RIVER AND BRIDGE.

13

CHAPTER II.

THE KIYER AND TnE BRIDGE.

HE Ashtabula river is a shallow streamwhich runs through the county and the

town. As it approaches the lake it widens and

deepens into what constitutes the harbor.

The banks lining the valley of it are high androckv precipices. They form in the rear or tothe southward of the town a gorge which iscalled, by the inhabitants, by the significant name“ the gulf.” Near the depot this gorge widens,andits banks become less precipitous; but, even atthis point, the river flows at least seventy-sixfeet below the level of the road, and is four feetdeep. Here the fatal, but far-famed, bridge wasbuilt. A grade on an arched viaduct conveyedthe track to the abutments, but these stood bythemselves, straight from the bottom of thegorge, two lofty pillars of stone seventy-six feet