CHAPTER VI.

LIGHTHOUSES ON THE ENGLISH COAST.

We propose, in the present chapter, to glance at a few of the best known pharoses which illuminate our home-waters, but without observing any particular order. Our description of each will be brief, for it is needless to say that, as a rule, lighthouses closely resemble one another in their principles of construction as in their general arrangements, and that the differences between them are simply matters of detail.

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Upon _Needles Point_, the westernmost extremity of the Isle of Wight, at an elevation of 474 feet, a lighthouse was erected early in the last century. Notwithstanding its great height, it is recorded that its windows were sometimes shattered by stones flung up by the mounting and raging billows.[46] It had ten Argand lamps, and the same number of plated reflectors; and its light, on clear and cloudless nights, was visible at a distance of eleven leagues. Seven hundred gallons of oil, we are told, were consumed annually; and in stormy nights the blaze attracted hundreds of small birds, which dashed themselves against the glass reflectors, and were killed.

[46] We think, however, that this statement is in great need of verification.

Owing to its great elevation, however, this lighthouse was of little service in hazy and foggy weather. The Trinity House, therefore, in 1859, caused a new one to be constructed on the outer part of the farthest of the celebrated chalk rocks, called the Needles, which was previously cut down and levelled almost to the water’s edge. This lighthouse is about 109 feet in height from the base to the top of the ball, and possesses only one light, with three concentrated wicks, whose brilliancy, however, is so great that it can be seen fourteen miles at sea. The shades are alternately white and red. A fog bell is rung by mechanical agency during stormy weather; its sounds may be heard at a distance of five miles. The base of the building is 38 feet in diameter.

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Near the south shore of the Isle of Wight rises the remarkable and picturesque eminence of _St. Catherine’s Hill_, 769 feet above the level of the sea. It looks down upon the rock-bound sweep of Chale Bay, which has been the scene of many deplorable catastrophes. From its summit the traveller commands a prospect of singular beauty, as remarkable for its extent as for its variety; since it not only includes by far the larger part of the “garden-isle,” but the green masses of the New Forest, the blue line of the misty Hampshire hills, and the undulating range of the coast of Sussex as far as the bold bluff promontory of Beachy Head. It is said that, in an opposite direction, the high lands about Cherbourg have occasionally been seen. On a calm, clear day the island lies at your feet like an open map, and you can trace each bare bold hill; each valley, dusky with its wealth of foliage; each village church and manor-house, girt with venerable trees; each distant town, with its floating canopy of smoke; each stream that trails like a silver snake through the emerald pastures; and all around and about, the mighty ocean, heaving with a flood of glorious light.

On the lofty summit of this hill, one Walter de Godyton, in 1323, erected a chantry, and dedicated it to St. Catherine, who, in the Roman Hagiology, is the invariable patroness of hills and mountains. He also provided an endowment for a priest, who should chant masses, and keep up a burning light through the hours of darkness, for the safety of mariners approaching this dangerous coast. This duty was regularly performed until the suppression of the minor religious houses, when the priest and his endowment disappeared; though the chantry, built of solid masonry, remained, and is still to be inspected by the curious. Many years ago it was carefully repaired, in consideration of its value as a landmark. The foundation of the whole chapel was then cleared and levelled, a process revealing not only its ground-plan, but also the floor and stone hearth of the priest’s little cell at the south-west corner. Its height is 35 feet 6 inches; its form, octagonal.

Almost adjoining stands the shell of a lighthouse erected in 1785 by the Trinity Board; but discontinued when it was discovered, as might at the outset have been surmised, that the mists so often gathering about the crown of the hill would render it of little service.

The dangerous character of the coast, however, was so widely known, that the Trinity Board felt it necessary to provide for its better protection, and in 1838 a lighthouse was commenced on _St. Catherine’s Point_, at the base of the hill, which was completed in 1840, and lighted for the first time on the 25th of March. Its dimensions are:—From the water-mark to the level of terrace, 81 feet. From the terrace to the top of the stone-work, 100 feet. Height of lantern and pedestal, 1 foot 6 inches. Extension of glass frame, 10 feet. Roof, ball, vane, and lightning conductor, 11½ feet. Height of tower, 122 feet. The diameter of the interior is 14 feet; and the staircase to the lantern-room numbers one hundred and fifty-two steps. The illuminating apparatus consists of one lamp, 3½ inches diameter, with four concentrated wicks, reflected through a lens surmounted by two hundred and fifty mirrors.

