Records of a family of engineers

Works by Robert Louis Stevenson

AN INLAND VOYAGE.

EDINBURGH: PICTURESQUE NOTES.

TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY.

VIRGINIBUS PUERISQUE.

FAMILIAR STUDIES OK MEN AND BOOKS.

NEW ARABIAN NIGHTS.

TREASURE ISLAND.

THE SILVERADO SQUATTERS.

A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES.

PRINCE OTTO.

THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLI, AND MR. HYDB.

KIDNAPPED.

THE MEKRY MEN.

UNDERWOODS.

MEMORIES AND PORTRAITS.

THE BLACK ARROW.

THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE.

FATHER DAMIEN : AN OPEN LETTER,

BALLADS.

ACROSS THE PLAINS.

ISLAND NIGHTS ENTERTAINMENTS.

A FOOTNOTE TO HISTORY.

CATRIONA.

WEIR OF HERMISTON.

VAILIMA LETTERS.

FABLES.

SONGS OF TRAVEL.

ST. IVES.

IN THE SOUTH SEAS

ESSAYS OF TRAVEL.

TALKS AND FANTASIES.

THK ART OF WRITING.

LAY MORALS, ETC.

RECORDS OF A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS.

PRAYERS WRITTEN AT VAILIMA.

A CHRISTMAS SERMON.

TALK AND TALKERS.

With Mrs. Stevenson

THE DYNAMITER.

With Lloyd Osbourne

THE WRONG BOX THE WRECKER. THE EBB-TIDS.

RECORDS OF
A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

RECORDS OF A
FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

BY

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

LONDON

CHATTO & WINDUS
1912

,<4 // rights reserved

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTION : THE SURNAME OF STEVEN-
SON 1

I. DOMESTIC ANNALS. 13

II. THE SERVICE OF THE NORTHERN

LIGHTS 47

III. THE BUILDING OF THE BELL ROCK 90

261472

RECORDS OF
A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

INTRODUCTION

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON

FROM the thirteenth century onwards, the name,
under the various disguises of Stevinstoun, Steven-
soun, Stevensonne, Stenesone, and Stewiusoune,
spread across Scotland from the mouth of the
Firth of Forth to the mouth of the Firth of Clyde.
Four times at least it occurs as a place-name.
There is a parish of Stevenston in Cunningham ;
a second place of the name in the Barony of
Bothwell in Lanark ; a third on Lyne, above
Drochil Castle ; the fourth on the Tyne, near
Traprain Law. Stevenson of Stevenson (co.
Lanark) swore fealty to Edward I in 1296, and
the last of that family died after the Restoration.
Stevensons of Hirdmanshiels, in Midlothian, rode
in the Bishops' Raid of Aberlady, served as jurors,
stood bail for neighbours — Hunter of Polwood,
for instance — and became extinct about the same
period, or possibly earlier. A Stevenson of Luthrie

•$; :.•••/:; A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and another of Pitroddie make their bows, give
their names, and vanish. And by the year 1700
it does not appear that any acre of Scots land was
vested in any Stevenson.1

Here is, so far, a melancholy picture of backward
progress, and a family posting towards extinction.
But the law (however administered, and I am
bound to aver that, in Scotland, ' it couldna weel
be waur ') acts as a kind of dredge, and with dis-
passionate impartiality brings up into the light of
day, and shows us for a moment, in the jury-box
or on the gallows, the creeping things of the past.
By these broken glimpses we are able to trace the
existence of many other and more inglorious
Stevensons, picking a private way through the
brawl that makes Scots history. They were
members of Parliament for Peebles, Stirling,
Pittenweem, Kilrenny, and Inverurie. We find
them burgesses of Edinburgh ; indwellers in
Biggar, Perth, and Dalkeith. Thomas was the
forester of Newbattle Park, Gavin was a baker,
John a maltman, Francis a chirurgeon, and ' Schir
William ' a priest. In the feuds of Humes and
Heatleys, Cunninghams, Montgomeries, Mures,
Ogilvies, and Turnbulls, we find them incon-
spicuously involved, and apparently getting rather

1 An error : Stevensons owned at this date the barony of Dol-
phingston in Haddingtonshire, Montgrennan in Ayrshire, and
several other lesser places,

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON 3

better than they gave. Schir William (reverend
gentleman) was cruellie slaughtered on the Links
of Kincraig in 1532 ; James (' in the mill- town of
Roberton '), murdered in 1590 ; Archibald (' in
Gallowfarren '), killed with shots of pistols and
hagbuts in 1608. Three violent deaths in about
seventy years, against which we can only put the
case of Thomas, servant to Hume of Cowden
Knowes, who was arraigned with his two young
masters for the death of the Bastard of Mellerstanes
in 1569. John ('in Dalkeith ') stood sentry
without Holyrood while the banded lords were
despatching Rizzio within. William, at the ring-
ing of Perth bell, ran before Gowrie House ' with
ane sword, and, entering to the yearde, saw George
Craiggingilt with ane twa-handit sword and utheris
nychtbouris ; at quilk time James Boig cryit ower
ane wynds, " Awa hame ! ye will all be hangit " ' —
a piece of advice which William took, and imme-
diately ' depairtit.' John got a maid with child
to him in Biggar, and seemingly deserted her ;
she was hanged on the Castle Hill for infanticide,
June 1614 ; and Martin, elder in Dalkeith, eternally
disgraced the name by signing witness in a witch
trial, 1661. These are two of our black sheep.1
Under the Restoration, one Stevenson was a
bailie in Edinburgh, and another the lessee of the
Canonmills. There were at the same period two
1 Pitcairn's Criminal Trials, at large.— [R. L. S.]

4 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

physicians of the name in Edinburgh, one of whom,
Dr. Archibald, appears to have been a famous man
in his day and generation. The Court had con-
tinual need of him ; it was he who reported, for
instance, on the state of Rumbold ; and he was for
some time in the enjoyment of a pension of a
thousand pounds Scots (about eighty pounds
sterling) at a time when five hundred pounds is
described as ' an opulent future.' I do not know
if I should be glad or sorry that he failed to keep
favour ; but on 6th January 1682 (rather a cheer-
less New Year's present) his pension was expunged.1
There need be no doubt, at least, of my exultation
at the fact that he was knighted and recorded
arms. Not quite so genteel, but still in public
life, Hugh was Under-Clerk to the Privy Council,
and liked being so extremely. I gather this from
his conduct in September 1681, when, with all the
lords and their servants, he took the woful and
soul-destroying Test, swearing it ' word by word
upon his knees.' And, behold ! it was in vain, for
Hugh was turned out of his small post in 1684.2
Sir Archibald and Hugh were both plainly inclined
to be trimmers ; but there was one witness of the
name of Stevenson who held high the banner of
the Covenant — John, ' Land-Labourer,3 in the

1 Fountainhall's Decisions, vol. i. pp. 56, 132, 186, 204, 368. —
[R. L. S.]

2 Ibid. pp. 158, 299.— [R. L. S.]

3 Working farmer : Fr. laboureur.

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON 5

parish of Daily, in Carrick,' that ' eminently pious
man.' He seems to have been a poor sickly soul,
and shows himself disabled with scrofula, and
prostrate and groaning aloud with fever ; but the
enthusiasm of the martyr burned high within him.

* I was made to take joyfully the spoiling of my
goods, and with pleasure for His name's sake
wandered in deserts and in mountains, in dens
and caves of the earth. I lay four months in the
coldest season of the year in a haystack in my
father's garden, and a whole February in the open
fields not far from Camragen, and this I did without
the least prejudice from the night air ; one night,
when lying in the fields near to the Carrick-Miln,
I was all covered with snow in the morning. Many
nights have I lain with pleasure in the churchyard
of Old Daily, and made a grave my pillow ; fre-
quently have I resorted to the old walls about the
glen, near to Camragen, and there sweetly rested.'
The visible hand of God protected and directed him.
Dragoons were turned aside from the bramble-bush
where he lay hidden. Miracles were performed for
his behoof. ' I got a horse and a woman to carry
the child, and came to the same mountain, where
I wandered by the mist before ; it is commonly
known by the name of Kellsrhins : when we came
to go up the mountain, there came on a great rain,
which we thought was the occasion of the child's
weeping, and she wept so bitterly, that all we could

6 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

do could not divert her from it, so that she was
ready to burst. When we got to the top of the
mountain, where the Lord had been formerly kind
to my soul in prayer, I looked round me for a stone,
and espying one, I went and brought it. When
the woman with me saw me set down the stone, she
smiled, and asked what I was going to do with it.
I told her I was going to set it up as my Ebenezer,
because hitherto, and in that place, the Lord had
formerly helped, and I hoped would yet help.
The rain still continuing, the child weeping bitterly,
I went to prayer, and no sooner did I cry to God,
but the child gave over weeping, and when we got
up from prayer, the rain was pouring down on
every side, but in the way where we were to go
there fell not one drop ; the place not rained on was
as big as an ordinary avenue.' And so great a
saint was the natural butt of Satan's persecutions.
' I retired to the fields for secret prayer about mid-
night. When I went to pray I was much straitened,
and could not get one request, but " Lord pity,"
" Lord help " ; this I came over frequently ; at
length the terror of Satan fell on me in a high
degree, and all I could say even then was — " Lord
help." I continued in the duty for some time,
notwithstanding of this terror. At length I got
up to my feet, and the terror still increased ; then
the enemy took me by the arm-pits, and seemed
to lift me up by my arms. I saw a loch just before

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON 7

me, and I concluded he designed to throw me
there by force ; and had he got leave to do so, it
might have brought a great reproach upon religion.' l
But it was otherwise ordered, and the cause of
piety escaped that danger.2

On the whole, the Stevensons may be described
as decent, reputable folk, following honest trades —
millers, maltsters, and doctors, playing the char-
acter parts in the Waverley Novels with propriety,
if without distinction ; and to an orphan looking
about him in the world for a potential ancestry,
offering a plain and quite unadorned refuge, equally
free from shame and glory. John, the land-
labourer, is the one living and memorable figure,
and he, alas ! cannot possibly be more near than a
collateral. It was on August 12, 1678, that he
heard Mr. John Welsh on the Craigdowhill, and
' took the heavens, earth, and sun in the firmament
that was shining on us, as also the ambassador
who made the offer, and the clerk who raised the
psalms, to witness that I did give myself away to
the Lord in a personal and perpetual covenant
never to be forgotten ' ; and already, in 1675, the
birth of my direct ascendant was registered in

1 This John Stevenson was not the only ' witness ' of the name ;
other Stevensons were actually killed during the persecutions, in
the Glen of Trool, on Pentland, etc. ; and it is very possible that
the author's own ancestor was one of the mounted party embodied
by Muir of Caldwell, only a day too late for Pentland.

2 Wodrow Society's Select Biographies, vol. ii.— [R. L. S.]

8 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

Glasgow. So that I have been pursuing ancestors
too far down ; and John the land-labourer is
debarred me, and I must relinquish from the
trophies of my house his rare soul-strengthening
and comforting cordial. It is the same case with
the Edinburgh bailie and the miller of the Canon-
mills, worthy man ! and with that public character,
Hugh the Under- Clerk, and, more than all, with
Sir Archibald, the physician, who recorded arms.
And I am reduced to a family of inconspicuous
maltsters in what was then the clean and handsome
little city on the Clyde.

The name has a certain air of being Norse. But
the story of Scottish nomenclature is confounded
by a continual process of translation and half-
translation from the Gaelic which in olden days
may have been sometimes reversed. Roy becomes
Reid ; Gow, Smith. A great Highland clan uses
the name of Robertson ; a sept in Appin that of
Livingstone ; Maclean in Glencoe answers to
Johnstone at Lockerby. And we find such hybrids
as Macalexander for Macallister. There is but
one rule to be deduced : that however uncom-
promisingly Saxon a name may appear, you can
never be sure it does not designate a Celt. My
great-grandfather wrote the name Stevenson but
pronounced it Steenson, after the fashion of the
immortal minstrel in Eedgauntlet ; and this elision
of a medial consonant appears a Gaelic process ;

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON 9

and, curiously enough, I have come across no less
than two Gaelic forms : John Macstophane cor-
dinerius in Crossraguel, 1573, and William M'Steen
in Dunskeith (co. Ross), 1605. Stevenson, Steen-
son, Macstophane, M'Steen : which is the original ?
which the translation ? Or were these separate
creations of the patronymic, some English, some
Gaelic ? The curiously compact territory in which
we find them seated — Ayr, Lanark, Peebles,
Stirling, Perth, Fife, and the Lothians — would
seem to forbid the supposition.1

* STEVENSON — or according to tradition of one
of the proscribed of the clan MacGregor, who was
born among the willows or in a hill-side sheep-pen
— " Son of my love," a heraldic bar sinister, but
history reveals a reason for the birth among the
willows far other than the sinister aspect of the
name ' : these are the dark words of Mr. Cosmo
Innes ; but history or tradition, being interrogated,
tells a somewhat tangled tale. The heir of Mac-
gregor of Glenorchy, murdered about 1353 by the
Argyll Campbells, appears to have been the original
' Son of my love * ; and his more loyal clansmen
took the name to fight under. It may be supposed
the story of their resistance became popular, and
the name in some sort identified with the idea of

1 Though the districts here named are those in which the name
of Stevenson is most common, it is in point of fact far more wide-
spread than the text indicates, and occurs from Dumfries and
Berwickshire to Aberdeen and Orkney.

10 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

opposition to the Campbells. Twice afterwards,
on some renewed aggression, in 1502 and 1552, we
find the Macgregors again banding themselves
into a sept of ' Sons of my love ' ; and when the
great disaster fell on them in 1603, the whole
original legend re-appears, and we have the heir
of Alaster of Glenstrae born ' among the willows '
of a fugitive mother, and the more loyal clansmen
again rallying under the name of Stevenson. A
story would not be told so often unless it had some
base in fact ; nor (if there were no bond at all
between the Red Macgregors and the Stevensons)
would that extraneous and somewhat uncouth
name be so much repeated in the legends of the
Children of the Mist.

But I am enabled, by my very lively and obliging
correspondent, Mr. George A. Macgregor Stevenson
of New York, to give an actual instance. His
grandfather, great-grandfather, great-great-grand-
father, and great-great-great-grandfather, all used
the names of Macgregor and Stevenson as occasion
served ; being perhaps Macgregor by night and
Stevenson by day. The great-great-great-grand-
father was a mighty man of his hands, marched with
the clan in the 'Forty-five, and returned with
spolia opima in the shape of a sword, which he had
wrested from an officer in the retreat, and which
is in the possession of my correspondent to this day.
His great-grandson (the grandfather of my corre-

THE SURNAME OF STEVENSON 11

spondent), being converted to Methodism by some
wayside preacher, discarded in a moment his name,
his old nature, and his political principles, and with
the zeal of a proselyte sealed his adherence to the
Protestant Succession by baptising his next son
George. This George became the publisher and
editor of the Wesleyan Times. His children were
brought up in ignorance of their Highland pedigree ;
and my correspondent was puzzled to overhear his
father speak of him as a true Macgregor, and
amazed to find, in rummaging about that peaceful
and pious house, the sword of the Hanoverian
officer. After he was grown up and was better
informed of his descent, ' I frequently asked my
father,' he writes, ' why he did not use the name
of Macgregor ; his replies were significant, and
give a picture of the man : " It isn't a good
Methodist name. You can use it, but it will do you
no good." Yet the old gentleman, by way of
pleasantry, used to announce himself to friends
as " Colonel Macgregor."

