More than seven years did London Bridge take a-building, and it was opened in 1831. The total costs were something under a million and a half of money—less than is needed for a modern battleship.
And already, before it is one hundred years old, there comes a cry that London's heart finds this great artery too small for the stream of life that flows for ever upon it. One may hope, however, that when the necessity arrives, this notable bridge will not be spoiled, but another created hard by, if needs must, to fulfil the demands of traffic. Perhaps a second tunnel may solve the problem, since metropolitan man is turning so rapidly into a mole.
From quarry to bridge is a far cry, yet he who has seen both may dream sometimes among the dripping ferns, silent cliff-faces and unruffled pools, of the city's roar and riot and the ceaseless thunder of man's march from dawn till even; while there—in the full throb and hurtle of London town, swept this way and that amid the multitudes that traverse Thames—it is pleasant to glimpse, through the reek and storm, the cradle of this city-stained granite, lying silent at peace in the far-away West Country.
BAGTOR
From the little southern salient of Bagtor at Dartmoor edge, there falls a slope to the "in country" beneath. Thereon Bagtor woods extend in many a shining plane—from wind-swept hill-crowns of beech and fir, to dingles and snug coombs in the valley bottom a thousand feet beneath.
On a summer day one loiters in the dappled wood, for here is welcome shade after miles of hot sunshine on the heather above. Music of water splashes pleasantly through the trees, where a streamlet falls from step to step; the last of the bluebells still linger by the way, and above them great beech-boles rise, all chequered with sun splashes. On the earth dead leaves make a russet warmth, brighter by contrast with the young green round about, and brilliant where sunlight winnows through. There, in the direct beam, flash little flies, which hang suspended upon the light like golden beads; while through the glades, young fern is spread for pleasant resting-places. Pigeons murmur aloft unseen, and many a grey-bird and black-bird sing beside their hidden homes.
At last the woodlands make an end, old orchards spread in a clearing, and the sun, now turning west, has left the apple trees, so that their blossom hangs cool and shaded on the boughs. Behind—a background for the orchard—there rise the walls of an ancient house, weathered and worn—a mass of picturesque gables and tar-pitched roofs with red-brick chimneys ascending above them. No great dignity or style marks this dwelling. It is a thing of patches and additions. Here the sun still burns radiantly, makes the roof golden, and flashes on the snow-white "fan-tails" that strut up and down upon it.
Great Scotch firs tower to the south, and the light burns redly in their boughs against the blue sky above them. A farmhouse nestles beside the old mansion under a roof of ancient thatch, that falls low over the dawn-facing front, and makes ragged eyelashes for the little windows. The face of the farm is nearly hidden in green things, and a colour note of mauve dominates the foliage where wistaria showers. There are climbing roses too, a Japanese quince, and wallflowers and columbines in the garden plot that subtends the dwelling. Mossy walls enclose the garden, and beneath them spreads the farmyard—a dust-dry place to-day wherein a litter of black piglets gambol round their mother. Poultry cluck and scratch everywhere, and a company of red calves cluster together in one corner. A ploughman brings in his horses. From a byre comes the purr of milk falling into a pail.