N the civilized world perhaps such another sight cannot be witnessed, as that which greets the eye from the great Cupola of St. Paul's, when the view is taken on a bright summer morning, after daybreak has settled on the leads and huge gilded cross of this, the most mighty of English Cathedrals.
I saw this vast expanse of brick, stone, and mortar, one delicious, but hazy September morning, from the outer circle of the dome, and I shall never forget that peopled metropolis which lay swarming below me like a vast human hive.
For a radius of ten miles, the roofs and spires of countless religious edifices, dwelling-houses, banks, the tall cones of storied monuments, the delicate tracery of a forest of slender masts, and the smoky chimneys of innumerable breweries, manufactories, and gas-houses, met my vision, which had already begun to weary long before any of the individual characteristics of the British metropolis had segregated themselves from the aggregate mass.
Directly before me, and almost at my feet, lay the turbid Thames, winding in and out sinuously under bridges, and heaving from the labor which the paddles of numerous steam craft impressed in its dirty yellow bosom. These small steamers were of a black and red, mixed, color, and it was only through a glass that I could discern where the two colors met and divided. Passing under the huge stone bridges, their smoke stacks seemed to break in two parts for an instant as they shot under an arch of the huge spans of London or Waterloo Bridges; gracefully as a gentleman bows to his partner in a quadrille, and then the black funnels went back to their original erect but raking position with great deliberation.
I had secured an eyrie in the top of St. Paul's at an early hour with the aid of a greasy half crown, which I had slipped to an old toothless verger with his silver-tipped wand, and he readily gratified my wish to allow me egress from the Whispering gallery which encircles the interior dome of the Cathedral, to a point where, giddily, I might lean out and look all over the great city.
"It's as good as my place is worth, sir," said he, "to let you look out here. A man who was a little light headed from drinking tumbled from this window some years ago, and was broken to pieces on the cobble stones below."
The danger did not prevent me from looking long and greedily at the splendid coup d'[oe]il.
