a new stone bridge has been erected by contract for ten thousand one
hundred and sixty-five pounds, by Mr. Edwards, son to the Edwards, who
built the famous Pont-y-pridd. It consists of five arches.
The commerce and population of this town are greatly increased of late
years. As a sea-port it is safe; its chief trade is in iron and coal.
The Monmouthshire Canal communicates here by a basin with the Usk river,
and by that means with the Bristol Channel; and as the Monmouthshire
Canal again communicates with the Brecon Canal and the Avon, Ebwy and
other rail roads, Newport becomes the grand depôt for the heavier
articles of trade of that part of the interior of South Wales. The
Crumlin bridge branch is eleven miles five furlongs, its falls, three
hundred and sixty-five feet. Pontypool, eleven miles, falls four hundred
and forty-seven feet. Brecknock, thirty-seven miles seven furlongs.
A circuitous, but more romantic route from Chepstow to Newport, is
recrossing the Wye, passing over the forest of Deane, through Saint
Briaval’s to Monmouth. The road is not bad, but narrow; if travelling
with a carriage, it will be necessary to be provided with a horn, which,
upon your sounding, if you find answered, you must wait till the party so
answering comes past.
The views to the right over the Severn and Glocestershire are most rich
and extensive, and those from the summits of the overhanging rocks of the
Wye, awful and terrific: before you reach Monmouth the country becomes
thickly inhabited, which the beautiful situations it affords readily
accounts for; and from Monmouth to Ragland and Usk, the same continues to
be the case.