Here, then, are certain Macgregors habitually
using the name of Stevenson, and at last, under
the influence of Methodism, adopting it entirely.
Doubtless a proscribed clan could not be particular ;
they took a name as a man takes an umbrella against
a shower ; as Rob Roy took Campbell, and his son
took Drummond. But this case is different ;
Stevenson was not taken and left — it was con-

12 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

sistently adhered to. It does not in the least follow
that all Stevensons are of the clan Alpin ; but it
does follow that some may be. And I cannot
conceal from myself the possibility that James
Stevenson in Glasgow, my first authentic ancestor,
may have had a Highland alias upon his conscience
and a claymore in his back parlour.

To one more tradition I may allude, that we are
somehow descended from a French barber-surgeon
who came to St. Andrews in the service of one of the
Cardinal Beatons. No details were added. Bui
the very name of France was so detested in my
family for three generations, that I am tempted
to suppose there may be something in it.1

1 Mr. J. H. Stevenson is satisfied that these speculations as to
a possible Norse, Highland, or French origin are vain. All we
know about the engineer family is that it was sprung from a stock
of Westland Whigs settled in the latter part of the seventeenth
century in the parish of Neilston, as mentioned at the beginning
of the next chapter. It may be noted that the Ayrshire parish of
Stevenston, the lands of which are said to have received the name
in the twelfth century, lies within thirteen miles south-west of this
place. The lands of Stevenson in Lanarkshire first mentioned in
the next century, in the Ragman Roll, lie within twenty miles
east.

DOMESTIC ANNALS 13

CHAPTER I

DOMESTIC ANNALS

IT is believed that in 1665, James Stevenson in
Nether Carsewell, parish of Neilston, county of
Renfrew, and presumably a tenant farmer, married
one Jean Keir ; and in 1675, without doubt, there
was born to these two a son Robert, possibly a
maltster in Glasgow. In 1710, Robert married,
for a second time, Elizabeth Gumming, and there
was born to them, in 1720, another Robert, certainly
a maltster in Glasgow. In 1742, Robert the second
married Margaret Fulton (Margret, she called
herself), by whom he had ten children, among
whom were Hugh, born February 1749, and Alan,
born June 1752.

With these two brothers my story begins. Their
deaths were simultaneous ; their lives unusually
brief and full. Tradition whispered me in child-
hood they were the owners of an islet near St.
Kitts ; and it is certain they had risen to be at the
head of considerable interests in the West Indies,
which Hugh managed abroad and Alan at home,
at an age when others are still curveting a clerk's

14 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

stool. My kinsman, Mr. Stevenson of Stirling,
has heard his father mention that there had been
' something romantic ' about Alan's marriage :
and, alas ! he has forgotten what. It was early
at least. His wife was Jean, daughter of David
Lillie, a builder in Glasgow, and several times
' Deacon of the Wrights ' : the date of the marriage
has not reached me ; but on 8th June 1772, when
Robert, the only child of the union, was born,
the husband and father had scarce passed, or had
not yet attained, his twentieth year. Here was
a youth making haste to give hostages to fortune.
But this early scene of prosperity in love and
business was on the point of closing.

There hung in the house of this young family,
and successively in those of my grandfather and
father, an oil painting of a ship of many tons
burthen. Doubtless the brothers had an interest
in the vessel ; I was told she had belonged to them
outright ; and the picture was preserved through
years of hardship, and remains to this day in the
possession of the family, the only memorial of my
great-grandsire Alan. It was on this ship that
he sailed on his last adventure, summoned to the
West Indies by Hugh. An agent had proved
unfaithful on a serious scale ; and it used to be told
me in my childhood how the brothers pursued him
from one island to another in an open boat, were
exposed to the pernicious dews of the tropics, and

DOMESTIC ANNALS 15

simultaneously struck down. The dates and places
of their deaths (now before me) would seem to
indicate a more scattered and prolonged pursuit :
Hugh, on the 16th April 1774, in Tobago, within
sight of Trinidad ; Alan, so late as 26th May, and
so far away as ' Santt Kittes,' in the Leeward
Islands — both,says the family Bible, ' of a fiver ' (!).
The death of Hugh was probably announced by
Alan in a letter, to which we may refer the details
of the open boat and the dew, Thus, at least, in
something like the course of post, both were called
away, the one twenty-five, the other twenty-two ;
their brief generation became extinct, their short-
lived house fell with them ; and * in these lawless
parts and lawless times ' — the words are my
grandfather's — their property was stolen or became
involved. Many years later, I understand some
small recovery to have been made ; but at the
moment almost the whole means of the family
seem to have perished with the young merchants.
On the 27th April, eleven days after Hugh Steven-
son, twenty-nine before Alan, died David Lillie,
the Deacon of the Wrights ; so that mother and
son were orphaned in one month. Thus, from a
few scraps of paper bearing little beyond dates,
we construct the outlines of the tragedy that
shadowed the cradle of Robert Stevenson.

Jean Lillie was a young woman of strong sense,
well fitted to contend with poverty, and of a pious

16 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

disposition, which it is like that these misfortunes
heated. Like so many other widowed Scots-
women, she vowed her son should wag his head in
a pulpit ; but her means were inadequate to her
ambition. A charity school, and some time under
a Mr. M'Intyre, ' a famous linguist,' were all she
could afford in the way of education to the would-
be minister. He learned no Greek ; in one place
he mentions that the Orations of Cicero were his
highest book in Latin ; in another that he had
' delighted ' in Virgil and Horace ; but his delight
could never have been scholarly. This appears to
have been the whole of his training previous to an
event which changed his own destiny and moulded
that of his descendants — the second marriage of
his mother.

There was a Merchant-Burgess of Edinburgh of
the name of Thomas Smith. The Smith pedigree
has been traced a little more particularly than the
Stevensons', with a similar dearth of illustrious
names. One character seems to have appeared,
indeed, for a moment at the wings of history :
a skipper of Dundee who smuggled over some
Jacobite big-wig at the time of the 'Fifteen, and
was afterwards drowned in Dundee harbour while
going on board his ship. With this exception,
the generations of the Smiths present no conceiv-
able interest even to a descendant ; and Thomas,
of Edinburgh, was the first to issue from respectable

DOMESTIC ANNALS IT

obscurity. His father, a skipper out of Broughty
Ferry, was drowned at sea while Thomas was still
young. He seems to have owned a ship or two —
whalers, I suppose, or coasters — and to have been
a member of the Dundee Trinity House, whatever
that implies. On his death the widow remained
in Broughty, and the son came to push his future
in Edinburgh. There is a story told of him in
the family which I repeat here because I shall
have to tell later on a similar, but more perfectly
authenticated, experience of his stepson, Robert
Stevenson. Word reached Thomas that his mother
was unwell, and he prepared to leave for Broughty
on the morrow. It was between two and three
in the morning, and the early northern daylight
was already clear, when he awoke and beheld the
curtains at the bed-foot drawn aside and his
mother appear in the interval, smile upon him for
a moment, and then vanish. The sequel is stereo-
type ; he took the time by his watch, and arrived
at Broughty to learn it was the very moment of
her death. The incident is at least curious in
having happened to such a person — as the tale is
being told of him. In all else, he appears as a
man, ardent, passionate, practical, designed for
affairs and prospering in them far beyond the
average. He founded a solid business in lamps
and oils, and was the sole proprietor of a con-
cern called the Greenside Company's Works — ' a

18 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

multifarious concern it was,' writes my cousin,
Professor Swan, ' of tinsmiths, coppersmiths, brass-
founders, blacksmiths, and japanners.' He was
also, it seems, a shipowner and underwriter. He
built himself ' a land ' — Nos. 1 and 2 Baxter's
Place, then no such unfashionable neighbourhood
— and died, leaving his only son in easy circum-
stances, and giving to his three surviving daughters
portions of five thousand pounds and upwards.
There is no standard of success in life ; but in one
of its meanings, this is to succeed.

In what we know of his opinions, he makes a
figure highly characteristic of the time. A high
Tory and patriot, a captain — so I find it in my
notes — of Edinburgh Spearmen, and on duty in
the Castle during the Muir and Palmer troubles,
he bequeathed to his descendants a bloodless sword
and a somewhat violent tradition, both long pre-
served. The judge who sat on Muir and Palmer,
the famous Braxfield, let fall from the bench the
obiter dictum — * I never liked the French all my
days, but now I hate them.' If Thomas Smith,
the Edinburgh Spearman, were in court, he must
have been tempted to applaud. The people of
that land were his abhorrence ; he loathed Buona-
parte like Antichrist. Towards the end he fell into
a kind of dotage ; his family must entertain him
with games of tin soldiers, which he took a childish
pleasure to array and overset ; but those who

DOMESTIC ANNALS 19

played with him must be upon their guard, for if
his side, which was always that of the English
against the French, should chance to be defeated,
there would be trouble in Baxter's Place. For
these opinions he may almost be said to have
suffered. Baptised and brought up in the Church
of Scotland, he had, upon some conscientious
scruple, joined the communion of the Baptists.
Like other Nonconformists, these were inclined to
the Liberal side in politics, and, at least in the
beginning, regarded Buonaparte as a deliverer.
From the time of his joining the Spearmen, Thomas
Smith became in consequence a bugbear to his
brethren in the faith. ' They that take the sword
shall perish with the sword,' they told him ; they
gave him ' no rest ' ; 'his position became intoler-
able ' ; it was plain he must choose between his
political and his religious tenets ; and in the last
years of his life, about 1812, he returned to the
Church of his fathers.

August 1786 was the date of his chief advance-
ment, when, having designed a system of oil lights
to take the place of the primitive coal fires before
in use, he was dubbed engineer to the newly-formed
Board of Northern Lighthouses. Not only were his
fortunes bettered by the appointment, but he was
introduced to a new and wider field for the exercise
of his abilities, and a new way of life highly agree-
able to his active constitution. He seems to have

20 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

rejoiced in the long journeys, and to have com-
bined them with the practice of field sports. * A
tall, stout man coming ashore with his gun over his
arm ' — so he was described to my father — the only
description that has come down to me by a light-
keeper old in the service. Nor did this change come
alone. On the 9th July of the same year, Thomas
Smith had been left for the second time a widower.
As he was still but thirty-three years old, prospering
in his affairs, newly advanced in the world, and
encumbered at the time with a family of children,
five in number, it was natural that he should enter-
tain the notion of another wife. Expeditious in
business, he was no less so in his choice ; and it
was not later than June 1787 — for my grandfather
is described as still in his fifteenth year — that he
married the widow of Alan Stevenson.

The perilous experiment of bringing together
two families for once succeeded. Mr. Smith's
two eldest daughters, Jean and Janet, fervent in
piety, unwearied in kind deeds, were well qualified
both to appreciate and to attract the stepmother ;
and her son, on the other hand, seems to have
found immediate favour in the eyes of Mr. Smith.
It is, perhaps, easy to exaggerate the ready-made
resemblances ; the tired woman must have done
much to fashion girls who were under ten ; the
man, lusty and opinionated, must have stamped
a strong impression on the boy of fifteen. But

DOMESTIC ANNALS 21

the cleavage of the family was too marked, the
identity of character and interest produced between
the two men on the one hand, and the three women
on the other, was too complete to have been the
result of influence alone. Particular bonds of
union must have pre-existed on each side. And
there is no doubt that the man and the boy met
with common ambitions, and a common bent, to
the practice of that which had not so long before
acquired the name of civil engineering.

For the profession which is now so thronged,
famous, and influential, was then a thing of yester-
day. My grandfather had an anecdote of Smeaton,
probably learned from John Clerk of Eldin, their
common friend. Smeaton was asked by the Duke
of Argyll to visit the West Highland coast for
a professional purpose. He refused, appalled, it
seems, by the rough travelling. * You can recom-
mend some other fit person ? ' asked the Duke.
' No,' said Smeaton, ' I }m sorry I can't.' * What ! '
cried the Duke, ' a profession with only one man
in it ! Pray, who taught you ? ' ' Why,' said
Smeaton, c I believe I may say I was self-taught,
an't please your grace.' Smeaton, at the date of
Thomas Smith's third marriage, was yet living ;
and as the one had grown to the new profession from
his place at the instrument-maker's, the other was
beginning to enter it by the way of his trade. The
engineer of to-day is confronted with a library of

22 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

acquired results ; tables and formulae to the value
of folios full have been calculated and recorded ;
and the student finds everywhere in front of him
the footprints of the pioneers. In the eighteenth
century the field was largely unexplored; the
engineer must read with his own eyes the face of
nature ; he arose a volunteer, from the workshop
or the mill, to undertake works which Were at once
inventions and adventures. It was not a science
then — it was a living art ; and it visibly grew
under the eyes and between the hands of its
practitioners.

The charm of such an occupation was strongly
felt by stepfather and stepson. It chanced that
Thomas Smith was a reformer ; the superiority of
his proposed lamp and reflectors over open fires
of coal secured his appointment ; and no sooner
had he set his hand to the task than the interest
of that employment mastered him. The vacant
stage on which he was to act, and where all had yet
to be created — the greatness of the difficulties,
the smallness of the means intrusted him — would
rouse a man of his disposition like a call to battle.
The lad introduced by marriage under his roof was
of a character to sympathise ; the public useful-
ness of the service would appeal to his judgment,
the perpetual need for fresh expedients stimulate
liis ingenuity. And there was another attraction
which, in the younger man at least, appealed to,

DOMESTIC ANNALS 23

and perhaps first aroused, a profound and enduring
sentiment of romance : I mean the attraction of
the life. The seas into which his labours carried
the new engineer were still scarce charted, the
coasts still dark ; his way on shore was often far
beyond the convenience of any road ; the isles in
which he must sojourn were still partly savage.
He must toss much in boats ; he must often
adventure on horseback by the dubious bridle-
track through unfrequented wildernesses ; he must
sometimes plant his lighthouse in the very camp
of wreckers ; and he was continually enforced to
the vicissitudes of outdoor life. The joy of my
grandfather in this career was strong as the love
of woman. It lasted him through youth and
manhood, it burned strong in age, and at the
approach of death his last yearning was to renew
these loved experiences. What he felt himself he
continued to attribute to all around him. And
to this supposed sentiment in others I find him
continually, almost pathetically, appealing; often
in vain.