St. Catherine’s lighthouse is a graceful structure, and the visitor, comparing it with the rude chantry on the brow of the hill, where the solitary priest muttered his orisons and fed his flickering fire, will obtain a vivid conception of the vast strides made by practical science in five centuries.

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A graphic writer[47] describes the extreme south-western point of England, the Land’s End, in the following language:—

“Those,” he says, “who expect to see a towering or far-stretching promontory will be disappointed. We form our ideas from ordinary maps, and imagine England’s utmost cape to be a narrow tongue thrust out from the firm shore, along which we may walk to meet the advancing waves. But we find the reality to be merely a protruding shoulder or buttress of the vast irregular bluff that terminates the county. Cape Cornwall, which looks so grand about two miles distant, appears to extend further to the west than the Land’s End.

“Sit still and gaze: the scene grows upon you. Here the two channels commingle with the ocean; and far out as eye can reach, and round on either hand till it meets the remotest point of the rugged shore, stretches the watery expanse. The billows come tumbling in, and break in thunder at the base of the cliffs, dashing the impatient spray well-nigh to their summit. You may descend by steep paths to a lower level, and see the cavernous opening which their plunging assaults have worn through from one side of the buttress to the other. With what fury they rush into the recess, and make horrid whirlpools behind the mass which some day will be an isolated member of the rocky group scattered along the shore! There, on the largest of the cluster, nearly two miles from shore, stands the _Longships Lighthouse_, and all between is foam and swirl; waves running together, and leaping high with the shock: a dangerous channel known as the Kettle’s Bottom. See how the water chafes around the Armed Knight there on the left, and the Irish Lady on the right, and all the nameless lumps! Yonder, under the cape, at the extremity of Whitesand Bay, are the Brisons, invested by shipwreck with a fearful interest.”

[47] Walter White, “A Londoner’s Walk to the Land’s End,” pp. 192, 193.

The _Longships Lighthouse_, mentioned in the foregoing extract, was erected in 1795 by a Mr. Smith, who received as his reward the right to level a toll upon shipping for a limited number of years. It was afterwards purchased of his representatives by the Trinity House. The tower is built of granite, and the stones are trenailed upon Smeaton’s plan, as introduced in his great monument of the Eddystone. The circumference at the base is 62 feet, the height from the base to the vane of the lantern, and from the sea to the foot of the building, 51 feet. The total height, therefore, exceeds 100 feet. Yet the lantern-panes, it is said, have been frequently shattered by the waves.

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About eight miles from this part of the Cornish coast lies a dangerous rock of greenstone, called the _Wolf’s Crag_, in the midst of a turbulent swirl and eddy of waters. An attempt was once made to plant on its summit the figure of an enormous wolf, constructed of copper, and hollow within, and so constructed that the mouth receiving the blasts of the gale should emit a loud hoarse sound to warn the seaman of his peril. The project, however, was rendered abortive by the violence of the elements.

In 1870 a lighthouse was successfully erected on the Wolf’s Crag;—a circular tower, 100 feet high.

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The uninhabited island of Annette, one of the Scilly group, is literally surrounded with reefs and rocks, each of which is associated with some melancholy tale of suffering and death. It has been well said that they are the “dogs” of Scilly, and fierce as those which, according to the old fable, howled round the monster of the Italian seas:—

“But Scylla crouches in the gloom, Deep in a cavern’s monstrous womb; Thence darts her ravening mouth, and drags The helpless vessel on the crags.“[48]

[48] Virgil, “Æneid,” transl. by Conington, bk. iii. 420.

On the Gilstone Sir Cloudesley Shovel, the gallant old sea-captain of Queen Anne’s reign, was wrecked in 1707; on the Crebawethan perished the “Douro,” and all hands, in 1843; and on Jacky’s Rock, in 1841, the “Thames” steamer went to pieces, and out of sixty-five on board only three were saved. The westernmost of those terrible rocks is the _Bishop Rock_, and here a lighthouse was erected in 1858, from the design of Mr. James Walker. It is built of granite, and the vane is 147 feet above high water mark. The first stone, one of the fifth course, was laid on the 16th of July 1852; and on the 30th of the same month was laid the lowest stone, one foot below the level of low water spring-tides, in the chasm of the rock. The stone-work of the tower was finished on the 28th of August 1857; and the light, a fixed bright dioptric light of the first order, illuminating the entire circle, and visible, in clear weather, at a distance of fourteen miles, was exhibited on the 1st of September 1858.

