There are forty warehouses for the storage of merchandise of every description, convenient in arrangement, and magnificent in design and execution. The cubical capacity of the warehouses is two hundred and forty-nine thousand four hundred and thirty tons; two hundred and thirty-one thousand one hundred and forty-seven for dry goods, and eighteen thousand two hundred and eighty-three for wet goods. The tobacco house in these docks sends its very strong odor all over the Thames, and it is as good as the flavor of a Havana cigar almost to smell this huge warehouse as you pass by on the river in a steamboat. This warehouse is the largest of its kind in the world, covering five acres of ground, and is rented by the government at fourteen thousand pounds a year of the company, for all the London Docks are owned by stock companies, and this perhaps explains the economy displayed in their construction, and their useful adaptability to the commerce of London. [Illustration: ENTRANCE TO DOCKS.] The tobacco warehouse will contain twenty-four thousand hogsheads of tobacco, each hogshead holding one thousand two hundred pounds, the total capacity being equal to thirty thousand tons of general merchandise. [Sidenote: THE WINE VAULTS, AND "TASTING PERMITS."] Under the London Docks are the finest vaults in the world, vast catacombs of the precious vintages garnered from every famous vineyard in the globe. The vaults in the London docks cover an area of eighteen acres, and afford accommodation for eighty thousand pipes of wine. One of the vaults alone is seven acres in extent, and the tea warehouses will hold one hundred and twenty thousand chests of that fragrant herb. To go into these vast wine vaults is indeed a treat. It is like entering a City of the dead, only that instead of the skeletons of human beings piled on top of each other, you find an Aceldama of casks, pipes, barrels, hogsheads, and butts, bonded and stored tier upon tier, until the eye becomes wearied, and a man wonders how all those costly vintages can ever be consumed. There is no difference between night and day in these dim deep recesses under the London streets. The vaults are only separated from the bed of the Thames by a thick wall, and at noonday, gas has to be turned on to light the way to the enormous storehouses of wine and brandy. Passes are granted by the companies and the owners of liquors on bond, called "tasting permits," which gives the privilege to the visitor to ask an attendant for a sample of any wine, or wines and liquors that he may choose to taste. Armed with one of these permits I visited the London docks one day with a friend, and we penetrated the gloomy cavern's entrance, and finally found our way to a part of the vaults where were stored thousands of pipes of the delicious golden brown vintage of Xeres de la Frontera.