[Illustration: NEW BRIDGE AND BROOMIELAW GLASGOW.]
The river Clyde, in a commercial point of view, is of the greatest importance, not only to the city of Glasgow, but to the whole western district of Scotland. Till the beginning of the sixteenth century, however, the channel of this noble river was so incommoded by fords and shoals, as to be hardly navigable even for the small craft of that day. Sensible of this great evil, and aware that it admitted of a remedy, the inhabitants of Glasgow, Renfrew, and Dumbarton entered into an agreement to excavate the channel of the river, and, by working six weeks alternately, succeeded in their enterprise. The principal ford and several others of less importance were removed, so that by the middle of the sixteenth century, flat-bottomed lighters could be floated with ease and safety to the landing-shore at the Broomielaw, which, in the process of time and events, has become the great commercial port of Glasgow.
A few years ago, the harbour of Broomielaw was only seven hundred and thirty feet long on one side; it is now 3340 feet long on the north side of the river, and 1260 on the south. Till of late years there were only a few _punts_ and ploughs for dredging the river; there are now four dredging-machines, with powerful steam-apparatus and two diving-bells. The shed accommodation on both sides of the river is most ample; and one of the cranes made by Messrs. Claud, Girdwood, and Co., for shipping steam-boat boilers, is capable of sustaining a weight of _thirty tons_, and may, for the union of power with elegance of construction, challenge all the ports in the kingdom. For the space of seven miles below the city the river is confined within narrow bounds, and the sloping banks, formed of whinstone, in imitation of ashlar, are unequalled as a work of beauty and utility.
From the Broomielaw, till it begins to expand into an estuary, the Clyde is everywhere overlooked, at short intervals, by the rising hulls and finished decks of steam-boats and other craft preparing for the launch. Compared with the bulk of its waters, and the breadth of its stream, this river is unequalled for the amount and stir of its navigation. Here it is seen bearing along ships of heavy burden and deep draught of water; there plentifully dotted with yawls and wherries, and kept in a constant state of foaming agitation by large steam-ships, freighted with heavy cargoes from the shores of England and Ireland--by numerous coasting steam-vessels, careering over its surface with thousands of human beings, and by steam tug-boats, dragging behind them trains of sailing craft, too unwieldy to pilot their own way within its narrow channel. First in the practical working of steam-ship architecture, the Clyde may be safely said to maintain its pre-eminence over every other river in the world.