It is a curious circumstance that the next projector of an iron bridge--and that of a very bold design--was the celebrated, or rather the notorious, Tom Paine, whose political writings Telford had so much admired. The son of a decent Quaker of Thetford, who trained him to his own trade of a staymaker, Paine seems early to have contracted a dislike for the sect to which his father belonged. Arrived at manhood, he gave up staymaking to embrace the wild life of a privateersman, and served in two successive adventures. Leaving the sea, he became an exciseman, but retained his commission for only a year. Then he became an usher in a school, during which he studied mechanics and mathematics. Again appointed an exciseman, he was stationed at Lewes in Sussex, where he wrote poetry and acquired some local celebrity as a writer. He was accordingly selected by his brother excisemen to prepare their petition to Government for an increase of pay, *[2] -- the document which he drew up procuring him introductions to Goldsmith and Franklin, and dismissal from his post. Franklin persuaded him to go to America; and there the quondam staymaker, privateersman, usher, poet, an a exciseman, took an active part in the revolutionary discussions of the time, besides holding the important office of Secretary to the Committee for Foreign Affairs. Paine afterwards settled for a time at Philadelphia, where he occupied himself with the study of mechanical philosophy, electricity, mineralogy, and the use of iron in bridge-building. In 1787, when a bridge over the Schnylkill was proposed, without any river piers, as the stream was apt to be choked with ice in the spring freshets, Paine boldly offered to build an iron bridge with a single arch of 400 feet span. In the course of the same year, he submitted his design of the proposed bridge to the Academy of Sciences at Paris; he also sent a copy of his plan to Sir Joseph Banks for submission to the Royal Society; and, encouraged by the favourable opinions of scientific men, he proceeded to Rotherham, in Yorkshire, to have his bridge cast.*[3] An American gentleman, named Whiteside, having advanced money to Paine on security of his property in the States, to enable the bridge to be completed, the castings were duly made, and shipped off to London, where they were put together and exhibited to the public on a bowling-green at Paddington. The bridge was there visited by a large number of persons, and was considered to be a highly creditable work. Suddenly Paine's attention was withdrawn from its further prosecution by the publication of Mr. Burke's celebrated 'Thoughts on the French Revolution,' which he undertook to answer. Whiteside having in the meantime become bankrupt, Paine was arrested by his assignees, but was liberated by the assistance of two other Americans, who became bound for him. Paine, however, was by this time carried away by the fervour of the French Revolution, having become a member of the National