It is on the Tower side that the line is least broken. London Bridge is scarcely left behind ere St. Katharine’s and London Docks come in sight; then follow the enormous acreage of the East and West India Docks, then come the docks at Millwall, and the Albert and Victoria Docks, stretching onward to North Woolwich—a vast contiguity of dock property, basin beyond basin occupied by some of the finest shipping that roams the seas.
Earlier in the century, when the screw-steamer was as yet undreamed of, and there had been no vision of the steam-tug which is so vast a convenience to-day, this portion of the river presented at certain seasons a much more stirring sight than now. Fleets of vessels, with their sails spread, came in at every tide; hundreds of ships lay crowding in the Thames at the mercy of the wind; it was a long panorama of seafaring life, with no bellying smoke to impede the view. All that has been changed by the wand of Science and the genius of Discovery. If a vessel lies in the stream instead of in the docks, it is for purposes peculiarly its own; and the dock gates, instead of opening to whole fleets driven up by a prosperous wind, swing open to solitary, but more gigantic, vessels propelled by steam.
Not that sailing-ships are no longer numerous in the Thames! The old East Indiaman has departed, the ships of John Company are broken to pieces; but the tall three-master is by no means an unfamiliar object, and on the Thames waters below London Bridge one may encounter schooners and brigs and brigantines galore. Nor has the number of lighters and wherries and dumb-barges diminished. On most shipping rivers these auxiliaries of trade have almost or wholly disappeared. The uncouth keelmen of the Tyne are a race with few survivors, and when the universally popular “Keel Row” is sung or played, it is almost invariably without reference to its former signification. On the Mersey no long line of coal-barges blocks the stream. The barge and the keel have, indeed, had their day, and are now little more than encumbrances; yet it is probable that they will be familiar objects for years to come on the Thames. When the docks were made, the watermen rose up in revolt against a threatened invasion of their privileges, and were fortunate enough to secure for themselves new rights which ensured their continuance and prosperity. So it happens that in addition to the sailing-ships and schooners which may be seen at anchor along either side of the Thames, there is a great number of smaller craft, inconvenient but full of interest, greatly in the way, but very delightful to the artist and the heedful possessor of a “quiet eye.”
No effective justice has ever yet been done to the lower portion of the Thames. You will find it stated in most books on the subject that the river ceases to be picturesque when it has passed St. Paul’s. A French poet calls it “an infected sea, rolling its black waters in sinuous detours”; and that is the despondent view that has been taken by the majority of English writers. Yet in the eyes of those who have roamed about this section of the river, and have loved it, only at London Bridge does the Thames become really interesting. In the higher reaches it is an idyllic river, swooning along through pleasant landscapes; after St. Paul’s it takes on a new and more sombre sort of glory, assumes a mightier interest, and is infinitely more majestic in the lifting of its waters. Above London Bridge, even when the wind is blowing, the waves are small and broken, like those of a mountain lake; in the Pool the water surges and heaves in broad masses, the light seems to deal with it more nobly, and the Thames assumes such majesty as becomes a stream which flows through the grandest city, and bears so great a portion of the commerce, of the world.
As for picturesqueness, one may behold a score of the finest possible pictures from London Bridge itself. The grey tower of St. Magnus’ Church, smitten by a passing ray of sunlight, stands out bright and shining behind the dark mass of buildings over Freshwater Wharf; beyond it, more dimly seen, the Monument lifts its flaming crown; the Pool is alive with hurrying steamers and clustering sails; Billingsgate is in the midst of its traffic; the white face of the Custom House looks down into the dun waters; and yonder rise the more sombre walls of our most ancient fortress, the venerable quadragon of the White Tower, with its four dark cupolas, dominating them all.
Round the spot on which Freshwater Wharf now stands clustered Roman London. There are still some half-hidden relics of it under the recent and handsome Coal Exchange in Thames Street. There, descending to the foundations, one may find a hypocaust full of fair spring water, a pavement floor, an ancient and austere seat built of Roman tiles, and some pieces of ruined wall. It is the lower portion of a Roman house, the most interesting and complete bit of evidence still remaining in London of the Roman occupation of Britain.
LONDON BRIDGE TO WOOLWICH.
The front of Billingsgate has altered its aspect of late. A wharf has arisen where, heretofore, a couple of narrow gangways descended sheer to the foreshore of the Thames, when it was exposed, and to the water, when the tide was in. Many a Billingsgate porter has lost his life hurrying up those gangways, yet, so conservative is the City of London in its habits, that it is only a few years since the conclusion was reached that the market would be no worse, and human life would be all the safer, for a pier. With that very modern improvement one of our London “sights” has changed its aspect. No longer may we behold the four lines of white-jacketed figures, two bustling up from and two hurrying down to the boats. Yet the white-jacketed figures are there, and they bustle about as of old, though the work has become indescribably easier, and is carried on by men in less constant peril of their lives.