It is satisfactory to add, that this difficult enterprise was carried to a successful termination without loss of life or serious accident to any person employed.

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One of our most famous English headlands is _Lizard Point_, the _Ocrinum_ of Ptolemy, the ancient geographer, and the most southerly promontory of England. Here are two large and massive lighthouses, whose bases are 168 feet above the sea, and 212 feet apart. Each tower is 61 feet high, and each lantern contains nineteen reflectors, which can be seen at a distance of twenty-one miles. Between the two, which were erected by Mr. Fonnereau, in 1751, and worked with coal-fires up to the year 1813, are built the residence and offices; so contrived that a long passage leads from one to the other, whereby the keepers communicate without going out of doors. “These beacons,” says a recent writer, “display two lights, to distinguish the Lizard from Scilly, known to mariners by one, and from Guernsey, which exhibits three. Notwithstanding, however, the brilliant illumination which is hence thrown for miles over the sea, ships, embayed in thick weather between the Lizard and Tol Pedn Penwith, are frequently lost in the vicinity of this headland, and the cliffs are of such a character that it is almost impossible to render from them the slightest assistance.”

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The _Plymouth Breakwater_, which protects the great Devonshire harbour from the furious gales of the Channel, carries on its western arm an important lighthouse, erected in 1841 to 1844, from the designs of Messrs. Walker and Burges. It consists of a circular tower, 126 feet in height from the base of the breakwater, 71 feet above high-water mark, and 18 feet in diameter at its widest part. It is built of the finest Cornish granite, and divided into five stories; the highest of which, the lantern, has a floor of polished slate; the others, of stone. The light, a dioptric one, has a range of nine miles.

On the dark craggy headland of _Start Point_, about 112 feet above high-water mark, is situated a lighthouse exhibiting _two_ lights; a revolving light for the Channel, and a fixed light to guide ships inshore clear of the Skerries shoal. Mr. White thus describes the tower and its “belongings:“—

“A substantial house, connected with the tall circular tower, in a walled enclosure, all nicely whitened, is the residence of the light-keepers. The buildings stand within a few yards of the verge of the cliff, the wall serving as parapet, from which you look down on the craggy slope outside and the jutting rocks beyond—the outermost point. You may descend by the narrow path, protected also by a low white wall, and stride and scramble from rock to rock, with but little risk of slipping, so rough are the surfaces with minute shells.

“A rude steep stair, chopped in the rock, leads down still lower to a little cove and a narrow strip of beach at the foot of the cliffs. It is the landing-place for the lighthouse-keepers when they go fishing; but can only be used in calm weather.

“The assistant-keeper spoke of the arrival of a visitor as a pleasure in the monotonous life of the establishment. Winter, he said, was a dreary time, not so much on account of cold, as of storms, fogs, and wild weather generally. In easterly gales the fury of the wind would be often such that to walk across the yard was impossible; they had to crawl under shelter of the wall, and the spray flew from one side of the Point to the other. But indoors there was no lack of comfort, for the house was solidly built and conveniently fitted, and the Trinity Board kept a small collection of books circulating from lighthouse to lighthouse.”

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There are two lighthouses at _Portland Bill_; the lantern of one 136, and that of the other 210 feet above the sea. Between the chalk cliffs and a bank called the _Shambles_, foams the wild impetuous current of the Race of Portland.

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The celebrated chalky range of the South Downs terminates on the Sussex coast in _Beachy Head_, an abrupt precipitous promontory, 575 feet above the sea-level. On a point considerably lower than this lofty headland, and projecting much further into the sea, stands the celebrated Belle Tout Lighthouse, erected in 1831.

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The _North Foreland_, one of the great Kentish promontories, is also crowned by its lighthouse, which dates from 1790. The light is visible at the Nore, a distance of twenty miles.

At the _South Foreland_ lighthouse, a few miles from Dover, the electric light is used; the electric current being originated by a set of enormous horse-shoe magnets fixed in a stand, before which a wheel revolves, loaded with a number of solid iron cylinders. The whole apparatus is set in motion by a steam-engine.

