as follows:--

"It is placed on a rock, with cliffs, either perpendicular and abrupt
towards the river, or with broken craggs, whose jutting prominences,
having a little soil, have been planted with orange and fig trees. A
fissure in this rock, of great depth, surrounds the city on three sides,
and at the bottom of the fissure the river rushes along with impetuous
rapidity. Two bridges are constructed over the fissure; the first is a
single arch, resting on the rocks on the two sides, the height of which
from the water is one hundred and twenty feet. The river descends from
this to the second bridge, whilst the rocks on each side as rapidly
increase in height; so that from this second bridge to the water, there is
the astonishing height of two hundred and eighty feet. The highest tower
in Spain, the Giralda, in Seville, or the Monument, near London Bridge, if
they were placed on the water, might stand under this stupendous arch,
without their tops reaching to it."

"The mode of constructing this bridge is no less surprising than the
situation in which it is placed, and its extraordinary elevation; it is a
single arch of one hundred and ten feet in diameter; it is supported by
solid pillars of masonry, built from the bottom of the river, about
fifteen feet in thickness, which are fixed into the solid rock on both
sides, and on which the ends of the arch rest; other pillars are built to
support these principal ones, which are connected with them by other small
arches. But as it is difficult to describe such an edifice, I must refer
to the sketch I have made of it." (_See the Cut_.)

"A bridge was built on this spot in 1735, but the key-stone not having
been properly secured, it fell down in 1741, by which fifty persons were
killed. The present bridge was finished in 1774, by Don Joseph Martin