Truly tremendous was the roar of the descending waters, and the bellow of the tremendous gulfs, which swallowed them for a time, and then cast them forth, foaming and frothing from their horrid wombs.

Slowly advancing along the bridge, I came to the highest point, and there I stood still, close beside one of the stone bowers, in which, beside a fruit-stall, sat an old woman, with a pan of charcoal at her feet, and a book in her hand, in which she appeared to be reading intently.

There I stood, just above the principal arch, looking through the balustrade at the scene that presented itself--and such a scene! Towards the left bank of the river, a forest of masts, thick and close, as far as the eye could reach; spacious wharfs, surmounted with gigantic edifices; and, far away, Caesar's Castle, with its White Tower.

To the right, another forest of masts, and a maze of buildings, from which, here and there, shot up to the sky chimneys taller than Cleopatra's Needle, vomiting forth huge wreaths of that black smoke which forms the canopy--occasionally a gorgeous one--of the more than Babel city.

Stretching before me, the troubled breast of the mighty river, and, immediately below, the main whirlpool of the Thames--the Maelstrom of the bulwarks of the middle arch--a grisly pool, which, with its superabundance of horror, fascinated me.