Fonder was Elaine of her husband in his humility and misfortune than in the pride of his success.
Davy had always stuck by him. 'He set no store by his bit of money whatever. William was welcome to every penny, if it was any good.'
Others, richer than Davy, who had held aloof from the 'self-confident amateur,' as they called him, were moved by his newly-developed modesty, no less than by his indomitable perseverance and resolution (Rhys called it obstinacy) in the face of catastrophes that would have overwhelmed weaker men. And they honoured his integrity. When his fresh plans were ready, funds to 'assist' were ready also.
Over those plans he had pondered and prayed. Like a flash it came to his mind that, as the single arch was a strength in masonry, a double arch—that is, a circle—must have double strength, and on that he formed his plan, to bind the haunches of his bridge with cylinders of decreasing sizes, not to narrow his span of arch.
Once more the river-bed was cleared. But on the Sunday, before a stone of the new bridge was laid, he summoned his workpeople around him in the Druids' circle, and, standing upon the rocking-stone, he preached to them from the text, 'Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it,' telling the story of his sudden conversion, of the failure of his other bridges as providential instruments to save him from overweening arrogance and self-sufficiency; and wound up with an exhortation that they should lay every stone as if they laid it before the Lord, who alone could decide whether this or that man's work was good or bad.
And so, week by week, as the work went on, Sunday by Sunday he preached and prayed amongst his men on that Druidical altar, consecrating it afresh to the living God, and dedicating himself and his life to the service of Christ.
In like manner, when the last coping-stone was in its place, and his workmen had gathered up their tools to depart, he knelt down upon the bridge, and dedicated that with prayer, saying at the last, 'Keep Thy servant from presumptuous sins. And be the glory Thine, O Lord.'
Thus, in 1755, when William Edwards was but thirty-six, he had completed his trinity of bridges over the terrible Taff. And there to this day it stands, fair to see, with the date of its erection upon it, a bridge with a wider span than the Venetian Rialto—a bridge pierced by three hollow cylinders on either side, rising gracefully with the magnificent arch as they decrease in size.[16]
Upon the opening day, apart from the peasantry, the magnates of three counties flocked to see this wonder of a bridge, and the indomitable man who had created it, in the face of difficulties that would have daunted weaker men.
As one by one Welshmen of note bent from horse or carriage to shake hands with Mr. Edwards and congratulated him on the unrivalled structure his genius had created, and he was heard to say modestly in reply, 'I trust, with the blessing of God, this bridge will stand,' even Rhys admitted that, ''Deed, after all, Willem was a great man,' and Thomas Williams kept close beside him, as if desirous to share in his employer's glory.