Snared by these interests, the boy seems to have
become almost at once the eager confidant and
adviser of his new connection ; the Church, if he
had ever entertained the prospect very warmly,
faded from his view ; and at the age of nineteen I
find him already in a post of some authority,
superintending the construction of the lighthouse

24 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

on the isle of Little Cumbrae, in the Firth of Clyde.
The change of aim seems to have caused or been
accompanied by a change of character. It sounds
absurd to couple the name of my grandfather with
the word indolence ; but the lad who had been
destined from the cradle to the Church, and who
had attained the age of fifteen without acquiring
more than a moderate knowledge of Latin, was at
least no unusual student. And from the day of
his charge at Little Cumbrae he steps before us
what he remained until the end, a man of the most
zealous industry, greedy of occupation, greedy
of knowledge, a stern husband of time, a reader,
a writer, unflagging in his task of self -improvement.
Thenceforward his summers were spent directing
works and ruling workmen, now in uninhabited,
now in half-savage islands ; his winters were set
apart, first at the Andersonian Institution, then at
the University of Edinburgh to improve himself
in mathematics, chemistry, natural history, agri-
culture, moral philosophy, and logic ; a bearded
student — although no doubt scrupulously shaved.
I find one reference to his years in class which will
have a meaning for all who have studied in Scottish
Universities. He mentions a recommendation
made by the professor of logic. * The high-school
men,' he writes, 4 and bearded men like myself, were
all attention.' If my grandfather were throughout
life^a thought too studious of the art of getting on,

DOMESTIC ANNALS 25

much must be forgiven to the bearded and belated
student who looked across, with a sense of difference,
at ' the high-school men.' Here was a gulf to be
crossed; but already he could feel that he had
made a beginning, and that must have been a
proud hour when he devoted his earliest earnings
to the repayment of the charitable foundation in
which he had received the rudiments of know-
ledge.

In yet another way he followed the example of
his father-in-law, and from 1794 to 1807, when the
affairs of the Bell Rock made it necessary for him
to resign, he served in different corps of volunteers.
In the last of these he rose to a position of
distinction, no less than captain of the Grena-
dier Company, and his colonel, in accepting his
resignation, entreated he would do them 6 the favour
of continuing as an honorary member of a corps
which has been so much indebted for your zeal and
exertions.'

To very pious women the men of the house are
apt to appear worldly. The wife, as she puts on
her new bonnet before church, is apt to sigh over
that assiduity which enabled her husband to pay
the milliner's bill. And in the household of the
Smiths and Stevensons the women were not only
extremely pious, but the men were in reality a
trifle worldly. Religious they both were ; con-
scious, like all Scots, of the fragility and unreality

26 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

of that scene in which we play our uncompre-
hended parts ; like all Scots, realising daily and
hourly the sense of another will than ours and a
perpetual direction in the affairs of life. But the
current of their endeavours flowed in a more
obvious channel. They had got on so far ; to get
on further was their next ambition — to gather
wealth, to rise in society, to leave their descendants
higher than themselves, to be (in some sense)
among the founders of families. Scott was in the
same town nourishing similar dreams. But in the
eyes of the women these dreams would be foolish
and idolatrous.

I have before me some volumes of old letters
addressed to Mrs. Smith and the two girls, her
favourites, which depict in a strong light their
characters and the society in which they moved.

1 My very dear and much esteemed Friend/ writes
one correspondent, s this day being the anniversary of
our acquaintance, I feel inclined to address you ; but
where shall I find words to express the fealings of a
graitful Heart, first to the Lord who graiciously in-
clined you on this day last year to notice an afflicted
Strainger providentially cast in your way far from any
Earthly friend? . . . Methinks I shall hear him say
unto you, "Inasmuch as ye shewed kindness to my
afflicted handmaiden, ye did it unto me." '

This is to Jean ; but the same afflicted lady
wrote indifferently to Jean, to Janet, and to Mrs.
Smith, whom she calls ' my Edinburgh mother.'

DOMESTIC ANNALS 27

It is plain the three were as one person, moving to
acts of kindness, like the Graces, inarmed. Too
much stress must not be laid on the style of this
correspondence ; Clarinda survived, not far away,
and may have met the ladies on the Calton Hill ;
and many of the writers appear, underneath the
conventions of the period, to be genuinely moved.
But what unpleasantly strikes a reader is that
these devout unfortunates found a revenue in their
devotion. It is everywhere the same tale ; on the
side of the soft-hearted ladies, substantial acts of
help ; on the side of the correspondents, affection,
italics, texts, ecstasies, and imperfect spelling.
When a midwife is recommended, not at all for
proficiency in her important art, but because she
has ' a sister whom I [the correspondent] esteem
and respect, and [who] is a spiritual daughter of
my Hond Father in the Gosple,' the mask seems
to be torn off, and the wages of godliness appear
too openly. Capacity is a secondary matter in
a midwife, temper in a servant, affection in a
daughter, and the repetition of a shibboleth fulfils
the law. Common decency is at times forgot in
the same page with the most sanctified advice and
aspiration. Thus I am introduced to a corre-
spondent who appears to have been at the time
the housekeeper at Invermay, and who writes
to condole with my grandmother in a season of
distress. For nearly half a sheet she keeps to the

28 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

point with an excellent discretion in language ;
then suddenly breaks out :

'It was fully my intention to have left this at
Martinmass, but the Lord fixes the bounds of our
habitation. I have had more need of patience in my
situation here than in any other, partly from the very
violent, unsteady, deceitful temper of the Mistress of
the Family, and also from the state of the house. It
was in a train of repair when I came here two years
ago, and is still in Confusion. There is above six
Thousand Pounds' worth of Furniture come from
London to be put up when the rooms are completely
finished ; and then, woe be to the Person who is
Housekeeper at Invermay ! '

And by the tail of the document, which is torn,
I see she goes on to ask the bereaved family to seek
her a new place. It is extraordinary that people
should have been so deceived in so careless an
impostor ; that a few sprinkled l God willings '
should have blinded them to the essence of this
venomous letter ; and that they should have been
at the pains to bind it in with others (many of them
highly touching) in their memorial of harrowing-
days. But the good ladies were without guile and
without suspicion ; they were victims marked for
the axe, and the religious impostors snuffed up the
wind as they drew near.

I have referred above to my grandmother ; it
was no slip of the pen : for by an extraordinary
arrangement, in which it is hard not to suspect

DOMESTIC ANNALS 29

the managing hand of a mother, Jean Smith
became the wife of Robert Stevenson. Mrs.
Smith had failed in her design to make her son a
minister, and she saw him daily more immersed
in business and worldly ambition. One thing
remained that she might do : she might secure
for him a godly wife, that great means of sanctifica-
tion ; and she had two under her hand, trained by
herself, her dear friends and daughters both in
law and love — Jean and Janet. Jean's com-
plexion was extremely pale, Janet's was florid ;
my grandmother's nose was straight, my great-
aunt's aquiline ; but by the sound of the voice,
not even a son was able to distinguish one from
other. The marriage of a man of twenty-seven
and a girl of twenty who have lived for twelve
years as brother and sister, is difficult to conceive.
It took place, however, and thus in 1799 the family
was still further cemented by the union of a repre-
sentative of the male or worldly element with one
of the female and devout.

This essential difference remained unbridged,
yet never diminished the strength of their relation.
My grandfather pursued his design of advancing
in the world with some measure of success ; rose
to distinction in his calling, grew to be the familiar
of members of Parliament, judges of the Court of
Session, and ' landed gentlemen ' ; learned a ready
address, had a flow of interesting conversation,

30 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and when he was referred to as ' a highly respectable
bourgeois,9 resented the description. My grand-
mother remained to the end devout and un-
ambitious, occupied with her Bible, her children,
and her house ; easily shocked, and associating
largely with a clique of godly parasites. I do not
know if she called in the midwife already referred
to ; but the principle on which that lady was
recommended, she accepted fully. The cook was
a godly woman, the butcher a Christian man,
and the table suffered. The scene has been often
described to me of my grandfather sawing with
darkened countenance at some indissoluble joint
— * Preserve me, my dear, what kind of a reedy,
stringy beast is this ? ' — of the joint removed, the
pudding substituted and uncovered ; and of my
grandmother's anxious glance and hasty, depre-
catory comment, ' Just mismanaged ! ' Yet with
the invincible obstinacy of soft natures, she would
adhere to the godly woman and the Christian man,
or find others of the same kidney to replace them.
One of her confidants had once a narrow escape ;
an unwieldy old woman, she had fallen from an
outside stair in a close of the Old Town ; and my
grandmother rejoiced to communicate the pro-
vidential circumstance that a baker had been
passing underneath with his bread upon his head.
' I would like to know what kind of providence
the baker thought it 1 ' cried my grandfather.

DOMESTIC ANNALS 31

But the sally must have been unique. In all
else that I have heard or read of him, so far from
criticising, he was doing his utmost to honour
and even to emulate his wife's pronounced opinions.
In the only letter which has come to my hand of
Thomas Smith's, I find him informing his wife
that he was ' in time for afternoon church * ;
similar assurances or cognate excuses abound
in the correspondence of Robert Stevenson ; and
it is comical and pretty to see the two generations
paying the same court to a female piety more
highly strung : Thomas Smith to the mother of
Robert Stevenson — Robert Stevenson to the
daughter of Thomas Smith. And if for once my
grandfather suffered himself to be hurried, by his
sense of humour and justice, into that remark
about the case of Providence and the Baker, I
should be sorry for any of his children who should
have stumbled into the same attitude of criticism.
In the apocalyptic style of the housekeeper of
Invermay, woe be to that person ! But there was
no fear ; husband and sons all entertained for the
pious, tender soul the same chivalrous and moved
affection. I have spoken with one who remem-
bered her, and who had been the intimate and
equal of her sons, and I found this witness had been
struck, as I had been, with a sense of disproportion
between the warmth of the adoration felt and the
nature of the woman, whether as described or

32 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

observed. She diligently read and marked her
Bible ; she was a tender nurse ; she had a sense of
humour under strong control ; she talked and found
some amusement at her (or rather at her husband's)
dinner-parties. It is conceivable that even my
grandmother was amenable to the seductions of
dress ; at least, I find her husband inquiring
anxiously about ' the gowns from Glasgow,' and
very careful to describe the toilet of the Princess
Charlotte, whom he had seen in church ' in a
Pelisse and Bonnet of the same colour of cloth as
the Boys5 Dress jackets, trimmed with blue satin
ribbons ; the hat or Bonnet, Mr. Spittal said, was
a Parisian slouch, and had a plume of three white
feathers.' But all this leaves a blank impression,
and it is rather by reading backward in these
old musty letters, which have moved me now to
laughter and now to impatience, that I glean
occasional glimpses of how she seemed to her
contemporaries, and trace (at work in her queer
world of godly and grateful parasites) a mobile
and responsive nature. Fashion moulds us, and
particularly women, deeper than we sometimes
think ; but a little while ago, and, in some circles,
women stood or fell by the degree of their appre-
ciation of old pictures ; in the early years of the
century (and surely with more reason) a character
like that of my grandmother warmed, charmed,
and subdued, like a strain of music, the hearts of

DOMESTIC ANNALS 33

the men of her own household. And there is
little doubt that Mrs. Smith, as she looked on at
the domestic life of her son and her stepdaughter,
and numbered the heads in their increasing nursery,
must have breathed fervent thanks to her Creator.
Yet this was to be a family unusually tried ;
it was not for nothing that one of the godly women
saluted Miss Janet Smith as ' a veteran in afflic-
tion ' ; and they were all before middle life exper-
ienced in that form of service. By the 1st of
January 1808, besides a pair of still-born twins,
five children had been born and still survived to
the young couple. By the llth two were gone ;
by the 28th a third had followed, and the two
others were still in danger. In the letters of a
former nurserymaid — I give her name, Jean
Mitchell, honoris causa — we are enabled to feel,
even at this distance of time, some of the bitterness
of that month of bereavement.

' I have this day received/ she writes to Miss Janet,
' the melancholy news of my dear babys' deaths.
My heart is like to break for my dear Mrs. Stevenson.
O may she be supported on this trying occasion ! I
hope her other three babys will be spared to her.
O, Miss Smith, did I think when I parted from my
sweet babys that I never was to see them more ? ' ' I
received/ she begins her next, ' the mournful news of
my dear Jessie's death. I also received the hair of
my three sweet babys, which I will preserve as dear
to their memorys and as a token of Mr. and Mrs.

34 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

Stevenson's friendship and esteem. At my leisure
hours, when the children are in bed, they occupy all
my thoughts, I dream of them. About two weeks ago
I dreamed that my sweet little Jessie came running
to me in her usual way, and I took her in my arms.
O my dear babys, were mortal eyes permitted to see
them in heaven, we would not repine nor grieve for
their loss.'

By the 29th of February, the Reverend John
Campbell, a man of obvious sense and human
value, but hateful to the present biographer, because
he wrote so many letters and conveyed so little
information, summed up this first period of
affliction in a letter to Miss Smith : ' Your dear
sister but a little while ago had a full nursery,
and the dear blooming creatures sitting around
her table filled her breast with hope that one day
they should fill active stations in society and
become an ornament in the Church below. But
ah!'

Near a hundred years ago these little creatures
ceased to be, and for not much less a period the
tears have been dried. And to this day, looking
in these stitched sheaves of letters, we hear the
sound of many soft-hearted women sobbing for
the lost. Never was such a massacre of the
innocents ; teething and chincough and scarlet
fever and smallpox ran the round ; and little
Lillies, and Smiths, and Stevensons fell like moths
about a candle ; and nearly all the sympathetic

DOMESTIC ANNALS 35

correspondents deplore and recall the little losses
of their own. ' It is impossible to describe the
Heavnly looks of the Dear Babe the three last
days of his life,' writes Mrs. Laurie to Mrs. Smith.
1 Never — never, my dear aunt, could I wish to
eface the rememberance of this Dear Child. Never,
never, my dear aunt ! ' And so soon the memory
of the dead and the dust of the survivors are
buried in one grave.

There was another death in 1812 ; it passes
almost unremarked ; a single funeral seemed but
a small event to these * veterans in affliction ' ;
and by 1816 the nursery was full again. Seven
little hopefuls enlivened the house ; some were
growing up ; to the elder girl my grandfather
already wrote notes in current hand at the tail
of his letters to his wife : and to the elder boys
he had begun to print, with laborious care, sheets
of childish gossip and pedantic applications.
Here, for instance, under date of 26th May 1816,
is part of a mythological account of London, with
a moral for the three gentlemen, ' Messieurs Alan,
Robert, and James Stevenson,' to whom the
document is addressed :

* There are many prisons here like Bridewell, for,
like other large towns, there are many bad men here
as well as many good men. The natives of London
are in general not so tall and strong as the people of
Edinburgh, because they have not so much pure air,

36 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and instead of taking porridge they eat cakes made
with sugar and plums. Here you have thousands of
carts to draw timber, thousands of coaches to take you
to all parts of the town, and thousands of boats to sail
on the river Thames. But you must have money to
pay, otherwise you can get nothing. Now the way
to get money is, become clever men and men of educa-
tion, by being good scholars.'

