“Think o’ that now!” exclaimed Maroon his wrinkles expanding into a bland smile of admiration.
“Don’t think of it, but do it,” returned Smeaton, with a laugh.
The thing was done at once. The “plate” of the Buss was melted down and mixed with lead, the hooks were fixed into the jambs, and the doors were hung in triumph. Solid doors they were too; not slender things with wooden panels, but thick iron-plated affairs somewhat resembling the armour of a modern ship-of-war, and fitted to defy the ocean’s most powerful battering-rams.
Progress thereafter was steady and rapid. There were points here and there in the work which served as landmarks. On the 6th of August Smeaton witnessed a strange sight—a bright halo round the top of the building. It was no miracle, though it looked like one. Doubtless some scientific men could give a satisfactory explanation of it, and prove that it was no direct interposition of the hand of God. So could they give a satisfactory account of the rainbow, though the rainbow is a direct sign to man. Whatever the cause, there the glory circled like a sign of blessing on the work, and a fitting emblem of the life-giving, because death-warding, beams which were soon to be sent streaming from that tower by the hand of man.
Three days afterwards they began to lay the balcony floor; on the 17th the main column was completed, and on the 26th the masonry was finished. It only remained that the lantern should be set up. But this lantern was a mighty mass of metal and glass, made with great care, and of immense strength and weight. Of course it had to be taken off to the rock in pieces, and we may almost say of course the ocean offered opposition. Then, as if everything had conspired to test the endurance and perseverance of the builders, the first and second coppersmiths fell ill on the 4th September. Skilled labour such as theirs could not readily be replaced in the circumstances, and every hour of the now far advanced season had become precious. Smeaton had set his heart on “showing a light” that year. In this difficulty, being a skilled mechanic himself, he threw off his coat and set to work with the men.
The materials of the lantern were landed on the 16th and fitted together, and the cupola was hoisted to its place on the 17th. This latter operation was extremely hazardous, the cupola being upwards of half a ton in weight, and it had to be raised outside the building and kept carefully clear of it the while. It seemed as if the elements themselves favoured this critical operation, or rather, as though they stood aghast and breathlessly still, while this, the crowning evidence of their defeat, was being put on. It was accomplished in less than half an hour, and, strange to say, no sooner was the tackling loosed and the screws that held the cupola fixed, than up got wind and sea once more in an uproarious gale of consternation from the east!
On the 18th a huge gilt ball was screwed on the top by Smeaton’s own hand, and thus the building of the Eddystone lighthouse was finished.
There still remained, however, a good deal of copper and wood-work to be done in the interior, but there was now no doubt in Smeaton’s mind that the light would be exhibited that season. He therefore removed his bed and stores from the Buss to the lighthouse, and remained there, the better to superintend the completion of the work.
One evening he looked into the upper storeroom, where some bars were being heated over a charcoal fire. He became giddy with the fumes, staggered, and fell down insensible. Assuredly poor Smeaton’s labours would have terminated then and there if it had not been that one of the men had providentially followed him. A startled cry was heard—one of those cries full of meaning which cause men to leap half involuntarily to the rescue.
“Och! somebody’s kilt,” cried Maroon, flinging away his pipe and springing up the staircase, followed by others, “wather! wather! look alive there!”