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Both the east and west coasts of our “sea-girt island” are well provided with warning lights, but a mere enumeration of them would scarcely be satisfactory to the reader, and a description would prove as wearisome as a twice-told tale, for the reason stated at the beginning of this chapter. If we traced the coast-line of Scotland, we should find it equally well defended; or if we crossed to the Isle of Man, we should still meet with the monuments of man’s warfare against the ocean. Then, again, if we cross from Holyhead to Dublin, our vessel is guided by the stately light which glows upon the Stack Rock, and by the Bailey Lighthouse at the extremity of the Howth peninsula. The Bailey on the south, and the Kish Lightship on the north, mark the extreme points of the beautiful Bay of Dublin. Keeping southward, along the eastern coast, we descry the lighthouses on the rugged cliffs of Wicklow Head, and in Tuskar Rock; and, on the south coast, at Hook Tower, marking the eastern side of the entrance to the port of Waterford; at Ballinacourty, as a guide to ships entering Dungarvan Harbour; at Mine Head, and Ballycottin Point, and Roche Point, the north-eastern boundary of Cork Harbour; and at the Old Head of Kinsale, whose light is visible for twenty-one nautical miles, and proves immeasurably welcome to the Briton home-bound from the New World, because it is the first he sees after his departure from American waters.

A revolving light, which gradually increases and decreases every two minutes, is exhibited on the _Fastnet Rock_, a few miles off the southernmost point of Ireland.

Of iron lighthouses the British coast presents but few examples. The reader will, therefore, be not unwilling to gain some particulars of the tower on this well-known rock; a rock rising about 60 feet above high-water mark. Its iron structure consists, in the main, of the following parts:[49]—The shell, composed of cast-iron plates; the hollow cast-iron central column; five cast-iron floors, the uppermost of which is the platform at the top of the tower, supporting the lantern; a projecting cast-iron gallery, level with the platform, sustained by cast-iron brackets, and having a balustrade; an external iron stair, for access to the doors on the first floor; internal iron stairs to connect the several floors; a lining of masonry in the basement, and of brick in the upper stories; and a cut stone moulding round the base.

[49] Practical Mechanic’s Journal for 1842, p. 265.

The principal dimensions are as follows:—

Feet. In. Height of tower from the base to the gallery 63 9 Height of lamp above the gallery 11 0 Total height of the lantern 30 0 Outside diameter at base, over stone moulding 23 0 Outside diameter over cast-iron shell 19 0 Outside diameter just below the cornice 13 11¼ Outside diameter of tower casing at light-room floor 13 8¼ Outside diameter of gallery, to outer ends of brackets 19 10¼ Inside diameter of cellar, or basement story 9 0 Inside diameter of each of the other four stories 12 0 Clear height of cellar 9 0 Clear height of each of the other four stories 12 0 Total thickness of each floor 0 9

The plates composing the cast-iron shell are curved, oblong, rectangular, and 1⅜ inch thick at the base, diminishing gradually to ⅞ inch at the top of the tower.

This lighthouse was erected in 1848, from the design of Mr. Halpin, engineer to the Corporation of Dublin.

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Of lighthouses on piles we shall take as an example the _Maplin Sands Lighthouse_, designed by Mr. Walker, for the Trinity House Corporation, and erected in 1841.

It stands upon nine piles of wrought-iron, each 26 feet long and 5 inches in diameter: these are screwed 14 feet 6 inches deep into the sand, and secured by screw-blades of cast-iron, each 4 feet in diameter. One pile forms the centre of an octagon; the others are placed one at each of the eight angles. To the tops of the piles are firmly fitted hollow iron columns; the central one being perpendicular, the others bent, so that they incline inwards. They are braced together by radiating, diagonal, and horizontal rods. Each terminates at the top in a socket, into which is fitted a timber post of about one foot square. The posts, like the columns, are braced together, and form the foundation of the house, platform, and lantern.

The principal dimensions are as follows:—

Feet. In.

Depth of the screw-blades below the sand, about 14 6 Depth of the screw-blades below low-water mark spring-tides 21 0 Rise of spring-tides 15 0 Height from high-water mark spring-tides to floor of house 20 6 Height from high-water mark to floor of light-room 29 6 Height from high-water mark to lamp 38 6 Height from high-water mark to top of vane spindle 54 0 Diameter of floor of house 27 0 Diameter of platform 21 0 Diameter of light-room 12 0

A lighthouse of this kind is excellently adapted for any locality where the light does not require to be seen at a great distance. The piles offer no appreciable opposition to the waves, which pass through the open spaces without rising higher than out at sea.

