Diana nodded. “But do go on about Sostratus,” she begged, turning to Dinocrates. “Ptolemy let him build the lighthouse, I suppose?”
“After my death,” continued their friend, “my pupil went to King Ptolemy with his plans, and he was ordered not only to set about the building of the tower, but to spare no expense and to make it the most beautiful monument he could possibly accomplish. So Sostratus worked and thought and invented, and in time, on the very spot where now we are seated, there rose the tower you beheld a short while ago. Four hundred feet high it towered above this rock, built of white marble, slender as a lily, yet strong as steel. And in the cup-like hollow at the top, was sunk a brazier, that is, a huge basket of iron in which a fire was kept always burning. The men who from the gallery around this hollow tended the fire and fed the flames, were the first lighthouse-keepers, and the tower itself, being the first lighthouse, was the model for others all over the world. The lighthouse on the spur of land at St. Mary’s Bay, little maids, owes its existence to the marble tower of Sostratus, as in like fashion do all the other famous lighthouses of modern days, such as Eddystone, the North Foreland, and the rest. No longer, it is true, do naked flames stream upwards into the darkness from these modern towers—for, in two thousand years other light has been invented, as well as shielding panes of glass. Nowadays, strong electric globes shoot forth their gleams over the sea at night. But the tower of Sostratus was not only the first of these friendly beacons but also the most beautiful as a monument. So beautiful, indeed, and in those early days so strange to the sight, that it was named amongst the Seven Wonders of the World.”
“Was it called the Tower of Sostratus?” asked Rachel.
Dinocrates smiled and shook his head.
“Nay,” he returned, “though that was the wish of Sostratus himself. It was called the Pharos Tower—after the name of this island upon which it stood.”
“Why,” exclaimed Diana suddenly, “phare is the French word for lighthouse. Is that because of the Pharos tower?”
Diana had a French governess, and to Rachel’s wonder and admiration, spoke French, if not as well, at least as quickly as she talked in English.
“Yes,” answered Dinocrates. “Every time French sailors use that word, even though they have no knowledge of its meaning, the work of Sostratus is mentioned by men who live to-day. His work is remembered, his name forgotten, even though he strove hard that this should not be the case.
“Listen, and I will tell you what chanced. When the tower was at length finished and stood gleaming white on this headland, the time had come for an inscription to be placed upon it, and Ptolemy, King of Egypt, ordered Sostratus to engrave these words upon the marble: King Ptolemy to the gods, the saviours, for the benefit of sailors.
“Now Sostratus, to whom the lighthouse represented all that he now cared for in life, was determined that his own name should be read, if not at the moment, at least in time to come. Yet he dared not disobey the King’s command. This, then, was the device by which he tried to ensure remembrance.