BOOK V.
THE AUXILIARIES OF LIGHTHOUSES.
CHAPTER I.
FLOATING LIGHTS: LIGHTSHIPS.
Lighthouses form the first line of the coast defences which man raises for his protection against the fury of the ocean. But there are many parts of the coasts of every maritime country which are unsuitable for their construction, whether they be built of stone or iron, and which, nevertheless, stand greatly in need of illumination. In England, especially, these points are numerous. Among others, we may refer to the Goodwin Sands—that fatal tract off the shore of Kent which has been the destruction of so many “tall ships” and “adventurous mariners,” whose name has for centuries been associated with the memory of the most deplorable disasters. On the entire coast of England there is probably no other locality so fatally connected with dismal stories of human suffering, and yet it was long impossible to warn the sailor from it by any certain agency. Lighthouses could not be stationed on its shifting sands; and it seemed as if this one wild waste must of necessity be abandoned to the pitiless winds and not more compassionate seas. However, towards the close of the last century, the idea occurred to one Robert Hamblin of substituting floating lights for fixed lights—a lightship for a lighthouse.