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The _Gunfleet Lighthouse_ stands on seven screw piles, screwed 40 feet deep into the sand. The _Point of Ayre Lighthouse_, on nine, screwed 12 feet into the sand.

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Before we conclude these desultory notes, it seems desirable to refer to a lighthouse now in course of erection, which is not unworthy to rank with the finest of its predecessors.

About midway between the famous Skerryvore Lighthouse and that of the Rhins of Islay—or 20 miles from Islay, 18 miles from Colonsay, 15 miles from Iona, and 15 miles from Mull—in the centre of an archipelago which ancient legend, and ecclesiastical history, and modern romance have done their best to render celebrated—lies the _Dubhe Artach_ (or _St. John’s_) _Rock_. It forms an isolated mass of augite about 240 feet in length by 43 feet in breadth, whose rounded summit rises 47 feet above high-water mark. In stormy weather the sea sweeps over it with terrific violence, and for miles around it boils and seethes with counter-currents and opposing waves. During the severe gales of the winter of 1865-66 many ships were lost in this dangerous neighbourhood, and it was therefore determined by the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses, with the sanction of the Trinity House and Board of Trade, to erect a lighthouse on the Dubhe Artach.

The material of the rock is so excessively hard that the works, at first, could not be carried forward with much rapidity. Neither in the building of the Eddystone nor of the Skerryvore could the engineers have had greater difficulties to contend with. A foundation has, however, been at last obtained, and several courses of the masonry securely laid, so that the elegant structure, designed by Messrs. D. and T. Stevenson of Edinburgh, will, in another twelvemonth, be completed. Its estimated cost is £56,900. It consists of a parabolic frustrum, whose topmost course is 109 feet above its base. The diameter at the bottom measures 36 feet, at the top 16 feet. There will be seven apartments besides the light-room. The total height of the lantern above the sea will be 154 feet, commanding a range of about eighteen miles.

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Lastly, we propose to wander away from the shores of the United Kingdom, though not to trespass beyond the confines of British territory. Had our limits permitted, we might have entered upon a description of the Australian and North American pharoses, of the lighthouse at Perim, of the lighthouses on the coast of Hindustan; but such a multiplicity of details would assuredly have wearied the reader. Yet, as a proof that our engineering operations in this department are not less skilfully and boldly executed abroad than at home, we shall adduce, in terminating this chapter, the noble structure situated on the Alguada Reef.

This reef lies a few miles to the southward of Cape Negrais, the south-west promontory of Pegu, near one of the mouths of the great Irrawady river. Being thrown, as it were, directly in the track of vessels sailing from Calcutta to the thriving ports of Moulmein and Rangoon, it was a constant danger to the mariner; for the sea, except in the calmest weather, always dashes against it with restless fury, and no vessel cast upon it can hope to escape. The late Marquis of Dalhousie, appreciating its perilous character, designed to erect a lighthouse upon it; but no action was taken in the matter until 1856, when the loss of a coolie ship and 286 lives induced Lord Canning to resume his predecessor’s project.

The stone had to be brought from Pulo Obin, near Singapore, a distance of 1200 miles; and it was not until January 1860 that the work of excavating the foundation was commenced. On February 14, 1861, the first stone was laid, and thenceforth the work proceeded bravely, though entirely carried on by Coolie labour. The light, a first-class holophotal light, designed by Messrs. D. and T. Stevenson of Edinburgh, was first kindled on April 23, 1865, at an elevation of 144 feet above high-water mark. It commands a range of twenty nautical miles.

In general appearance the Alguada Reef Lighthouse resembles the Skerryvore, after which, indeed, it was designed, by Captain Fraser; but it surpasses its model in its dimensions.

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[Here we conclude our sketches of celebrated lighthouses; structures, we think, scarcely less deserving of the public interest and admiration, than the triumphal arches and stately columns erected to the memory of successful generals, or the superb palaces which enshrine the magnificence of kings and princes. For every lighthouse, be it remembered, is a proof of formidable engineering difficulties successfully overcome, and, therefore, rises before us as an impressive monument of human ingenuity, skill, and perseverance, exerted, for the noblest of purposes—for the preservation of human life, for the prevention of that misery and grief and deep-abiding sorrow which are the invariable consequences of the “wreck ashore.“]