From the same absence, he writes to his wife
on a Sunday :

' It is now about eight o'clock with me, and I
imagine you to be busy with the young folks, hearing
the questions [Anglice, catechism], and indulging the
boys with a chapter from the large Bible, with their
interrogations and your answers in the soundest doc-
trine. I hope James is getting his verse as usual, and
that Mary is not forgetting her little hymn. While
Jeannie will be reading Wotherspoon, or some other
suitable and instructive book, I presume our friend,
Aunt Mary, will have just arrived with the news of
a throng kirk [a crowded church] and a great sermon.
You may mention, with my compliments to my mother,
that I was at St. Paul's to-day, arid attended a very
excellent service with Mr. James Lawrie. The text
was " Examine and see that ye be in the faith." '

A twinkle of humour lights up this evocation of
the distant scene — the humour of happy men and
happy homes. Yet it is penned upon the threshold
of fresh sorrow. James and Mary — he of the verse
and she of the hymn — did not much more than
survive to welcome their returning father. On

DOMESTIC ANNALS 37

the 25th, one of the godly women writes to
Janet :

' My dearest beloved madam, when I last parted
from you, you was so affected with your affliction
[you ? or I ?] could think of nothing else. But on
Saturday, when I went to inquire after your health,
how was I startled to hear that dear James was gone !
Ah, what is this ? My dear benefactors, doing so
much good to many, to the Lord, suddenly to be
deprived of their most valued comforts ! I was thrown
into great perplexity, could do nothing but murmur,
why these things were done to such a family. I
could not rest, but at midnight, whether spoken
[or not] it was presented to my mind — " Those whom
ye deplore are walking with me in white." I con-
clude from this the Lord saying to sweet Mrs. Steven-
son : " I gave them to be brought up for me : well
done, good and faithful ! they are fully prepared, and
now I must present them to my father and your father,
to my God and your God." '

It would be hard to lay on flattery with a more
sure and daring hand. I quote it as a model of
a letter of condolence ; be sure it would console.
Very different, perhaps quite as welcome, is this
from a lighthouse inspector to my grandfather :

( In reading your letter the trickling tear ran down
my cheeks in silent sorrow for your departed dear ones,
my sweet little friends. Well do I remember, and
you will call to mind, their little innocent and inter-
esting stories. Often have they come round me and
taken me by the hand, but alas ! I am no more
destined to behold them/

38 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

The child who is taken becomes canonised, and
the looks of the homeliest babe seem in the retrospect
' heavenly the three last days of his life.' But it
appears that James and Mary had indeed been
children more than usually engaging ; a record
was preserved a long while in the family of their
remarks and ' little innocent and interesting
stories,5 and the blow and the blank were the more
sensible.

Early the next month Robert Stevenson must
proceed upon his voyage of inspection, part by
land, part by sea. He left his wife plunged in
low spirits ; the thought of his loss, and still more
of her concern, was continually present in his mind,
and he draws in his letters home an interesting
picture of his family relations :

' Windygates Inn., Monday (Postmark July 1 6th).
' MY DEAREST JEANNIE, — While the people of the
inn are getting me a little bit of something to eat,
I sit down to tell you that I had a most excellent
passage across the water, and got to Wemyss at mid-
day. I hope the children will be very good, and that
Robert will take a course with you to learn his Latin
lessons daily ; he may, however, read English in com-
pany. Let them have strawberries on Saturdays/

' Westhaven, 11 th July.

'I have been occupied to-day at the harbour of
Newport, opposite Dundee, and am this far on my
way to Arbroath. You may tell the boys that I slept
last night in Mr. Steadman's tent. I found my bed

DOMESTIC ANNALS 39

rather hard, but the lodgings were otherwise extremely
comfortable. The encampment is on the Fife side of
the Tay, immediately opposite to Dundee. From the
door of the tent you command the most beautiful view
of the Firth, both up and down, to a great extent. At
night all was serene and still, the sky presented the
most beautiful appearance of bright stars, and the
morning was ushered in with the song of many little
birds.'

'Aberdeen, July I9tk.

1 1 hope, my dear, that you are going out of doors
regularly and taking much exercise. I would have
you to make the markets daily — and by all means to take
a seat in the coach once or twice in the week and see
what is going on in town. [The family were at the
sea-side.] It will be good not to be too great a
stranger to the house. It will be rather painful at
first, but as it is to be done, I would have you not to
be too strange to the house in town.

1 Tell the boys that I fell in with a soldier — his
name is Henderson — who was twelve years with Lord
Wellington and other commanders. He returned
very lately with only eightpence-halfpenny in his
pocket, and found his father and mother both in life,
though they had never heard from him, nor he from
them. He carried my great-coat and umbrella a few
miles.'

' Fraserburgh, July 20th.

' Fraserburgh is the same dull place which [Auntie]
Mary and Jeannie found it. As I am travelling along
the coast which they are acquainted with, you had
better cause Robert bring down the map from Edin-
burgh ; and it will be a good exercise in geography
for the young folks to trace my course. I hope they

40 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

have entered upon the writing. The library will
afford abundance of excellent books, which I wish
you would employ a little. I hope you are doing me.
the favour to go much out with the boys, which will
do you much good and prevent them from getting so
very much overheated.'

[To the Boys— Printed.]

fWhen I had last the pleasure of writing to you,
your dear little brother James and your sweet little
sister Mary were still with us. But it has pleased
God to remove them to another and a better world,
and we must submit to the will of Providence. 1
must, however, request of you to think sometimes
upon them, and to be very careful not to do anything
that will displease or vex your mother. It is therefore
proper that you do not roamp [Scottish indeed] too
much about, and that you learn your lessons.

' I went to Fraserburgh and visited Kinnaird Head
Lighthouse, which I found in good order. All this
time I travelled upon good roads, and paid many a
toll-man by the way ; but from Fraserburgh to Banff
there is no toll-bars, arid the road is so bad that I had
to walk up and down many a hill, and for want of
bridges the horses had to drag the chaise up to the
middle of the wheels in water. At Banff I saw a large
ship of 300 tons lying on the sands upon her beam-
ends, and a wreck for want of a good harbour.
Captain Wilson — to whom I beg my compliments —
will show you a ship of 300 tons. At the towns of
Macduff, Banff, and Portsoy, many of the houses are
built of marble, and the rocks on this part of the coast
or sea-side are marble. But, my dear Boys, unless
marble be polished and dressed, it is a very coarse-

DOMESTIC ANNALS 41

looking stone, and has no more beauty than common
rock. As a proof of this, ask the favour of your
mother to take you to Thomson's Marble Works in
South Leith, and you will see marble in all its stages,
and perhaps you may there find Portsoy marble ! The
use I wish to make of this is to tell you that, without
education, a man is just like a block of rough, un-
polished marble. Notice, in proof of this, how much
Mr. Neill and Mr. M'Gregor [the tutor] know, and
observe how little a man knows who is not a good
scholar. On my way to Fochabers I passed through
many thousand acres of Fir timber, and saw many
deer running in these woods.'

[To Mrs. Stevenson.]

'Inverness, July 2 1st.

' I propose going to church in the afternoon, and as
I have breakfasted late, I shall afterwards take a walk,
and dine about six o'clock. I do not know who is
the clergyman here, but I shall think of you all. I
travelled in the mail-coach [from Banff] almost alone.
While it was daylight I kept the top, and the passing
along a country I had never before seen was a con-
siderable amusement. But, my dear, you are all much
in my thoughts, and many are the objects which recall
the recollection of our tender and engaging children
we have so recently lost. We must not, however,
repine. I could not for a moment wish any change of
circumstances in their case ; and in every comparative
view of their state, I see the Lord's goodness in
removing them from an evil world to an abode of
bliss; and I must earnestly hope that you may be
enabled to take such a view of this affliction as to live
in the happy prospect of our all meeting again to part

42 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

no more — and that under such considerations you are
getting up your spirits. I wish you would walk about,
and by all means go to town, and do not sit much at
home/

' Inverness, July 23rd.

' 1 am duly favoured with your much-valued letter,
and I am happy to find that you are so much with my
mother,, because that sort of variety has a tendency to
occupy the mind, and to keep it from brooding too
much upon one subject. Sensibility and tenderness
are certainly two of the most interesting and pleasing
qualities of the mind. These qualities are also none
of the least of the many endearingments of the female
character. But if that kind of sympathy and pleasing
melancholy, which is familiar to us under distress, be
much indulged, it becomes habitual, and takes such a
hold of the mind as to absorb all the other affections,
and unfit us for the duties and proper enjoyments of
life. Resignation sinks into a kind of peevish dis-
content. I am far, however, from thinking there is
the least danger of this in your case, my dear ; for you
have been on all occasions enabled to look upon the
fortunes of this life as under the direction of a higher
power, and have always preserved that propriety and
consistency of conduct in all circumstances which
endears your example to your family in particular,
and to your friends. I am therefore, my dear, for
you to go out much, and to go to the house up-stairs
[he means to go up-stairs in the house, to visit the
place of the dead children], and to put yourself in the
way of the visits of your friends. I wish you would
call on the Miss Grays, and it would be a good thing
upon a Saturday to dine with my mother, and take
Meggy and all the family with you, and let them have

DOMESTIC ANNALS 43

their strawberries in town. The tickets of one of the
old-fashioned coaches would take you all up, and if the
evening were good, they could all walk down, except-
ing Meggy and little David.'

1 Inverness, July Z5th, 11 p.m.

' Captain Wemyss, of Wemyss, has come to Inverness
to go the voyage with me, and as we are sleeping in
a double-bedded room, I must no longer transgress.
You must remember me the best way you can to the
children.'

' On board of the Lighthouse Yacht, July
' 1 got to Cromarty yesterday about mid-day, and
went to church. It happened to be the sacrament
there, and I heard a Mr. Smith at that place conclude
the service with a very suitable exhortation. There
seemed a great concourse of people, but they had
rather an unfortunate day for them at the tent,, as it
rained a good deal. After drinking tea at the inn,
Captain Wemyss accompanied me on board, and we
sailed about eight last night. The wind at present
being rather a beating one, I think I shall have an
opportunity of standing into the bay of Wick, and
leaving this letter to let you know my progress and
that I am well.'

' Lighthouse Yacht, Stornorvay, August 4>th.
' To-day we had prayers on deck as usual when
at sea. I read the 14th chapter, I think, of Job.
Captain Wemyss has been in the habit of doing this
on board his own ship, agreeably to the Articles of
War. Our passage round the Cape [Cape Wrath] was
rather a cross one, and as the wind was northerly, we
had a pretty heavy sea, but upon the whole have

44. A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

made a good passage, leaving many vessels behind us
in Orkney. I am quite well, my dear; and Captain
Wemyss, who has much spirit, and who is much given
to observation, and a perfect enthusiast in his pro-
fession, enlivens the voyage greatly. Let me entreat
you to move about much, and take a walk with the
boys to Leith. I think they have still many places to
see there, and I wish you would indulge them in this
respect. Mr. Scales is the best person I know for
showing them the sailcloth -weaving, etc., and he
would have great pleasure in undertaking this. My
dear, I trust soon to be with you, and that through
the goodness of God we shall meet all well.

' There are two vessels lying here with emigrants
for America, each with eighty people on board, at all
ages, from a few days to upwards of sixty! Their
prospects must be very forlorn to go with a slender
purse for distant and unknown countries/

'Lighthouse Yacht, off Greenock, Aug. 1 8th.
f It was after church-time before we got here, but we
had prayers upon deck on the way up the Clyde. This
has, upon the whole, been a very good voyage, and
Captain Wemyss, who enjoys it much, has been an
excellent companion ; we met with pleasure, and shall
part with regret.'

Strange that, after his long experience, my
grandfather should have learned so little of the
attitude and even the dialect of the spiritually-
minded ; that after forty-four years in a most
religious circle, he could drop without sense of
incongruity from a period of accepted phrases to
4 trust his wife was getting up her spirits,' or think

DOMESTIC ANNALS 45

to reassure her as to the character of Captain
Wemyss by mentioning that he had read prayers
on the deck of his frigate ' agreeably to the Articles
of War ' ! Yet there is no doubt — and it is one of
the most agreeable features of the kindly series—-
that he was doing his best to please, and there is
little doubt that he succeeded. Almost all my
grandfather's private letters have been destroyed.
This correspondence has not only been preserved
entire, but stitched up in the same covers with the
works of the godly women, the Reverend John
Campbell, and the painful Mrs. Ogle. I did not
think to mention the good dame, but she comes in
usefully as an example. Amongst the treasures
of the ladies of my family, her letters have been
honoured with a volume to themselves. I read
about a half of them myself ; then handed over
the task to one of stauncher resolution, with orders
to communicate any fact that should be found
to illuminate these pages. Not one was found ;
it was her only art to communicate by post second-
rate sermons at second-hand ; and such, I take it,
was the correspondence in which my grandmother
delighted. If I am right, that of Robert
Stevenson, with his quaint smack of the contem-
porary ' Sandford and Merton,' his interest in the
whole page of experience, his perpetual quest, and
fine scent of all that seems romantic to a boy, his
needless pomp of language, his excellent good

46 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

sense, his unfeigned, unstained, unwearied human
kindliness, would seem to her, in a comparison,
dry and trivial and worldly. And if these letters
were by an exception cherished and preserved, it
would be for one or both of two reasons — because
they dealt with and were bitter-sweet reminders
of a time of sorrow ; or because she was pleased,
perhaps touched, by the writer's guileless efforts
to seem spiritually-minded.

After this date there were two more births and
two more deaths, so that the number of the family
remained unchanged ; in all five children survived
to reach maturity and to outlive their parents.

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 47

CHAPTER II

THE SERVICE OF THE NORTHERN LIGHTS

I

IT were hard to imagine a contrast more sharply
denned than that between the lives of the men and
women of this family : the one so chambered, so
centred in the affections and the sensibilities ; the
other so active, healthy, and expeditious. From
May to November, Thomas Smith and Robert
Stevenson were on the mail, in the saddle, or at
sea ; and my grandfather, in particular, seems
to have been possessed with a demon of activity
in travel. In 1802, by direction of the Northern
Lighthouse Board, he had visited the coast of
England from St. Bees, in Cumberland, and round
by the Scilly Islands to some place undecipherable
by me ; in all a distance of 2500 miles. In 1806 I
find him starting ' on a tour round the south coast
of England, from the Humber to the Severn.'
Peace was not long declared ere he found means to
visit Holland, where he was in time to see, in the
navy-yard at Helvoetsluys, ' about twenty of
Bonaparte's English flotilla lying in a state of decay,

48 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

the object of curiosity to Englishmen.' By 1834
he seems to have been acquainted with the coast
of France from Dieppe to Bordeaux ; and a main
part of his duty as Engineer to the Board of
Northern Lights was one round of dangerous and
laborious travel.

