On
either bide of Hungerford and Waterloo Bridges

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there will be steamboat landing-piaces. The durv-
mies for these piers will be partly concealed within
_ _

recesses formed by massive granite pillars projecting
into the river in front of the general line of Embank-
ment. These pillars will have moulded pedestals,
and will rise about 39ft above the roadway, and it
is part of the design that they shall be ornamented
with statuary. Half way between Hungerford and
Waterloo Bridges there will be a flight of landing-
steps GOft wide projecting into the river, and flinked
at each end with massive piers, rising to the level of

a few feet above the roadway, and hereafter to be
surmounted with colossal figures of river deities or
other appropriate groups. There will be an approach
for foot passengers from the high level roadway to

the river by a second flight of steps, descending to
the level of the lower or Embankment roadway. As

the plan at present stands, it is proposed to construct

the Embankment from the Temple to Blackfriars-

bridge on arches, so as to give an access for boats

from the river to the wharves ; but is not likely that

thin design will be adhered to, because it is expected
that the Inner Circle Railway Bill will pass into

law this session, and, if so, it will cut off all water
approach to those wharves, and the Embankment
will be continued in the solid, the roadway ascend-
ing by a gradual incline to the level of Blackfriars-
bridge. Besides the low-level sewer, there will be
a sub-way for gas and water pipes and telegraph
wires beneath the road, and if the Inner Circle

Railway be adopted, this line will also pass under
the entire length of the roadway or the space be-

hind it. From end to end the Embankment will be

faced with granite. It will be enriched with mould-

ings of a simple character down to the level of
high-water mark; but the line of moulding will be

broken by the introduction at intervals of massive
blocks of granite to bear ornamental lamps and by

occasional recesses for seats. Behind the embank•

meat wall the reclaimed space will be filled in to a

level of Oft, above Trinity high-water mark.
Owing to the uncertainty to which we have al-
luded as to the way in which the embankment will
have to be constructed between the Temple and
Blackfriars• bridge, that portion of it has not been
contracted for; but the remainder has been divided
into two contracts, and since early in the month of
March the pile-driving " monkey' has been heard

day and night from the Temple to Blackfriars, and
piles have been driven and the dams lowered with a
rapidity marvellous in the case of an English public
work. Perhaps it is that the Board learnt a lesson
from the railway companies, and determined not to
be outdone by Mr. Ha wkshaw, who throws an iron
bridge across the Thames in a few months. Be this
as it may, they have bound their contractors within
short and narrow limits as regards time, and
since the present session of Parliament opened
they have greatly changed the appearance of the
river. The work from Westminster to Waterloo
Bridges, 3,740 ft. in length, has been contracted for
by Mr. George Furness, at a sum of £520,000,
and he is bound to complete it in two years
from the 16th of February in the present year. Mr.
Ritson is the contractor for the 1,970 ft. from
Waterloo-bridge to the east side of the Temple. His
contract price is £229,000, and his work is to be
completed in two years from the 9th of March.
Each contractor is proceeding on a different prin.
ciple as regards details, though to the public eye
their work when finished will present an uniform
appearance: Mr. Ritson commenced on the old
coffer-dam system. It may be observed that the
river mnd and sand average a total depth of 7ft.,
below which :there is a bed of gravel, varying

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The Weather—Sun Office, July 20, 1864.

THERIKOI4ETBIt.
Thin day at Two o'clock. 79

Barometer--20.88.
WIND-S.W. ; light, and fine.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
This DAT.--Morning, 311. 20m.—Afternoon, 3h.. 44m.
ro.mottuow.-Morning, 4h. Bm.—Afternoon, "..4h. 28m.

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LONDON, TRURSDAY, JULY 21, 1864.

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Mr. MACIIIIRE's speech on the Paper Manufac-
ture was very
appropriate, and it is most suitable
that before the House separates attention should
have been given to this subject
Among a certain
class of politicians and by to"
7 general observers,
it has been too much the fashion to laud and extol
all the various provisions of the French Treaty,
without pausing to inquire into the effects it has
produced on some branches of industry in this
country. If some furtk.r-seeing or sharper-witted
persons ventured to suggest that there was a diffi.
culty, or there would be found a danger in the
realisation of the plans, they were peremptorily
told that they were mistaken, or else opposition was
excited against them on the plea of their being
prejudiced, For a time, unfortunately, the specious
semblances of Mr. r —OBDEN, and the subtle casnis-
tries of Mr. GLADsToNE triumphed over the sober
judgments, and the calm reflections of those who
interposed their veto against the complete fulfilment
of the projects submitted to the licludo in 1860.