NEW IRON BRIDGE, BATH.

The present age is distinguished for improvements in all the useful as well as ornamental arts; and iron, from its abundance and comparative cheapness, has been employed for various purposes: hence cylinders, beams, and pumps for steam-engines, boats and barges for canals and navigable rivers, and, lastly, bridges have been constructed of this material.

Iron bridges possess the advantages of lightness, strength, and durability, combined with a superior elegance of form; and as the termination of a great public road, as it enters the precincts of a first-rate city, this erection, in every respect of a superior description, is peculiarly appropriate.

This new road is considerably shorter than the old one through Walcot; it enters the suburb of Bathwick nearly opposite to Sydney Gardens, and the City near its centre, by a second passage over the Avon at Pulteney Bridge.

QUEEN SQUARE, BATH.

This elegant Square is on the north-west, on high ground, airy, pleasant, and healthy; forming a conspicuous and highly ornamental object from almost every part of the City. It is in length from north to south, between the buildings, three hundred and sixteen feet; and from east to west, the breadth is three hundred and six feet. In the centre there is an enclosure, according to the original design, measuring equally on each side two hundred and six feet: there was originally a reservoir, supplied with clear water from a natural spring; and an obelisk rose from the centre of the reservoir to the height of seventy feet from the foundation; but as, from some cause or other, the spring that supplied the water has been destroyed, or carried off in some other direction, the place has been filled up, and earth raised against the base of the obelisk, by which it has lost ten feet of its altitude, and rises, apparently, baseless, from the ground.

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This column was built in 1738, by order of Mr. Nash, in honour of the Prince and Princess of Wales, who had visited Bath about that time. It bears on its southern side the following inscription :

In Memory of Honours conferred,

and in Gratitude for Benefits bestowed,
in this City,

By His Royal Highness, FREDERICK, Prince of Wales,

and his

ROYAL CONSORT,

in the year 1738,

This Obelisk is erected
By RICHARD NASH, Esq.

Of the numerous splendid buildings by the celebrated Mr. Wood, the ARCHITECT OF BATH, this of Queen's Square is not the least excellent, and remains a durable monument of his taste and genius. The statement given by the Architect, of the design and execution of the obelisk, is curious, and accounts for the peculiarity of its terminating in a point. He observes, that the size of this obelisk is the same as that described by Pliny, which was erected by Ramisses, king of Egypt, about the time of the Trojan war. "I should not have deviated," he observes, " from the common form of an obelisk, if there had been any other authority for such form than modern examples. The Egyptian name for this kind of pillar, as Pliny attests, implies a ray of the sun; and, consequently, the pillar that represented such ray, must have terminated, like it, in a point. It was usual, as Scaliger observes, for the Grecians to make statues of their gods in the form of pyramidal columns, or obelisks, terminating in a point; many of which, the learned Mr. Greaves tells us, he found standing in the East; and from hence I took my authority; in which I shall think myself right, till I am induced to think otherwise, from further information."

The north wing of the Square is composed of stately buildings, so contrived as to give the appearance of a palace, when viewed from a central station. The body is of the Corinthian order, on a rustic basement, decorated with all the ornaments of that order ; and, as the aspect of this pile of building is directly south, it enjoys all the advantages of light and shade from the sun, to give a picturesque appearance, which its situation, raised above the other buildings of the City, insures to it.

The east and west sides are composed of buildings too extensive to bear the character of wings; either of them might, with propriety, form the front for a country villa of the first-rate description. The houses of the south side form a distinct building; they are of the Ionic order, and nine in number. The houses facing this Square are all fronted with white freestone, and before each there is an enclosed area, to separate it from the street; the whole may be considered correct as to design, durable as to materials, and beautiful

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