In 1786, when Thomas Smith first received the
appointment, the extended and formidable coast
of Scotland was lighted at a single point — the Isle
of May, in the jaws of the Firth of Forth, where,
on a tower already a hundred and fifty years old,
an open coal-fire blazed in an iron chauffer. The
whole archipelago, thus nightly plunged in dark-
ness, was shunned by sea-going vessels, and the
favourite courses were north about Shetland and
west about St. Kilda. When the Board met,
four new lights formed the extent of their intentions
— Kinnaird Head, in Aberdeenshire, at the eastern
elbow of the coast ; North Ronaldsay, in Orkney,
to keep the north and guide ships passing to the
south'ard of Shetland ; Island Glass, on Harris,
to mark the inner shore of the Hebrides and
illuminate the navigation of the Minch ; and the
Mull of Kintyre. These works were to be attempted
against obstacles, material and financial, that might
have staggered the most bold. Smith had no ship
at his command till 1791 ; the roads in those
outlandish quarters where his business lay were
scarce passable when they existed, and the tower

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 49

on the Mull of Kintyre stood eleven months un-
lighted while the apparatus toiled and foundered
by the way among rocks and mosses. Not only
had towers to be built and apparatus transplanted ;
the supply of oil must be maintained, and the men
fed, in the same inaccessible and distant scenes ;
a whole service, with its routine and hierarchy,
had to be called out of nothing ; and a new trade
(that of lightkeeper) to be taught, recruited, and
organised. The funds of the Board were at the
first laughabty inadequate. They embarked on
their career on a loan of twelve hundred pounds,
and their income in 1789, after relief by a fresh
Act of Parliament, amounted to less than three
hundred. It must be supposed that the thoughts
of Thomas Smith, in these early years, were some-
times coloured with despair ; and since he built and
lighted one tower after another, and created and
bequeathed to his successors the elements of an
excellent administration, it may be conceded that
he was not after all an unfortunate choice for a
first engineer.

War added fresh complications. In 1794 Smith
came 4 very near to be taken ' by a French squadron.
In 1813 Robert Stevenson was cruising about the
neighbourhood of Cape Wrath in the immediate
fear of Commodore Rogers. The men, and
especially the sailors, of the lighthouse service
must be protected by a medal and ticket from the

D

50 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

brutal activity of the press-gang. And the zeal
of volunteer patriots was at times embarrassing.

'I set off on foot/ writes my grandfather, 'for
Marazion, a town at the head of Mount's Bay, where I
was in hopes of getting a boat to freight. I had
just got that length, and was making the necessary
inquiry, when a young man, accompanied by several
idle-looking fellows, came up to me, and in a hasty
tone said, " Sir, in the king's name I seize your person
and papers." To which I replied that I should be
glad to see his authority, and know the reason of an
address so abrupt. He told me the want of time
prevented his taking regular steps, but that it would
be necessary for me to return to Penzance, as I was
suspected of being a French spy. I proposed to
submit my papers to the nearest Justice of Peace,
who was immediately applied to, and came to the inn
where I was. He seemed to be greatly agitated, and
quite at a loss how to proceed. The complaint
preferred against me was " that I had examined the
Longships Lighthouse with the most minute attention,
and was no less particular in my inquiries at the
keepers of the lighthouse regarding the sunk rocks
lying off the Land's End, with the sets of the currents
and tides along the coast : that I seemed particularly
to regret the situation of the rocks called the Seven
Stones, and the loss of a beacon which the Trinity
Board had caused to be fixed on the Wolf Rock ; that
I had taken notes of the bearings of several sunk
rocks, and a drawing of the lighthouse, and of Cape
Cornwall. Further, that I had refused the honour
of Lord Edgecombe's invitation to dinner, offering as
an apology that I had some particular business on
hand." '

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 51

My grandfather produced in answer his credentials
and letter of credit ; but the justice, after perusing
them, ' very gravely observed that they were
" musty bits of paper," ' and proposed to maintain
the arrest. Some more enlightened magistrates
at Penzance relieved him of suspicion and left him
at liberty to pursue his journey, — c which I did
with so much eagerness,' he adds, ' that I gave
the two coal lights on the Lizard only a very
transient look.'

Lighthouse operations in Scotland differed
essentially in character from those in England.
The English coast is in comparison a habitable,
homely place, well supplied with towns ; the
Scottish presents hundreds of miles of savage
islands and desolate moors. The Parliamentary
committee of 1834, profoundly ignorant of this
distinction, insisted with my grandfather that the
work at the various stations should be let out on
contract c in the neighbourhood,' where sheep and
deer, and gulls and cormorants, and a few ragged
gillies, perhaps crouching in a bee-hive house,
made up the only neighbours. In such situations
repairs and improvements could only be overtaken
by collecting (as my grandfather expressed it)
a few 4 lads,' placing them under charge of a fore-
man, and despatching them about the coast as
occasion served. The particular danger of these
seas increased the difficulty. The course of the

52 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

lighthouse tender lies amid iron-bound coasts,
among tide-races, the whirlpools of the Pentland
Firth, flocks of islands, flocks of reefs, many of them
uncharted. The aid of steam was not yet. At
first in random coasting sloop, and afterwards
in the cutter belonging to the service, the engineer
must ply and run amongst these multiplied dangers,
and sometimes late into the stormy autumn. For
pages together my grandfather's diary preserves a
record of these rude experiences ; of hard winds
and rough seas ; and of ' the try-sail and storm-
jib, those old friends which I never like to see.'
They do not tempt to quotation, but it was the
man's element, in which he lived, and delighted to
live, and some specimen must be presented. On
Friday, September 10th, 1830, the Regent lying in
Lerwick Bay, we have this entry : 4 The gale
increases, with continued rain.' On the morrow,
Saturday, llth, the weather appeared to moderate,
and they put to sea, only to be driven by evening
into Levenswick. There they lay, ' rolling much,'
with both anchors ahead and the square yard on
deck, till the morning of Saturday, 18th. Saturday
and Sunday they were plying to the southward with
a ' strong breeze and a heavy sea,' and on Sunday
evening anchored in Otterswick. ' Monday, 20th,
it blows so fresh that we have no communication
with the shore. We see Mr. Rome on the beach,
but we cannot communicate with him. It blows

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 53

" mere fire," as the sailors express it.' And for
three days more the diary goes on with tales of
davits unshipped, high seas, strong gales from the
southward, and the ship driven to refuge in Kirk-
wall or Deer Sound. I have many a passage before
me to transcribe, in which my grandfather draws
himself as a man of minute and anxious exactitude
about details. It must not be forgotten that these
voyages in the tender were the particular pleasure
and reward of his existence ; that he had in him
a reserve of romance which carried him delightedly
over these hardships and perils ; that to him it
was 4 great gain ' to be eight nights and seven
days in the savage bay of Levenswick — to read
a book in the much agitated cabin — to go on deck
and hear the gale scream in his ears, and see the
landscape dark with rain, and the ship plunge at
her two anchors — and to turn in at night and wake
again at morning, in his narrow berth, to the
clamorous and continued voices of the gale.

His perils and escapes were beyond counting.
I shall only refer to two : the first, because of the
impression made upon himself ; the second, from
the incidental picture it presents of the north
islanders. On the 9th October 1794 he took
passage from Orkney in the sloop Elizabeth of
Stromness. She made a fair passage till within
view of Kinnaird Head, where, as she was becalmed
some three miles in the offing, and wind seemed

54 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

to threaten from the south-east, the captain
landed him, to continue his journey more ex-
peditiously ashore. A gale immediately followed,
and the Elizabeth was driven back to Orkney and
lost with ah1 hands. The second escape I have been
in the habit of hearing related by an eye-witness,
my own father, from the earliest days of childhood.
On a September night, the Regent lay in the Pentland
Firth in a fog and a violent and windless swell.
It was still dark, when they were alarmed by the
sound of breakers, and an anchor was immediately
let go. The peep of dawn discovered them swing-
ing in desperate proximity to the Isle of Swona l
and the surf bursting close under their stern.
There was in this place a hamlet of the inhabitants,
fisher-folk and wreckers ; their huts stood close
about the head of the beach. All slept ; the doors
were closed, and there was no smoke, and the
anxious watchers on board ship seemed to contem-
plate a village of the dead. It was thought possible
to launch a boat and tow the Regent from her place
of danger ; and with this view a signal of distress
was made and a gun fired with a red-hot poker
from the galley. Its detonation awoke the
sleepers. Door after door was opened, and in the
grey light of the morning fisher after fisher was

1 This is only a probable hypothesis ; I have tried to identify
my father's anecdote in my grandfather's diary, and may very
well have been deceived.— [R. L. S.]

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 55

seen to come forth, yawning and stretching himself,
nightcap on head. Fisher after fisher, I wrote,
and my pen tripped ; for it should rather stand
wrecker after wrecker. There was no emotion,
no animation, it scarce seemed any interest ; not
a hand was raised ; but all callously awaited the
harvest of the sea, and their children stood by their
side and waited also. To the end of his life, my
father remembered that amphitheatre of placid
spectators on the beach ; and with a special and
natural animosity, the boys of his own age. But
presently a light air sprang up, and filled the sails,
and fainted, and filled them again ; and little by
little the Regent fetched way against the swell, and
clawed off shore into the turbulent firth.

The purpose of these voyages was to effect a
landing on open beaches or among shelving rocks,
not for persons only, but for coals and food, and
the fragile furniture of light-rooms. It was often
impossible. In 1831 I find my grandfather
4 hovering for a week ' about the Pentland Skerries
for a chance to land ; and it was almost always
difficult. Much knack and enterprise were early
developed among the seamen of the service ; their
management of boats is to this day a matter of
admiration ; and I find my grandfather in his
diary depicting the nature of their excellence in
one happily descriptive phrase, when he remarks
that Captain Soutar had landed ' the small stores

56 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and nine casks of oil with all the activity of a
smuggler.' And it was one thing to land, another
to get on board again. I have here a passage
from the diary, where it seems to have been touch-
and-go. ' I landed at Tarbetness, on the eastern
side of the point, in a mere gale or blast of wind
from west-south-west, at 2 p.m. It blew so fresh
that the captain, in a kind of despair, went off
to the ship, leaving myself and the steward ashore.
While I was in the light-room, I felt it shaking
and waving, not with the tremor of the Bell Rock,
but with the waving of a tree ! This the light-
keepers seemed to be quite familiar to, the principal
keeper remarking that " it was very pleasant,"
perhaps meaning interesting or curious. The
captain worked the vessel into smooth water with
admirable dexterity, and I got on board again
about 6 p.m. from the other side of the point.'
But not even the dexterity of Soutar could prevail
always ; and my grandfather must at times have
been left in strange berths and with but rude
provision. I may instance the case of my father,
who was storm-bound three days upon an islet,
sleeping in the uncemented and unchimneyed
houses of the islanders, and subsisting on a diet
of nettle-soup and lobsters.

The name of Soutar has twice escaped my pen,
and I feel I owe him a vignette. Soutar first
attracted notice as mate of a praam at the Bell

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 57

Rock, and rose gradually to be captain of the
Regent. He was active, admirably skilled in his
trade, and a man incapable of fear. Once, in
London, he fell among a gang of confidence-men,
naturally deceived by his rusticity and his
prodigious accent. They plied him with drink —
a hopeless enterprise, for Soutar could not be made
drunk ; they proposed cards, and Soutar would not
play. At last, one of them, regarding him with a
formidable countenance, inquired if he were not
frightened ? ' 1 5m no' very easy fleyed,' replied
the captain. And the rooks withdrew after some
easier pigeon. So many perils shared, and the
partial familiarity of so many voyages, had given
this man a stronghold in my grandfather's esti-
mation ; and there is no doubt but he had the
art to court and please him with much hypocritical
skill. He usually dined on Sundays in the cabin.
He used to come down daily after dinner for a glass
of port or whisky, often in his full rig of sou'-wester,
oilskins, and long boots ; and I have often heard it
described how insinuatingly he carried himself on
these appearances, artfully combining the extreme
of deference with a blunt and seamanlike
demeanour. My father and uncles, with the
devilish penetration of the boy, were far from being
deceived ; and my father, indeed, was favoured
with an object-lesson not to be mistaken. He had
crept one rainy night into an apple-barrel on deck,

58 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and from this place of ambush overheard Soutar
and a comrade conversing in their oilskins. The
smooth sycophant of the cabin had wholly dis-
appeared, and the boy listened with wonder to a
vulgar and truculent ruffian. Of Soutar, I may
say tantum vidi, having met him in the Leith docks
now more than thirty years ago, when he abounded
in the praises of my grandfather, encouraged me
(in the most admirable manner) to pursue his
footprints, and left impressed for ever on my
memory the image of his own Bardolphian nose.
He died not long after.

The engineer was not only exposed to the hazards
of the sea ; he must often ford his way by land to
remote and scarce accessible places, beyond reach
of the mail or the post-chaise, beyond even the
tracery of the bridle-path, and guided by natives
across bog and heather. Up to 1807 my grand-
father seems to have travelled much on horseback ;
but he then gave up the idea — ' such,' he writes
with characteristic emphasis and capital letters, c is
the Plague of Baiting.' He was a good pedestrian ;
at the age of fifty-eight I find him covering seven-
teen miles over the moors of the Mackay country
in less than seven hours, and that is not bad
travelling for a scramble. The piece of country-
traversed was already a familiar track, being
that between Loch Eriboll and Cape Wrath ; and
I think I can scarce do better than reproduce from

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 59

the diary some traits of his first visit. The tender
lay in Loch Eriboll ; by five in the morning they
sat down to breakfast on board ; by six they
were ashore — my grandfather, Mr. Slight an
assistant, and Soutar of the jolly nose, and had
been taken in charge by two young gentlemen of
the neighbourhood and a pair of gillies. About
noon they reached the Kyle of Durness and passed
the ferry. By half-past three they were at Cape
Wrath — not yet known by the emphatic abbrevia-
tion of ' The Cape ' — and beheld upon all sides of
them unfrequented shores, an expanse of desert
moor, and the high-piled Western Ocean. The
site of the tower was chosen. Perhaps it is by
inheritance of blood, but I know few things more
inspiriting than this location of a lighthouse in
a designated space of heather and air, through
which the sea-birds are still flying. By 9 p.m. the
return journey had brought them again to the
shores of the Kyle. The night was dirty, and as
the sea was high and the ferry-boat small, Soutar
and Mr. Stevenson were left on the far side, while
the rest of the party embarked and were received
into the darkness. They made, in fact, a safe
though an alarming passage ; but the ferryman
refused to repeat the adventure ; and my grand-
father and the captain long paced the beach,
impatient for their turn to pass, and tormented
with rising anxiety as to the fate of their com-

60 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

panions. At length they sought the shelter of a
shepherd's house. ' We had miserable up-putting,'
the diary continues, ' and on both sides of the ferry
much anxiety of mind. Our beds were clean straw,
and but for the circumstance of the boat, I should
have slept as soundly as ever I did after a walk
through moss and mire of sixteen hours.'

