The spans are supported on masonry piers, each 18 feet wide by 8 feet thick. Mr. Lawley found the river-bed to be composed of rock and gravel, which gave a first-class foundation, and favoured the expeditious erection of the piers. Consequently he concluded, if the piers were pushed forward at low water, that it would be possible to set the steel-work directly the river once more gained flood-level, and arrangements to this end were carried out. Timber coffer-dams were built around the sites for the piers, and by the aid of pumps the interior was kept clear of water to permit the workmen to achieve their stone-setting task within under the most favourable conditions. While the piers were progressing other gangs of natives were hard at work in the improvised shipyard riveting the steel-work together. Each span measured 100 feet long, 14 feet in width, 20 feet in height, and weighed 56 tons. The pontoon itself measured 95 feet long by 45 feet wide. Work continued so favourably that by the time the masonry work on the piers was completed the spans had been assembled, and all was ready for transhipping them from the yard to their respective positions on the piers. Novel means for transporting the weighty and bulky masses of steel were adopted. The pontoon was brought endwise against the river bank and made fast. A length of railway track was laid from end to end along the deck of the pontoon, and was brought against the ends of another short track running down the river bank, thereby making a continuous length of railway line. As the completed spans were ranged side by side in the yard at right angles to the river, they had to be hauled sideways for some distance. Rails were laid under each end of the spans at right angles to the railway and were well greased so as to become a kind of “ways” such as are used to launch a vessel. Gangs of natives tugged at the span to haul it broadside until it rested on the railway line, which also was lubricated. Then two locomotives were brought up to the rear end of the span, and by sheer steam force pushed it down the bank railway on to the pontoon, where it rested fairly and squarely, and overhanging equally each end of the pontoon, which was five feet shorter than the span.