Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 4).djvu/34

26 for the western was furnished by William Weston, esq. of Gainsborough in England, a celebrated hydraulick engineer. Eight hundred thousand feet of timber, board measure, were employed in and about it. Mr. Samuel Robinson of Philadelphia, executed the work of the piers under the directions of a president and five directors, who also superintended the mason work done by Mr. Thomas Vickers, on an uncommon plan, which has answered the intention perfectly well. The walls of the abutments and wings are perpendicular without buttresses, and supported by interior offsets. The eastern abutment is founded on a rock, the western on piles. There are near eight thousand tons of masonry in the western pier, many of the stones in it, as well as in the eastern, weighing from three to twelve tons. Several massive chains are worked in with the masonry, stretched across the piers in various positions; and the exterior is clamped and finished in the most substantial manner.

The frame of the superstructure was designed and erected by Mr. Timothy Palmer of Newburyport in Massachusetts, combining in its principles, that of ring posts and braces with a stone arch. The platform for travelling rises only eight feet from a horizontal line. The foot ways are five feet in width, elevated above the carriage ways, and neatly protected by posts and chains.

The whole of the bridge is covered by a roof, and the sides closed in, to preserve the timber from the decay occasioned by exposure to the weather. The side covering is done in imitation of masonry by sprinkling it with stone dust, while the painting was fresh: this is a novel mode of ornamenting and protecting the surfaces of wooden work exposed to weather, which from its goodness and cheapness will probably be brought into general use. The work of the [11] roof and covering was done by Mr. Owen Biddle, house carpenter in Philadelphia.