To go round the lights, even to-day, is to visit
past centuries. The tide of tourists that flows
yearly in Scotland, vulgarising all where it
approaches, is still defined by certain barriers. It
will be long ere there is a hotel at Sumburgh or a
hydropathic at Cape Wrath; it will be long ere
any char-a-banc, laden with tourists, shall drive
up to Barra Head or Monach, the Island of the
Monks. They are farther from London than St.
Petersburg, and except for the towers, sounding and
shining all night with fog-bells and the radiance of
the light-room, glittering by day with the trivial
brightness of white paint, these island and moor-
land stations seem inaccessible to the civilisation
of to-day, and even to the end of my grandfather's
career the isolation was far greater. There ran
no post at all in the Long Island ; from the light-
house on Barra Head a boat must be sent for letters
as far as Tobermory, between sixty and seventy
miles of open sea ; and the posts of Shetland,
which had surprised Sir Walter Scott in 1814, were
still unimproved in 1833, when my grandfather

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 61

reported on the subject. The group contained at
the time a population of 30,000 souls, and enjoyed
a trade which had increased in twenty years seven-
fold, to between three and four thousand tons.
Yet the mails were despatched and received by
chance coasting vessels at the rate of a penny a
letter ; six and eight weeks often elapsed between
opportunities, and when a mail was to be made
up, sometimes at a moment's notice, the bellman
was sent hastily through the streets of Lerwick.
Between Shetland and Orkney, only seventy miles
apart, there was ' no trade communication what-
ever.5

Such was the state of affairs, only sixty years
ago, with the three largest clusters of the Scottish
Archipelago ; and forty-seven years earlier, when
Thomas Smith began his rounds, or forty-two,
when Robert Stevenson became conjoined with
him in these excursions, the barbarism was deep,
the people sunk in superstition, the circumstances
of their life perhaps unique in history. Lerwick
and Kirkwall, like Guam or the Bay of Islands,
were but barbarous ports where whalers called
to take up and to return experienced seamen. On
the outlying islands the clergy lived isolated,
thinking other thoughts, dwelling in a different
country from their parishioners, like missionaries
in the South Seas. My grandfather's unrivalled
treasury of anecdote was never written down ;

62 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

it embellished his talk while he yet was, and died
with him when he died ; and such as have been
preserved relate principally to the islands of
Ronaldsay and Sanday, two of the Orkney group.
These bordered on one of the water-highways of
civilisation ; a great fleet passed annually in their
view, and of the shipwrecks of the world they were
the scene and cause of a proportion wholly incom-
mensurable to their size. In one year, 1798, my
grandfather found the remains of no fewer than
five vessels on the isle of Sanday, which is scarcely
twelve miles long.

' Hardly a year passed/ he writes, ' without instances
of this kind ; for, owing to the projecting points of
this strangely formed island, the lowness and whiteness
of its eastern shores, and the wonderful manner in
which the scanty patches of land are intersected with
lakes and pools of water, it becomes, even in daylight,
a deception, and has often been fatally mistaken for
an open sea. It had even become proverbial with
some of the inhabitants to observe that tl if wrecks
were to happen, they might as well be sent to the
poor isle of Sanday as anywhere else." On this and
the neighbouring islands the inhabitants had certainly
had their share of wrecked goods, for the eye is
presented with these melancholy remains in almost
every form. For example, although quarries are to be
met with generally in these islands, and the stones are
very suitable for building dykes (Anglice, walls), yet
instances occur of the land being enclosed, even to a
considerable extent, with ship-timbers. The author
has actually seen a park (Anglice, meadow) paled

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 63

round chiefly with cedar-wood and mahogany from the
wreck of a Honduras-built ship ; and in one island,
after the wreck of a ship laden with wine, the inhabit-
ants have been known to take claret to their barley-
meal porridge. On complaining to one of the pilots
of the badness of his boat's sails, he replied to the
author with some degree of pleasantry, " Had it been
His will that you came na' here wi' your lights, we
might 'a' had better sails to our boats, and more o'
other things." It may further be mentioned that
when some of Lord Dundas's farms are to be let in
these islands a competition takes place for the lease,
and it is bona Jide understood that a much higher rent
is paid than the lands would otherwise give were it
not for the chance of making considerably by the
agency and advantages attending shipwrecks on the
shores of the respective farms/

The people of North Ronaldsay still spoke Norse,
or, rather, mixed it with their English. The walls
of their huts were built to a great thickness of
rounded stones from the sea-beach ; the roof
flagged, loaded with earth, and perforated by a
single hole for the escape of smoke. The grass
grew beautifully green on the flat house-top, where
the family would assemble with their dogs and
cats, as on a pastoral lawn ; there were no windows,
and in my grandfather's expression, ' there was
really no demonstration of a house unless it were
the diminutive door.' He once landed on
Ronaldsay with two friends. ' The inhabitants
crowded and pressed so much upon the strangers

64 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

that the bailiff, or resident factor of the island,
blew with his ox-horn, calling out to the natives to
stand off and let the gentlemen come forward to
the laird ; upon which one of the islanders, as
spokesman, called out, " God ha'e us, man ! thou
needsna mak' sic a noise. It 's no* every day we
ha'e three hatted men on our isle." When the
Surveyor of Taxes came (for the first time, per-
haps) to Sanday, and began in the King's name
to complain of the unconscionable swarms of dogs,
and to menace the inhabitants with taxation, it
chanced that my grandfather and his friend, Dr.
Patrick Neill, were received by an old lady in a
Ronaldsay hut. Her hut, which was similar to
the model described, stood on a Ness, or point of
land jutting into the sea. They were made
welcome in the firelit cellar, placed l in casey or
straw-worked chairs, after the Norwegian fashion,
with arms, and a canopy overhead,' and given milk
in a wooden dish. These hospitalities attended
to, the old lady turned at once to Dr. Neill, whom
she took for the Surveyor of Taxes. ' Sir,' said
she, ' gin ye '11 tell the King that I canna keep the
Ness free o' the Bangers (sheep) without twa
hun's, and twa guid hun's too, he '11 pass me
threa the tax on dugs.'

This familiar confidence, these traits of engaging
simplicity, are characters of a secluded people.
Mankind — and, above all, islanders — come very

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 65

swiftly to a bearing, and find very readily, upon
one convention or another, a tolerable corporate
life. The danger is to those from without, who
have not grown up from childhood in the islands,
but appear suddenly in that narrow horizon, life-
sized apparitions. For these no bond of humanity
exists, no feeling of kinship is awakened by their
peril ; they will assist at a shipwreck, like the
fisher-folk of Lunga, as spectators, and when the
fatal scene is over, and the beach strewn with dead
bodies, they will fence their fields with mahogany,
and, after a decent grace, sup claret to their
porridge. It is not wickedness : it is scarce evil ;
it is only, in its highest power, the sense of isolation
and the wise disinterestedness of feeble and poor
races. Think how many viking ships had sailed
by these islands in the past, how many vikings
had landed, and raised turmoil, and broken up
the barrows of the dead, and carried off the wines
of the living ; and blame them, if you are able,
for that belief (which may be called one of the
parables of the devil's gospel) that a man rescued
from the sea will prove the bane of his deliverer.
It might be thought that my grandfather, coming
there unknown, and upon an employment so
hateful to the inhabitants, must have run the hazard
of his life. But this were to misunderstand. He
came franked by the laird and the clergyman ;
he was the King's officer ; the work was ' opened

E

66 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

with prayer by the Rev. Walter Trail, minister of
the parish ' ; God and the King had decided it,
and the people of these pious islands bowed their
heads. There landed, indeed, in North Ronald-
say, during the last decade of the eighteenth
century, a traveller whose life seems really to have
been imperilled. A very little man of a swarthy
complexion, he came ashore, exhausted and un-
shaved, from a long boat passage, and lay down
to sleep in the home of the parish schoolmaster.
But he had been seen landing. The inhabitants
had identified him for a Pict, as, by some singular
confusion of name, they called the dark and
dwarfish aboriginal people of the land. Imme-
diately the obscure ferment of a race-hatred,
grown into a superstition, began to work in their
bosoms, and they crowded about the house and the
room-door with fearful whisperings. For some
time the schoolmaster held them at bay, and at
last despatched a messenger to call my grand-
father. He came : he found the islanders beside
themselves at this unwelcome resurrection of the
dead and the detested ; he was shown, as admini-
cular of testimony, the traveller's uncouth and
thick-soled boots ; he argued, and finding argu-
ment unavailing, consented to enter the room
and examine with his own eyes the sleeping Pict.
One glance was sufficient : the man was now a
missionary, but he had been before that an

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 67

Edinburgh shopkeeper with whom my grandfather
had dealt. He came forth again with this report,
and the folk of the island, wholly relieved, dispersed
to their own houses. They were timid as sheep
and ignorant as limpets ; that was all. But the
Lord deliver us from the tender mercies of a
frightened flock !

I will give two more instances of their super-
stition. When Sir Walter Scott visited the Stones
of Stennis, my grandfather put in his pocket a
hundred-foot line, which he unfortunately lost.

'Some years afterwards,' he writes, 'one of my
assistants on a visit to the Stones of Stennis took
shelter from a storm in a cottage close by the lake ;
and seeing a box-measuring-line in the bole or sole of
the cottage window, he asked the woman where she
got this well-known professional appendage. She
said : et O sir, ane of the bairns fand it lang syne at
the Stanes ; and when drawing it out we took fright,
and thinking it had belanged to the fairies, we threw
it into the bole, and it has layen there ever since." ;

This is for the one ; the last shall be a sketch by
the master hand of Scott himself :

' At the village of Stromness, on the Orkney main
island, called Pomona, lived, in 1814, an aged dame
called Bessie Millie, who helped out her subsistence
by selling favourable winds to mariners. He was a
venturous master of a vessel who left the roadstead
of Stromness without paying his offering to propitiate
Bessie Millie ! Her fee was extremely moderate,
being exactly sixpence, for which she boiled her

68 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

kettle and gave the bark the advantage of her prayers,
for she disclaimed all unlawful acts. The wind thus
petitioned for was sure, she said, to arrive, though
occasionally the mariners had to wait some time for it.
The woman's dwelling and appearance were not unbe-
coming her pretensions. Her house, which was on
the brow of the steep hill on which Stromness is
founded, was only accessible by a series of dirty and
precipitous lanes, and for exposure might have been
the abode of Eolus himself, in whose commodities the
inhabitant dealt. She herself was, as she told us,
nearly one hundred years old, withered and dried up
like a mummy. A clay-coloured kerchief, folded
round her neck, corresponded in colour to her corpse-
like complexion. Two light blue eyes that gleamed
with a lustre like that of insanity, an utterance of
astonishing rapidity, a nose and chin that almost met
together, and a ghastly expression of cunning, gave
her the effect of Hecate. Such was Bessie Millie, to
whom the mariners paid a sort of tribute with a feeling
between jest and earnest/

II

From about the beginning of the century up to
1807 Robert Stevenson was in partnership with
Thomas Smith. In the last-named year the
partnership was dissolved ; Thomas Smith return-
ing to his business, and my grandfather becoming
sole engineer to the Board of Northern Lights.

I must try, by excerpts from his diary and corre-
spondence, to convey to the reader some idea of the
ardency and thoroughness with which he threw

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 69

himself into the largest and least of his multifarious
engagements in this service. But first I must
say a word or two upon the life of lightkeepers,
and the temptations to which they are more
particularly exposed. The lightkeeper occupies
a position apart among men. In sea-towers the
complement has always been three since the
deplorable business in the Eddystone, when one
keeper died, and the survivor, signalling in vain
for relief, was compelled to live for days with the
dead body. These usually pass their time by the
pleasant human expedient of quarrelling ; and
sometimes, I am assured, not one of the three is
on speaking terms with any other. On shore
stations, which on the Scottish coast are sometimes
hardly less isolated, the usual number is two, a
principal and an assistant. The principal is dis-
satisfied with the assistant, or perhaps the assistant
keeps pigeons, and the principal wants the water
from the roof. Their wives and families are with
them, living cheek by jowl. The children quarrel ;
Jockie hits Jimsie in the eye, and the mothers make
haste to mingle in the dissension. Perhaps there
is trouble about a broken dish ; perhaps Mrs.
Assistant is more highly born than Mrs. Principal
and gives herself airs ; and the men are drawn
in and the servants presently follow. ' Church
privileges have been denied the keeper's and the
assistant's servants,' I read in one case, and the

70 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

eminently Scots periphrasis means neither more
nor less than excommunication, ' on account of the
discordant and quarrelsome state of the families.
The cause, when inquired into, proves to be tittle-
tattle on both sides.' The tender comes round ;
the foremen and artificers go from station to
station ; the gossip flies through the whole system
of the service, and the stories, disfigured and
exaggerated, return to their own birthplace with
the returning tender. The English Board was
apparently shocked by the picture of these dis-
sensions. ' When the Trinity House can,' I find
my grandfather writing at Beachy Head, in 1834,
4 they do not appoint two keepers, they disagree
so ill. A man who has a family is assisted by his
family ; and in this way, to my experience and
present observation, the business is very much
neglected. One keeper is, in my view, a bad
system. This day's visit to an English lighthouse
convinces me of this, as the lightkeeper was walking
on a staff with the gout, and the business performed
by one of his daughters, a girl of thirteen or four-
teen years of age.' This man received a hundred
a year I It shows a different reading of human
nature, perhaps typical of Scotland and England,
that I find in my grandfather's diary the following
pregnant entry : ' The lightkeepers, agreeing ill,
keep one another to their duty.' But the Scottish
system was not alone founded on this cynical

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 71

opinion. The dignity and the comfort of the
northern lightkeeper were both attended to. He
had a uniform to ' raise him in his own estimation,
and in that of his neighbour, which is of conse-
quence to a person of trust. The keepers,' my
grandfather goes on, in another place, ' are attended
to in all the detail of accommodation in the best
style as shipmasters ; and this is believed to have
a sensible effect upon their conduct, and to regulate
their general habits as members of society.' He
notes, with the same dip of ink, that ' the brasses
were not clean, and the persons of the keepers not
trig ' ; and thus we find him writing to a culprit :
' I have to complain that you are not cleanly in
your person, and that your manner of speech is
ungentle, and rather inclines to rudeness. You
must therefore take a different view of your duties
as a lightkeeper.'. A high ideal for the service
appears in these expressions, and will be more
amply illustrated further on. But even the
Scottish lightkeeper was frail. During the un-
broken solitude of the winter months, when
inspection is scarce possible, it must seem a vain
toil to polish the brass hand-rail of the stair, or
to keep an unrewarded vigil in the light-room ;
and the keepers are habitually tempted to the
beginnings of sloth, and must unremittingly resist.
He who temporises with his conscience is already
lost. I must tell here an anecdote that illustrates

72 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

the difficulties of inspection. In the days of my
uncle David and my father there was a station
which they regarded with jealousy. The two
engineers compared notes and were agreed. The
tower was always clean, but seemed always to bear
traces of a hasty cleansing, as though the keepers
had been suddenly forewarned. On inquiry, it
proved that such was the case, and that a wander-
ing fiddler was the unfailing harbinger of the
engineer. At last my father was storm-stayed one
Sunday in a port at the other side of the island.
The visit was quite overdue, and as he walked
across upon the Monday morning he promised
himself that he should at last take the keepers
unprepared. They were both waiting for him
in uniform at the gate ; the fiddler had been there
on Saturday !

