Telford was not the first who had proposed to bridge the Menai. Forty-two years before he had prepared his plans a Mr. Golborne sketched a design, and Rennie had at a later period proposed a cast-iron bridge to span the water in one arch. Even Telford’s first proposals differed wholly from the design he eventually adopted; and he, like Rennie, favoured more than any other type of bridge the single cast-iron arch. Difficulties in the way of construction, in some degree, but in greater measure the objections of the seafaring interest engaged in navigating the Straits, led to this type being abandoned and the suspension principle adopted. A legend, much in favour at Llangollen, tells how the engineer, at a loss for ideas, obtained the suggestion for his Menai Bridge from a small bridge on the suspension principle that then crossed the Dee at Berwyn. However that may be, suspension bridges of practical use, if of no very great size or scientific construction, were already known to the world. Telford produced his design in 1818, and it was submitted to the Commissioners and authorised by Parliament in the following year. The design, carried out exactly as proposed, was to provide a level roadway across the Straits at a height of 100 feet above high water, with a clear opening between the main suspension towers of 579 feet, thus providing an ample fairway for mariners, and silencing the objections of the shipping interest. The spot chosen was at a narrowing of the channel, where the rocky shores, rising on either side abruptly to a considerable height, afforded this clearance, and where an island called Ynys-y-Moch gave a ready site for one of the great towers. Between these main supports of the chains and the shores, a series of arches—four on the Anglesey side and three on the Carnarvonshire approach—were to support the rest of the roadway, to be 52 feet wide, divided into two carriage ways of 12 feet each, with a central footpath between of 4 feet width. The total height of the two great towers, above high water mark, was to be 153 feet, and the entire length of the bridge 1000 feet. The first stone of this great work was laid on the 10th of August, 1819, when the tower on Ynys-y-Moch, on the Anglesey side, was begun. In the course of four years the whole of the masonry work was completed, and the series of piers and arches, built of Anglesey limestone, ready to receive the iron chains, weighing close upon 2,200 tons. The first of these was hauled up to its place on the 26th of April, 1825, in the presence of thousands of spectators, come, many of them, in expectation of seeing a colossal failure. When the hauling was completed, and the first of the sixteen great chains that carry the central span safely bolted in position, the friends who rushed to congratulate the anxious engineer found him on his knees, in prayer.