Scott, the American diver, lost his life while performing acrobatic feats on Waterloo Bridge. The season he chose for diving from a height of twenty feet above the parapet of the highest London bridge was during an intense frost, when the river was full of ice, and the enormous masses floating with the tide scarcely appeared to leave a space for his reckless plunge into the river or his rise therefrom. He watched his moment, and the feat was performed over and over again with perfect safety. But he had been told that the Londoners wanted novelty. It was not enough that he should do day after day what no man had ever ventured to do before.
DEADLY ACROBATICS.
To leap off the parapets of the Southwark and Waterloo bridges into the half-frozen river had become a common thing; and so the poor fellow must have a scaffold put up, and he must suspend himself from its cross bars by his arm, his leg and his neck, in succession. Twice was the last experiment repeated; but on the third attempt the body hung motionless. The applause and laughter that death could be so counterfeited was tumultuous; but a cry of terror went forth that the man was dead. He perished for catering to a morbid public appetite. Every one who saw this voluntary hanging went away degraded and disgusted at the terrible result of the show.
AT WINDSOR CASTLE.