My grandfather, as will appear from the following
extracts, was much a martinet, and had a habit of
expressing himself on paper with an almost startling
emphasis. Personally, with his powerful voice,
sanguine countenance, and eccentric and original
locutions, he was well qualified to inspire a salutary
terror in the service.

' I find that the keepers have, by some means or
another, got into the way of cleaning too much with
rotten-stone and oil. I take the principal keeper to
task on this subject, and make him bring a clean towel
and clean one of the brazen frames, which leaves the

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 73

towel in an odious state. This towel I put up in a
sheet of paper, seal, and take with me to confront Mr.
Murdoch, who has just left the station.' 'This letter'
— a stern enumeration of complaints — ' to lie a week
on the light-room book-place, and to be put in the
Inspector's hands when he comes round.' 'It is
the most painful thing that can occur for me to have
a correspondence of this kind with any of the keepers ;
and when I come to the Lighthouse, instead of having
the satisfaction to meet them with approbation, it is
distressing when one is obliged to put on a most angry
countenance and demeanour ; but from such culpable
negligence as you have shown there is no avoiding it.
I hold it as a fixed maxim that, when a man or a
family put on a slovenly appearance in their houses,
stairs, and lanterns, I always find their reflectors,
burners, windows, and light in general, ill attended
to ; and, therefore, I must insist on cleanliness
throughout/ ' I find you very deficient in the duty
of the high tower. You thus place your appointment
as Principal Keeper in jeopardy ; and I think it
necessary, as an old servant of the Board, to put you
upon your guard once for all at this time. I call upon
you to recollect what was formerly and is now said to
you. The state of the backs of the reflectors at the
high tower was disgraceful, as I pointed out to you on
the spot. They were as if spitten upon, and greasy
finger-marks upon the back straps. I demand an
explanation of this state of things.' « The cause of
the Commissioners dismissing you is expressed in the
minute ; and it must be a matter of regret to you
that you have been so much engaged in smuggling,
and also that the Reports relative to the cleanliness of
the Lighthouse, upon being referred to, rather added
to their unfavourable opinion. ' * I do not go into the

74 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

dwelling-house, but severely chide the lightkeepers
for the disagreement that seems to subsist among
them.' 'The families of the two lightkeepers here
agree very ill. I have effected a reconciliation for the
present.' s Things are in a very humdrum state here.
There is no painting, and in and out of doors no taste
or tidiness displayed. Robert's wife greets and
McGregor's scolds; and Robert is so down-hearted
that he says he is unfit for duty. I told him that if
he was to mind wives' quarrels, and to take them up,
the only way was for him and McGregor to go down
to the point like Sir G. Grant and Lord Somerset.'
( I cannot say that I have experienced a more
unpleasant meeting than that of the lighthouse folks
this morning, or ever saw a stronger example of unfeel-
ing barbarity than the conduct which the s

exhibited. These two cold-hearted persons, not con-
tented with having driven the daughter of the poor
nervous woman from her father's house, both kept
pouncing at her, lest she should forget her great mis-
fortune. Write me of their conduct. Do not make
any communication of the state of these families at
Kinnaird Head, as this would be like Tale-bearing.'

There is the great word out. Tales and Tale-
bearing, always with the emphatic capitals, run
continually in his correspondence. I will give
but two instances : —

' Write to David [one of the lightkeepers] and cau-
tion him to be more prudent how he expresses himself.
Let him attend his duty to the Lighthouse and his
family concerns, and give less heed to Tale-bearers.'
' I have not your last letter at hand to quote its date ;
but, if I recollect, it contains some kind of tales,

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 75

which nonsense I wish you would lay aside, and notice
only the concerns of your family and the important
charge committed to you.'

Apparently, however, my grandfather was not
himself inaccessible to the Tale-bearer, as the
following indicates :

' In walking along with Mr. , I explain to him

that I should be under the necessity of looking more
closely into the business here from his conduct at
Buddonness, which had given an instance of weakness
in the Moral principle which had staggered my opinion
of him. His answer was, " That will be with regard to
the lass ? " I told him I was to enter no farther with
him upon the subject.' ' Mr. Miller appears to be
master and man. I am sorry about this foolish fellow.
Had I known his train, I should not, as I did, have
rather forced him into the service. Upon finding the
windows in the state they were, I turned upon
Mr. Watt, and especially upon Mr. Stewart. The
latter did not appear for a length of time to have
visited the light-room. On asking the cause — did
Mr. Watt and him (s/c) disagree ; he said no ; but he
had got very bad usage from the assistant, " who was a
very obstreperous man." I could not bring Mr. Watt
to put in language his objections to Miller; all I could
get was that, he being your friend, and saying he was
unwell, he did not like to complain or to push the
man ; that the man seemed to have no liking to any-
thing like work ; that he was unruly ; that, being an
educated man, he despised them. I was, however,
determined to have out of these unwilling witnesses the
language alluded to. I fixed upon Mr. Stewart as
chief; he hedged. My curiosity increased, and I

76 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

urged. Then he said, "What would I think, just

exactly, of Mr. Watt being called an Old B ?"

You may judge of my surprise. There was not
another word uttered. This was quite enough, as com-
ing from a person I should have calculated upon quite
different behaviour from. It spoke a volume of the
man's mind and want of principle.' ' Object to the
keeper keeping a Bull-Terrier dog of ferocious appear-
ance. It is dangerous, as we land at all times of the
night/ ' Have only to complain of the storehouse
floor being spotted with oil. Give orders for this being
instantly rectified, so that on my return to-morrow I
may see things in good order.' ' The furniture of both

houses wants much rubbing. Mrs. 's carpets are

absurd beyond anything I have seen. I want her to
turn the fenders up with the bottom to the fireplace :
the carpets, when not likely to be in use, folded up
and laid as a hearthrug partly under the fender.'

My grandfather was king in the service to his
finger-tips. All should go in his way, from the
principal lightkeeper's coat to the assistant's fender,
from the gravel in the garden-walks to the bad
smell in the kitchen, or the oil-spots on the store-
room floor. It might be thought there was nothing
more calculated to awake men's resentment, and
yet his rule was not more thorough than it was
beneficent. His thought for the keepers was
continual, and it did not end with their lives. He
tried to manage their successions ; he thought
no pains too great to arrange between a widow
and a son who had succeeded his father ; he was

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 77

often harassed and perplexed by tales of hardship ;
and I find him writing, almost in despair, of their
improvident habits and the destitution that awaited
their families upon a death. ' The house being
completely furnished, they come into possession
without necessaries, and they go out NAKED. The
insurance seems to have failed, and what next is to
be tried ? ' While they lived he wrote behind their
backs to arrange for the education of their children,
or to get them other situations if they seemed
unsuitable for the Northern Lights. When he
was at a lighthouse on a Sunday he held prayers
and heard the children read. When a keeper was
sick, he lent him his horse and sent him mutton
and brandy from the ship. ' The assistant's wife
having been this morning confined, there was sent
ashore a bottle of sherry and a few rusks — a practice
which I have always observed in this service,' he
writes. They dwelt, many of them, in uninhabited
isles or desert forelands, totally cut off from shops.
Many of them were, besides, fallen into a rustic
dishabitude of life, so that even when they visited
a city they could scarce be trusted with their
own affairs, as (for example) he who carried home
to his children, thinking they were oranges, a bag
of lemons. And my grandfather seems to have
acted, at least in his early years, as a kind of
gratuitous agent for the service. Thus I find him
writing to a keeper in 1806, when his mind was

78 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

already preoccupied with arrangements for the
Bell Rock : ' I am much afraid I stand very un-
favourably with you as a man of promise, as I was
to send several things of which I believe I have
more than once got the memorandum. All I can
say is that in this respect you are not singular.
This makes me no better ; but really I have been
driven about beyond all example in my past
experience, and have been essentially obliged to
neglect my own urgent affairs.' No servant of the
Northern Lights came to Edinburgh but he was
entertained at Baxter's Place to breakfast. There,
at his own table, my grandfather sat down
delightedly with his broad-spoken, homespun
officers. His whole relation to the service was,
in fact, patriarchal ; and I believe I may say that
throughout its ranks he was adored. I have
spoken with many who knew him ; I was his
grandson, and their words may have very well
been words of flattery ; but there was one thing
that could not be affected, and that was the look
and light that came into their faces at the name
of Robert Stevenson.

In the early part of the century the foreman
builder was a young man of the name of George
Peebles, a native of Anstruther. My grandfather
had placed in him a very high degree of confidence,
and he was already designated to be foreman at
the Bell Rock, when, on Christmas-day 1806, on

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 79

his way home from Orkney, he was lost in the
schooner Traveller. The tale of the loss of the
Traveller is almost a replica of that of the Elizabeth
of Stromness ; like the Elizabeth she came as far
as Kinnaird Head, was then surprised by a storm,
driven back to Orkney, and bilged and sank on
the island of Flotta. It seems it was about the
dusk of the day when the ship struck, and many
of the crew and passengers were drowned. About
the same hour, my grandfather was in his office
at the writing-table ; and the room beginning to
darken, he laid down his pen and fell asleep. In a
drearn he saw the door open and George Peebles
come in, ' reeling to and fro, and staggering like a
drunken man,' with water streaming from his head
and body to the floor. There it gathered into a
wave which, sweeping forward, submerged my
grandfather. Well, no matter how deep ; versions
vary ; and at last he awoke, and behold it was a
dream ! But it may be conceived how profoundly
the impression was written even on the mind
of a man averse from such ideas, when the news
came of the wreck on Flotta and the death of
George.

George's vouchers and accounts had perished
with himself ; and it appeared he was in debt to
the Commissioners. But my grandfather wrote to
Orkney twice, collected evidence of his disburse-
ments, and proved him to be seventy pounds

80 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

ahead. With this sum, he applied to George's
brothers, and had it apportioned between their
mother and themselves. He approached the
Board and got an annuity of £5 bestowed on the
widow Peebles ; and we find him writing her a
long letter of explanation and advice, and pressing
on her the duty of making a will. That he should
thus act executor was no singular instance. But
besides this we are able to assist at some of the
stages of a rather touching experiment ; no less
than an attempt to secure Charles Peebles heir
to George's favour. He is despatched, under the
character of ' a fine young man ' ; recommended
to gentlemen for ' advice, as he 's a stranger in
your place, and indeed to this kind of charge, this
being his first outset as Foreman ' ; and for a long
while after, the letter-book, in the midst of that
thrilling first year of the Bell Rock, is encumbered
with pages of instruction and encouragement.
The nature of a bill, and the precautions that are
to be observed about discounting it, are expounded
at length and with clearness. ' You are not, I
hope, neglecting, Charles, to work the harbour
at spring-tides ; and see that you pay the greatest
attention to get the well so as to supply the keeper
with water, for he is a very helpless fellow, and so
unfond of hard work that I fear he could do ill to
keep himself in water by going to the other side
for it.' — ' With regard to spirits, Charles, I see

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 81

very little occasion for it.' These abrupt apo-
strophes sound to me like the voice of an awakened
conscience ; but they would seem to have rever-
berated in vain in the ears of Charles. There was
trouble in Pladda, his scene of operations ; his
men ran away from him, there was at least a talk
of calling in the Sheriff. ' I fear,' writes my
grandfather, ' you have been too indulgent, and I
am sorry to add that men do not answer to be
too well treated, a circumstance which I have
experienced, and which you will learn as you go
on in business.' I wonder, was not Charles Peebles
himself a case in point ? Either death, at least,
or disappointment and discharge, must have ended
his sendee in the Northern Lights ; and in later
correspondence I look in vain for any mention of
his name — Charles, I mean, not Peebles : for as
late as 1839 my grandfather is patiently writing
to another of the family : ' I am sorry you took
the trouble of applying to me about your son, as
it lies quite out of my way to forward his views in
the line of his profession as a Draper.'

in

A professional life of Robert Stevenson has been
already given to the world by his son David, and
to that I would refer those interested in such
matters. But my own design, which is to represent
the man, would be very ill carried out if I suffered

F

82 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

myself or my reader to forget that he was, first of
all and last of all, an engineer. His chief claim
to the style of a mechanical inventor is on account
of the Jib or Balance Crane of the Bell Rock,
which are beautiful contrivances. But the great
merit of this engineer was not in the field of engines.
He was above all things a projector of works in
the face of nature, and a modifier of nature itself.
A road to be made, a tower to be built, a harbour
to be constructed, a river to be trained and guided
in its channel — these were the problems with which
his mind was continually occupied ; and for these
and similar ends he travelled the world for more
than half a century, like an artist, note-book in
hand.

He once stood and looked on at the emptying
of a certain oil-tube ; he did so watch in hand, and
accurately timed the operation ; and in so doing
offered the perfect type of his profession. The
fact acquired might never be of use : it was
acquired : another link in the world's huge chain
of processes was brought down to figures and placed
at the service of the engineer. ' The very term
mensuration sounds engineer-like? I find him
writing; and in truth what the engineer most
properly deals with is that which can be measured,
weighed, and numbered. The time of any operation
in hours and minutes, its cost in pounds, shillings,
and pence, the strain upon a given point in foot-

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 83

pounds — these are his conquests, with which he
must continually furnish his mind, and which, after
he has acquired them, he must continually apply
and exercise. They must be not only entries in
note-books, to be hurriedly consulted ; in the
actor's phrase, he must be stale in them ; in a word
of my grandfather's, they must be ' fixed in the
mind like the ten fingers and ten toes.'

These are the certainties of the engineer ; so far
he finds a solid footing and clear views. But the
province of formulas and constants is restricted.
Even the mechanical engineer comes at last to an
end of his figures, and must stand up, a practical
man, face to face with the discrepancies of nature
and the hiatuses of theory. After the machine is
finished, and the steam turned on, the next is to
drive it ; and experience and an exquisite sym-
pathy must teach him where a weight should be
applied or a nut loosened. With the civil engineer,
more properly so called (if anything can be proper
with this awkward coinage), the obligation starts
with the beginning. He is always the practical
man. The rains, the winds and the waves, the
complexity and the fitfulness of nature, are always
before him. He has to deal with the unpredictable,
with those forces (in Smeaton's phrase) that * are
subject to no calculation ' ; and still he must
predict, still calculate them, at his peril. His
work is not yet in being, and he must foresee its

84 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

influence : how it shall deflect the tide, exaggerate
the waves, dam back the rain-water, or attract
the thunderbolt. He visits a piece of sea-board ;
and from the inclination and soil of the beach,
from the weeds and shell-fish, from the configura-
tion of the coast and the depth of soundings out-
side, he must deduce what magnitude of waves is
to be looked for. He visits a river, its summer
water babbling on shallows ; and he must not only
read, in a thousand indications, the measure of
winter freshets, but be able to predict the violence
of occasional great floods. Nay, and more ; he
must not only consider that which is, but that
which may be. Thus I find my grandfather
writing, in a report on the North Esk Bridge :
' A less waterway might have sufficed, but the
valleys may come to be meliorated by drainage.9
One field drained after another through all that
confluence of vales, and we come to a time when
they shall precipitate by so much a more copious
and transient flood, as the gush of the flowing
drain-pipe is superior to the leakage of a peat.

