"From the dim headlands many a lighthouse gleams,
The street lamps of the ocean."
Far away to the northeast a single white star appears eleven miles off, on the solitary rock of Boon Island, out in mid-ocean, where not a pound of soil exists, excepting what has been carried there. One of the worst wrecks of modern times occurred on this rock before the lighthouse was built. The "Nottingham," from London, was driven ashore, the crew with difficulty gaining the island when the ship broke up. They had no food; day by day their sufferings from cold and hunger increased; the mainland was in full view and they built a raft of pieces of wreck to try and get there, but it was swamped; they signalled passing vessels, but could not attract attention. Gradually they sank into hopelessness, but thought to make a final effort by constructing another rude raft, on which two of them tried to reach the shore. It too was wrecked, being afterwards found on the beach with a dead man alongside. Then hope entirely failed them, and to sustain life they became cannibals, living on the body of the ship's carpenter, sparingly doled out to them by the captain. Eventually the survivors were rescued, the wrecked raft being their preserver. When it was found, the people on shore started a search for the builders, and they were discovered and taken off the island, after twenty-four days of starvation. Then the lighthouse was built on Boon Island, and its steady white star gleams in nightly warning:
"Steadfast, serene, immovable, the same
Year after year, through all the silent night,
Burns on for evermore that quenchless flame,
Shines on that inextinguishable light!
"A new Prometheus chained upon the rock,
Still grasping in his hand the fire of Jove,
It does not hear the cry nor heed the shock,