Improvements on the Light-house, Brass-door, &c.
Though the Light-house might be considered as long since finished, various improvements have still at different times been made on it. In the course of the year 1820, an inner entrance-door was hung in the passage, chiefly to prevent the necessity of shutting the outer-door so frequently during the continuance of westerly winds. To save room, and cutting the walls, this door was constructed of brass-pannelled work, and the upper part glazed with plate-glass, to preserve the light. In the original fitting up of the interior of the house, the machinery-weight had been carried through the centre of the several apartments; but this having been found incommodious, the rope was now conducted close to the wall, in a small case; and, by introducing a double-pulley, the weight does not require to be brought higher than the floor of the Light-room-store, from which it descends into the drop-hole formed in the solid part of the building, as shewn in [Plate XVI.] The store-room for water, fuel, and provisions, was also fitted up this year in a more commodious manner, with cast-iron cisterns, an enlarged magazine for fuel, and a complete set of lockers. The water, which hitherto had been carried from the store to the kitchen in buckets, was now raised by a pump, fitted up after the manner of the beer-pumps in general use in London.
1821.
A new machine for taking up the stores.
The weather during 1821 was comparatively mild, and no storm of any consequence occurred at the Rock. The only work deserving notice that year, was the removal of the small crane from the entrance-door, to the provision-store; where a machine, upon a new principle, was constructed, the barrel or drum of which moves vertically upon its axis, instead of horizontally, while it winds up the chain. By means of this machine, the stores are now taken up to the entrance-door more conveniently; while both the door and passage are entirely relieved of the encumbrance of the crane-apparatus; as will be understood by examining [Plate XIV.] Fig. 7. and [Plate XVI.]
Mr Reid retires from the Light-house service.
In the course of this year, Mr John Reid, the principal light-keeper, on account of the state of his health, resigned his situation, and was succeeded by Mr Thomson Milne, reflector-maker. In consideration of Mr Reid’s faithful services, the Board put him on the half-pay list, at the rate of 30 guineas per annum.
1822.
Light-house works and model completed. Design for Wolf Rock.
In the year 1822, the several large holes in the Rock, formerly alluded to, were filled up, and that important work completed. The writer may here mention, that he is possessed of a complete model of the Bell Rock Light-house as executed, and of the chief implements mentioned in this work, which he will take measures for preserving to the Public; from a recollection of the interest he should have felt in examining any model of the Edystone Light-house, before he had an opportunity of seeing that work itself. He also, for similar reasons, gives a design, in [Plate XXIII.], founded on experience, as applicable to the erection of Light-houses on sunken rocks, which more particularly occurred to him after his first visit to the Wolf Rock situate between the Land’s End and the Scilly Islands, in the year 1813, under the auspices of the Admiralty, in the Orestes sloop of war, commanded by Captain Smith.