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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 February 2009
It will be seen by the above title that my present purpose is not to attempt a history of Bridges. That indeed would be an herculean task: for the materials lie scattered through the histories of nations, and no serious attempt has been made to bring them into a manageable compass. Still I assume it will be expected that I shall present such an historical review as may serve to make the subject intelligible to those who have not heretofore turned their attention to it.
page 364 note 1 Perhaps I ought here to except from this remark a pamphlet published in 1751 bearing the title of Gephyralogia: an Historical Account of Bridges, upon which, in the main, the article ‘Bridges’ in Rees's Cyclopedia is based; but, to say the most, it presents a very crude outline.
page 365 note 1 It has been pointed out, indeed, that the Nile, their principal river, was alike too wide and usually too rapid to admit of the building of a bridge with their then appliances; while the instability of foundations laid in the deep alluvial soil of which Egypt is mainly composed in her river valleys constituted another, and perhaps the greater, difficulty.
page 366 note 1 It is recorded that the Jesuit Raynoldus wrote a treatise expressly on St. John the bridge-builder. I have not met with it.
page 366 note 2 Monk's Ferry, Birkenhead, still marks the spot, and so verifies the traditions associated with the ferry and its right of toll, &c.
page 366 note 3 Vide, Monumentum Danicorum, by Wormius, Olaus, 1643Google Scholar.
page 369 note 1 Gephyralogia, pp. 7–8.
page 372 note 1 Vide Smith's, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, ii. 657Google Scholar.
page 375 note 1 It will probably appear in the ‘Antiquary's Library’ (Stock) in due course.