dent check and counter-check. And finally, he organised and
directed, through his assistants, the vast band of skilled workmen and
labourers who were for so many years occupied in carrying his magnificent
original conception to a successful practical issue. As he himself said
of the work,--"The true and accurate calculation of all the conditions
and elements essential to the safety of the bridge had been a source not
only of mental but of bodily toil; including, as it did, a combination of
abstract thought and well-considered experiment adequate to the magnitude
of the project."

The Britannia Bridge was the result of a vast combination of skill and
industry. But for the perfection of our tools and the ability of our
mechanics to use them to the greatest advantage; but for the matured
powers of the steam-engine; but for the improvements in the iron
manufacture, which enabled blooms to be puddled of sizes before deemed
impracticable, and plates and bars of immense size to be rolled and
forged; but for these, the Britannia Bridge would have been designed in
vain. Thus, it was not the product of the genius of the railway engineer
alone, but of the collective mechanical genius of the English nation.

[Picture: Conway Bridge.--Floating the First Tube]

[Picture: View in Tapton Gardens]

CHAPTER XVIII.
GEORGE STEPHENSON'S CLOSING YEARS--ILLNESS AND DEATH.

In describing the completion of the series of great works detailed in the
preceding chapter, we have somewhat anticipated the closing years of
George Stephenson's life. He could not fail to take an anxious interest
in the success of his son's designs, and he accordingly paid many visits
to Conway and to Menai, during the progress of the works. He was present
on the occasion of the floating and raising of the first Conway tube, and
there witnessed a clear proof of the soundness of Robert's judgment as to
the efficiency and strength of the tubular bridge, of which he had at
first expressed some doubts; but before the like test could be applied at
the Britannia Bridge, George Stephenson's mortal anxieties were at an
end, for he had then ceased from all his labours.

Towards the close of his life, George Stephenson almost entirely withdrew
from the active pursuit of his profession; he devoted himself chiefly to
his extensive collieries and lime-works, taking a local interest only in
such projected railways as were calculated to