Engineering Wonders of the World
Volume I

192 ENGINEERING WONDERS OF THE WORLD. Sixteen more months passed, and then the shield came into contact with the brickwork of the caisson. The Tunnel opened. This completed the work, ex- cept for joining tunnel to shaft —a somewhat difficult matter on account of the silt which forced its way into every crevice, and hindered the bricklayers greatly. In the very moment of his triumph Brunel was stricken with paralysis, which did not, how- ever, prevent him from taking part, on March 25, 1843, in the ceremony of opening the tunnel. Public Interest in the Work. The enthusiasm which marked this event contrasts strangely with the matter-of-fact way in which. Londoners learned, sixty-five years later, of the opening of the Rotlierhithe Tunnel. In twenty-seven hours fifty thou- sand persons made the sub- river journey—a striking proof of the general confidence in Brunel’s struc- ture ; and in the course of the * next four months the number of visitors rose to over one million. Note— The illustrations to this article {the first two excepted') are reproduced from an interesting booklet published by the Thames Tunnel Company in 1837. THE INTERIOR OF THE TUNNEL.