glimpses of blue
sky. Towards sunset, the evening mists drape the darkening banks and
crowded shipping in a soft robe of gray, which, together with the
glowing sky behind, produces most wonderful Turneresque effects; and the
fall of night on the river only changes the aspect without diminishing
the interest of the scene. The blaze from a myriad workshops and forges
glows against the darkness, the lamps twinkle overhead on the steep
banks, and the lights from wharf and steamer are reflected in a thousand
shimmering lines on the dark water, which flows on soundlessly, like the
river of a dream.

On a day of wind and sun all these beauties are intensified a
thousandfold; the smoke is blown hither and thither in flying clouds,
the current seems to rush more swiftly, and a sense of vigorous life
permeates the whole scene, giving to the beholder a feeling of keen
exhilaration, as of new life rushing through his veins. Especially is
this the case on reaching the mouth of the river and meeting the dancing
waters of the open harbour, where the twin piers of South Shields and
Tynemouth reach out sheltering arms. Within the wide bay they enclose,
the storm-driven vessel may always find comparatively smooth water, how
wildly soever the waves may rage and roar outside.

It is difficult to believe that so lately as the years 1858-60, the
"bar" at the mouth of the Tyne was an insuperable obstacle to all but
vessels of very moderate draught; and that ships might lie for days, and
sometimes weeks, after being loaded, before there came a tide high
enough to carry them out to sea. The river was full of sand-banks, and
little islands stood here and there--one in mid-stream, where the
ironclads are now launched at Elswick. Three or four vessels might be
seen at once bumping and grounding on the "bar" unable to make their way
over. Well might the old song say--

"The ships are all at the bar,
They canna get up to Newcastle!"

An old map of the Tyne shows a number of sand-banks down the lower
reaches of the river, with ships aground on each, of them.

But the River Tyne Commissioners have changed all that, and their
implement of warfare has been the hideous but necessary dredger. No
longer need vessels of heavy tonnage desert the Tyne for the Wear, as
they were perforce driven to do during the first half of the nineteenth
century, for the Wearsiders had set about deepening and widening their
river long before the Tynesiders did the