There is also a record in Strabo of a magnificent lighthouse of stone at Lighthouse at the mouth of the Guadalquivir. Capio, or Apio, near the Harbour of Menestheus (the modern Mesa Asta, or Puerto de Sta. Maria), which he describes as built on a rock nearly surrounded by the sea, as a guide for the shallows at the mouth of the Guadalquivir, in terms almost identical with those used by him in speaking of the Pharos of Alexandria. I am not aware of any other notice of this great work, for such it seems to have been, to have deserved the praises of Strabo.[34]
[34] The words of Strabo are (Oxon. 1807, p. 184), Και ὁ του Καπὶωνος (vel Ἀπιωνος) πὺργος ἵδρυται ἐπι πέτρας ἀμφκλυστου, θαυμασιως κατεσκευασμένος, ὥσπερ ό Φαρος τῆς των πλωϊζομενων σωτηριας χαριν, ῃ τε γαρ ἐκβαλλομενη χους ὕπο του ποταμου βραχεα ποιει και χοιραδωδης ἐστὶν ὁ πρὸ ἀυτου τοπος ὥστε δει σημειου τινος ἐπιφανοῦς.
Ancient Phari in Britain. In Camden’s Britannia, a passing notice is taken of the ruins called Cæsar’s Altar, at Dover, and of the Tour d’Ordre, at Boulogne, on the opposite coast; both of which are conjectured to have been ancient lighthouses. Pennant describes the remains of a Roman Pharos near Holywell, but cites no authorities for his opinion as to its use. There were likewise remains of a similar structure at Flamborough-head. A very meagre and unintelligible account is also given of a lighthouse at St Edmund’s Chapel, on the coast of Norfolk, in Gough’s additions to Camden, by which it might seem that the lighthouse was erected in 1272.[35]
[35] Gough’s Camden’s Britannia, vol. i., 318, and vol. ii., p. 198; Batcheller, in his Dover Guide (1845, p. 111), says, that the Dover Pharos was built “during the lieutenancy of Aulus Plautius and Ostorius Scapula, the latter of whom left Britain, A. D. 53.”—Pennant’s History of Whiteford and Holywell, p. 112.
Such seems to be the sum of our knowledge of the ancient history of lighthouses, which, it must be admitted, is neither accurate nor extensive. Our information regarding modern lighthouses is of course more minute in its details and more worthy of credit. The greater part of it is drawn from authentic sources; and much of what is afterwards stated is the result of my own observation, during my visits to the most important lighthouses of Europe.
The first lighthouse of modern days that merits attention, is the Tour de Corduan. Tour de Corduan, which, in point of architectural grandeur, is unquestionably the noblest edifice of the kind in the world. It is situated on an extensive reef at the mouth of the river Garonne, and serves as a guide to the shipping of Bordeaux and the Languedoc Canal, and indeed of all that part of the Bay of Biscay. It was founded in the year 1584, but was not completed till 1610, under Henri IV. It is minutely described in Belidor’s Architecture Hydraulique. The building is 197 feet in height, and consists of a pile of masonry, forming successive galleries, enriched with pilasters and friezes, and rising above each other with gradually diminished diameters. Those galleries are surmounted by a conical tower, which terminates in the lantern. Round the base is a wall of circumvallation, 134 feet in diameter, in which the light-keepers’ apartments are formed, somewhat in the style of casemates. This wall is an outwork of defence, and receives the chief shock of the waves. The tower itself contains a chapel, and various apartments; and the ascent is by a spacious staircase. The first light exhibited in the Tour de Corduan was obtained by burning billets of oak-wood, in a chauffer at the top of the tower; and the use of coal instead of wood, was the first improvement which the light received. A rude reflector, in the form of an inverted cone, was afterwards added, to prevent the loss of light which escaped upwards. About the year 1780, M. Lenoir was employed to substitute paraboloïdal reflectors and lamps; and in 1822, the light received its last improvement, by the introduction of the dioptric instruments of Augustin Fresnel, the celebrated French Academician.
Eddystone. The history of the famous Lighthouse on the Eddystone Rocks is well known to the general reader, from the narrative of Smeaton the Engineer. Those Rocks are 9¹⁄₂ miles from the Ram-Head, on the coast of Cornwall; and from the small extent of the surface of the chief Rock and its exposed situation, the construction of the Lighthouse was a work of very great difficulty. The first erection was of timber, designed by Mr Winstanley; and was commenced in 1696. The light was exhibited in November 1698. It was soon found, however, that the sea rose upon that tower to a much greater height than had been anticipated; so much so, it is said, as to “bury under the water” the lantern, which was sixty feet above the Rock; and the Engineer was therefore afterwards under the necessity of enlarging the Tower, and carrying it to the height of 120 feet. In November 1703, some considerable repairs were required, and Mr Winstanley, accompanied by his workmen, went to the Lighthouse to attend to their execution; but the storm of the 26th of that month, carried away the whole erection, when the Engineer and all his assistants unhappily perished!
The want of a light on the Eddystone, soon led to a fatal accident; for not long after the destruction of Mr Winstanley’s lighthouse, the Winchilsea man-of-war was wrecked on the Eddystone Rocks, and most of her crew were lost. Three years, however, elapsed, after this melancholy proof of the necessity for a light, before the Trinity-House of London could obtain a new Act of Parliament, to extend their powers; and it was not till the month of July 1706, that the construction of a new lighthouse was begun under the direction of Mr John Rudyerd of London. On the 28th of July 1708, the new light was first shewn, and it continued to be regularly exhibited till the year 1755, when the whole fabric was destroyed by accidental fire, after it had stood forty-seven years. But for this circumstance, it is impossible to tell how long the lighthouse might, with occasional repair, have lasted, as Mr Rudyerd seems to have executed his task with much judgment, carefully rejecting all architectural decoration, as unsuitable for such a situation, and directing his attention to the formation of a tower which should offer the least resistance to the waves. The height of the tower, which was of a conical form and constructed of timber, was 92 feet, including the lantern; and the diameter at the base, which was a little above the level of high water, was 23 feet.
The advantages of a light on the Eddystone having been so long known and acknowledged by seamen, no time was permitted to elapse before active measures were taken for its restoration; and Smeaton, to whom application was made for advice on the subject, recommended the exclusive use of stone as the material, which, both from its weight and other qualities, he considered most suitable for the situation. On the 5th of April 1756, Smeaton first landed on the Rock and made arrangements for erecting a Lighthouse of stone and preparing the foundations, by cutting the surface of the rock into regular horizontal benches, into which the stones were carefully dovetailed or notched. The first stone was laid on 12th June 1757 and the last on the 24th of August 1759. The Tower measures 68 feet in height and 26 feet in diameter at the level of the first entire course; and the diameter under the cornice is 15 feet. The first 12 feet of the Tower form a solid mass of masonry; and the stones of which it is composed are united by means of stone joggles, dovetailed joints, and oaken treenails. It is remarkable that Smeaton should have adopted an arched form for the floors of his building, instead of employing the floors as tie-walls formed of dovetailed stones. To counteract the injurious tendency of the outward thrust of those arched floors, he had recourse to the ingenious expedient of laying, in circular trenches or grooves cut in the stones which form the outside casing, tie-belts of chain, which were heated before being set in the grooves by means of an application of hot lead and became tight in cooling, after they were fixed in the wall. The light was exhibited on the 16th October 1759; but such was the state of lighthouse apparatus in Britain at that period, that a feeble light from tallow candles was all that decorated this noble structure. In 1807, when the property of this lighthouse again came into the hands of the Trinity-House, at the expiry of a long lease, Argand burners, and paraboloïdal reflectors of silvered copper, were substituted for the chandelier of candles.
Bell Rock. The dangerous reef called the Inch Cape, or Bell Rock, so long a terror to mariners, was well known to the earliest navigators of Scotland. Its dangers were so generally acknowledged, that the Abbots of Aberbrothwick, from which the Rock is distant about twelve miles, caused a float to be fixed upon the Rock with a bell attached to it, which being swung by the motion of the waves, served by its tolling to warn the mariner of his approach to the reef. From this circumstance, which formed the groundwork of Southey’s striking ballad of Sir Ralph the Rover, the Rock is said to have derived its name. Amongst the many losses which occurred on the Bell Rock in modern times, one of the most remarkable is that of the York, seventy-four, with all her crew, part of the wreck having been afterwards found on the Rock and part having come ashore on the neighbouring coast. During the survey of the Rock also, several instances were discovered of the extent of loss which this reef had occasioned; and many articles of ships’ furnishings were picked up on it, as well as various coins, a bayonet, a silver shoe-buckle, and many other small objects. Impressed with the great importance of some guide for the Bell Rock, Captain Brodie, R.N., set a small subscription on foot and erected a beacon of spars on the Rock, which, however, was soon destroyed by the sea. He afterwards constructed a second beacon, which soon shared the same fate. It was not, therefore, until 1802, when the Commissioners of Northern Lights brought a bill into Parliament for power to erect a lighthouse on it, that any efficient measures were contemplated for the protection of seamen from this Rock, which, being covered at every spring-tide to the depth of from twelve to sixteen feet, and lying right in the fairway to the Friths of Forth and Tay, had been the occasion of much loss both of property and life. In 1806, the bill passed into a law; and various ingenious plans were suggested for overcoming the difficulties which were apprehended, in erecting a lighthouse on a rock twelve miles from land, and covered to the depth of twelve feet by the tide. But the suggestion of Mr Robert Stevenson, the Engineer to the Lighthouse Board, after being submitted to the late Mr Rennie, was at length adopted; and it was determined to construct a tower of masonry, on the principle of the Eddystone. On the 17th of August 1807, Mr Stevenson accordingly landed with his workmen and commenced the work by preparing the Rock to receive the supports of a temporary pyramid of timber, on which a barrack-house for the reception of the workmen (similar to that which has already been described in a preceding part of this volume) was to be placed; and during this operation, much hazard was often incurred in transporting the men from the Rock, which was only dry for a few hours at spring-tides, to the vessel which lay moored off it. The lowest floor of this temporary erection, in which the mortar for the building was prepared, was often broken up and removed by the force of the sea. The foundation for the tower having been excavated, the first stone was laid on the 10th July 1808, at the depth of sixteen feet below the high water of spring-tides; and at the end of the second season, the building was five feet six inches above the lowest part of the foundation. The third season’s operations terminated by finishing the solid part of the structure, which is thirty feet in height; and the whole of the masonry was completed in October 1810. The light was first exhibited to the public on the night of the 1st of February 1811. The difficulties and hazards of this work were chiefly caused by the short time during which the Rock was accessible between the ebbing and flowing tides; and amongst the many eventful incidents which render the history of this work interesting, was the narrow escape which the Engineer and thirty-one persons made from being drowned, by the rising of the tide upon the Rock, before a boat came to their assistance, at a time when the attending vessel had broken adrift. This circumstance occurred before the Barrack-house was erected, and is narrated by Mr Stevenson, in his Account of the work, published at the expense of the Lighthouse Board in 1824, to which I would refer for more minute information on the subject of this work and the other lighthouses on the coast of Scotland.