It is plain there is here but a restricted use for
formulas. In this sort of practice, the engineer
has need of some transcendental sense. Smeaton,
the pioneer, bade him obey his ' feelings ' ; my
father, that ' power of estimating obscure forces
which supplies a coefficient of its own to every rule.'
The rules must be everywhere indeed ; but they

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 85

must everywhere be modified by this transcendental
coefficient, everywhere bent to the impression of
the trained eye and the feelings of the engineer.
A sentiment of physical laws and of the scale
of nature, which shall have been strong in the
beginning and progressively fortified by observation,
must be his guide in the last recourse. I had
the most opportunity to observe my father. He
would pass hours on the beach, brooding over the
waves, counting them, noting their least deflection,
noting when they broke. On Tweedside, or by
Lyne or Manor, we have spent together whole
afternoons ; to me, at the time, extremely weari-
some ; to him, as I am now sorry to think, bitterly
mortifying. The river was to me a pretty and
various spectacle ; I could not see — I could not be
made to see — it otherwise. To my father it was
a chequer-board of lively forces, which he traced
from pool to shallow with minute appreciation and
enduring interest. * That bank was being under-
cut,' he might say. ' Why ? Suppose you were to
put a groin out here, would not the filum fluminis
be cast abruptly off across the channel ? and where
would it impinge upon the other shore ? and what
would be the result ? Or suppose you were to
blast that boulder, what would happen ? Follow
it — use the eyes God has given you — can you not
see that a great deal of land would be reclaimed
upon this side ? ' It was to me like school in

86 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

holidays ; but to him, until I had worn him out
with my invincible triviality, a delight. Thus he
pored over the engineer's voluminous handy-book
of nature ; thus must, too, have pored my grand-
father and uncles.

But it is of the essence of this knowledge, or
this knack of mind, to be largely incommunicable.
" It cannot be imparted to another,' says my father.
The verbal casting-net is thrown in vain over these
evanescent, inferential relations. Hence the in-
significance of much engineering literature. So
far as the science can be reduced to formulas or
diagrams, the book is to the point ; so far as the
art depends on intimate study of the ways of
nature, the author's words will too often be found
vapid. This fact — that engineering looks one
way, and literature another — was what my grand-
father overlooked. All his life long, his pen was
in his hand, piling up a treasury of knowledge,
preparing himself against all possible contingencies.
Scarce anything fell under his notice but he per-
ceived in it some relation to his work, and chronicled
it in the pages of his journal in his always lucid,
but sometimes inexact and wordy, style. The
Travelling Diary (so he called it) was kept in
fascicles of ruled paper, which were at last bound
up, rudely indexed, and put by for future reference.
Such volumes as have reached me contain a surpris-
ing medley : the whole details of his employment

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 87

in the Northern Lights and his general practice ;
the whole biography of an enthusiastic engineer.
Much of it is useful and curious ; much merely
otiose ; and much can only be described as an
attempt to impart that which cannot be imparted
in words. Of such are his repeated and heroic
descriptions of reefs ; monuments of misdirected
literary energy, which leave upon the mind of the
reader no effect but that of a multiplicity of words
and the suggested vignette of a lusty old gentleman
scrambling among tangle. It is to be remembered
that he came to engineering while yet it was in
the egg and without a library, and that he saw
the bounds of that profession widen daily. He
saw iron ships, steamers, and the locomotive
engine, introduced. He lived to travel from
Glasgow to Edinburgh in the inside of a forenoon,
and to remember that he himself had ' often been
twelve hours upon the journey, and his grand-
father (Lillie) two days ' ! The profession was
still but in its second generation, and had already
broken down the barriers of time and space. Who
should set a limit to its future encroachments ?
And hence, with a kind of sanguine pedantry, he
pursued his design of ' keeping up with the day '
and posting himself and his family on every mortal
subject. Of this unpractical idealism we shall
meet with many instances ; there was not a trade,
and scarce an accomplishment, but he thought

88 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

it should form part of the outfit of an engineer ;
and not content with keeping an encyclopaedic
diary himself, he would fain have set all his sons
to work continuing and extending it. They were
more happily inspired. My father's engineering
pocket-book was not a bulky volume ; with its
store of pregnant notes and vital formulas, it
served him through life, and was not yet filled
when he came to die. As for Robert Stevenson
and the Travelling Diary, I should be ungrateful
to complain, for it has supplied me with many
lively traits for this and subsequent chapters ; but
I must still remember much of the period of my
study there as a sojourn in the Valley of the
Shadow.

The duty of the engineer is twofold — to design
the work, and to see the work done. We have
seen already something of the vociferous thorough-
ness of the man, upon the cleaning of lamps and
the polishing of reflectors. In building, in road-
making, in the construction of bridges, in every
detail and byway of his employments, he pursued
the same ideal. Perfection (with a capital P
and violently under-scored) was his design. A
crack for a penknife, the waste of * six-and-thirty
shillings,' ' the loss of a day or a tide,' in each of
these he saw and was revolted by the finger of the
sloven ; and to spirits intense as his, and immersed
in vital undertakings, the slovenly is the dishonest,

THE NORTHERN LIGHTS 89

and wasted time is instantly translated into lives
endangered. On this consistent idealism there is
but one thing that now and then trenches with a
touch of incongruity, and that is his love of the
picturesque. As when he laid out a road on
Hogarth's line of beauty ; bade a foreman be
careful, in quarrying, not ' to disfigure the island * ;
or regretted in a report that ' the great stone,
called the Devil in the Hole, was blasted or broken
down to make road-metal, and for other purposes
of the work.'

90 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

CHAPTER III

THE BUILDING OF THE BELL ROCK

OFF the mouths of the Tay and the Forth, thirteen
miles from Fifeness, eleven from Arbroath, and
fourteen from the Red Head of Angus, lies the
Inchcape or Bell Rock. It extends to a length of
about fourteen hundred feet, but the part of it
discovered at low water to not more than four
hundred and twenty-seven. At a little more than
half -flood in fine weather the seamless ocean joins
over the reef, and at high-water springs it is buried
sixteen feet. As the tide goes down, the higher
reaches of the rock are seen to be clothed by
Conferva rupestris as by a sward of grass ; upon the
more exposed edges, where the currents are most
swift and the breach of the sea heaviest, Baderlock
or Hen ware flourishes ; and the great Tangle grows
at the depth of several fathoms with luxuriance.
Before man arrived, and introduced into the silence
of the sea the smoke and clangour of a blacksmith's
shop, it was a favourite resting-place of seals.
The crab and lobster haunt in the crevices ; and
limpets, mussels, and the white buckie abound.

THE BELL ROCK 91

According to a tradition, a bell had been once
hung upon this rock by an abbot of Arbroath,1
4 and being taken down by a sea-pirate, a year
thereafter he perished upon the same rock, with
ship and goods, in the righteous judgment of God.'
From the days of the abbot and the sea-pirate no
man had set foot upon the Inchcape, save fishers
from the neighbouring coast, or perhaps — for a
moment, before the surges swallowed them — the
unfortunate victims of shipwreck. The fishers
approached the rock with an extreme timidity ;
but their harvest appears to have been great, and
the adventure no more perilous than lucrative.
In 1800, on the occasion of my grandfather's first
landing, and during the two or three hours which
the ebb-tide and the smooth water allowed them
to pass upon its shelves, his crew collected upwards
of two hundredweight of old metal : pieces of a
kedge anchor and a cabin stove, crowbars, a hinge
and lock of a door, a ship's marking-iron, a piece
of a ship's caboose, a soldier's bayonet, a cannon
ball, several pieces of money, a shoe-buckle, and
the like. Such were the spoils of the Bell Rock.

1 This is, of course, the tradition commemorated by Southey
in his ballad of 'The Inchcape Bell.' Whether true or not, it
points to the fact that from the infancy of Scottish navigation,
the seafaring mind had been fully alive to the perils of this reef.
Repeated attempts had been made to mark the place with
beacons, but all efforts were unavailing (one such beacon having
been carried away within eight days of its erection) until Robert
Stevenson conceived and carried out the idea of the stone tower.

92 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

But the number of vessels actually lost upon the
reef was as nothing to those that were cast away
in fruitless efforts to avoid it. Placed right in the
fairway of two navigations, and one of these the
entrance to the only harbour of refuge between
the Downs and the Moray Firth, it breathed abroad
along the whole coast an atmosphere of terror and
perplexity ; and no ship sailed that part of the
North Sea at night, but what the ears of those on
board would be strained to catch the roaring of the
seas on the Bell Rock.

From 1794 onward, the mind of my grandfather
had been exercised with the idea of a light upon
this formidable danger. To build a tower on a
sea rock, eleven miles from shore, and barely
uncovered at low water of neaps, appeared a
fascinating enterprise. It was something yet
unattempted, unessayed ; and even now, after it
has been lighted for more than eighty years, it is
still an exploit that has never been repeated.1

1 The particular event which concentrated Mr. Stevenson's
attention on the problem of the Bell Rock was the memorable
gale of December 1799, when, among many other vessels, H.M.S.
York, a seventy-four-gun ship, went down with all hands on
board. Shortly after this disaster Mr. Stevenson made a careful
survey, and prepared his models for a stone tower, the idea of
which was at first received with pretty general scepticism.
Smeaton's Eddystone tower could not be cited as affording a
parallel, for there the rock is not submerged even at high-water,
while the problem of the Bell Rock was to build a tower of
masonry on a sunken reef far distant from land, covered at every
tide to a depth of twelve feet or more, and having thirty-two
fathoms' depth of water within a mile of its eastern edge.

THE BELL ROCK 93

My grandfather was, besides, but a young man,
of an experience comparatively restricted, and a
reputation confined to Scotland ; and when he
prepared his first models, and exhibited them in
Merchants' Hall, he can hardly be acquitted of
audacity. John Clerk of Eldin stood his friend
from the beginning, kept the key of the model
room, to which he carried ' eminent strangers,'
and found words of counsel and encouragement
beyond price. ' Mr. Clerk had been personally
known to Smeaton, and used occasionally to speak
of him to me,' says my grandfather ; and again :
' I felt regret that I had not the opportunity of
a greater range of practice to fit me for such an
undertaking ; but I was fortified by an expression
of my friend Mr. Clerk in one of our conversations.
" This work," said he, " is unique, and can be little
forwarded by experience of ordinary masonic
operations. In this case Smeaton's * Narrative '
must be the text-book, and energy and perseverance
the pratique." '

A Bill for the work was introduced into Parlia-
ment and lost in the Lords in 1802-3. John Rennie
was afterwards, at my grandfather's suggestion,
called in council, with the style of chief engineer.
The precise meaning attached to these words by
any of the parties appears irrecoverable. Chief
engineer should have full authority, full responsi-
bility, and a proper share of the emoluments;

94 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

and there were none of these for Rennie. I find
in an appendix a paper which resumes the con-
troversy on this subject ; and it will be enough
to say here that Rennie did not design the Bell
Rock, that he did not execute it, and that he was
not paid for' it.1 From so much of the corre-
spondence as has come down to me, the acquaint-
ance of this man, eleven years his senior, and already
famous, appears to have been both useful and
agreeable to Robert Stevenscn. It is amusing to

1 The grounds for the rejection of the Bill by the House of
Lords in 1802-3 had been that the extent of coast over which dues
were proposed to be levied would be too great. Before going
to Parliament again, the Board of Northern Lights, desiring to
obtain support and corroboration for Mr. Stevenson's views, con-
sulted first Telford, who was unable to give the matter his atten-
tion, and then (on Stevenson's suggestion) Rennie, who concurred
in affirming the practicability of a stone tower, and supported the
Bill when it came again before Parliament in 1806. Rennie was
afterwards appointed by the Commissioners as advising engineer,
whom Stevenson might consult in cases of emergency. It seems
certain that the title of chief engineer had in this instance no more
meaning than the above. Rennie, in point of fact, proposed
certain modifications in Stevenson's plans, which the latter did
not accept ; nevertheless Rennie continued to take a kindly
interest in the work, and the two engineers remained in friendly
correspondence during its progress. The official view taken by
the Board as to the quarter in which lay both the merit and the
responsibility of the work may be gathered from a minute of the
Commissioners at their first meeting held after Stevenson died ;
in which they record their regret 'at the death of this zealous,
faithful, and able officer, to whom is due the honour of conceiving
and executing the Bell Rock Lighthouse* The matter is briefly
summed up in the Life of Robert Stevenson by his son David
Stevenson (A. & C. Black, 1878), and fully discussed, on the
basis of official facts and figures, by the same writer in a letter to
the Civil Engineers* and Architects' Journal t 1862.

THE BELL ROCK 95

find my grandfather seeking high and low for a
brace of pistols which his colleague had lost by
the way between Aberdeen and Edinburgh ; and
writing to Messrs. Dollond, ' I have not thought
it necessary to trouble Mr. Rennie with this order,
but / beg you will see to get two minutes of him
as he passes your door ' — a proposal calculated rather
from the latitude of Edinburgh than from London,
even in 1807. It is pretty, too, to observe with
what affectionate regard Smeaton was held in mind
by his immediate successors. ' Poor old fellow,'
writes Rennie to Stevenson, ' I hope he will now
and then take a peep at us, and inspire you with
fortitude and courage to brave all difficulties and
dangers to accomplish a work which will, if success-
ful, immortalise you in the annals of fame.' The
style might be bettered, but the sentiment is
charming.

Smeaton was, indeed, the patron saint of the
Bell Rock. Undeterred by the sinister fate of
Winstanley, he had tackled and solved the problem
of the Eddystone ; but his solution had not been
in all respects perfect. It remained for my grand-
father to outdo him in daring, by applying to a
tidal rock those principles which had been already
justified by the success of the Eddystone, and to
perfect the model by more than one exemplary
departure. Smeaton had adopted in his floors
the principle of the arch ; each therefore exercised

96 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

an outward thrust upon the walls, which must
be met and combated by embedded chains. My
grandfather's flooring-stones, on the other hand,
were flat, made part of the outer wall, and were
keyed and dovetailed into a central stone, so as to
bind the work together and be positive elements
of strength. In 1703 Winstanley still thought
it possible to erect his strange pagoda, with its
open gallery, its florid scrolls and candlesticks :
like a rich man's folly for an ornamental water in
a park, Smeaton followed ; then Stevenson in
his turn corrected such flaws as were left in
Smeaton's design ; and with his improvements,
it is not too much to say the model was made
perfect. Smeaton and Stevenson had between
them evolved and finished the sea-tower. No
subsequent builder has departed in anything
essential from the principles of their design. It
remains, and it seems to us as though it must
remain for ever, an ideal attained. Every stone
in the building, it may interest the reader to know,
my grandfather had himself cut out in the model ;
and the manner in which the courses were fitted,
joggled, trenailed, wedged, and the bond broken,
is intricate as a puzzle and beautiful by ingenuity.

In 1806 a second Bill passed both Houses, and
the preliminary works were at once begun. The
same year the Navy had taken a great harvest of
prizes in the North Sea, one of which, a Prussian

THE BELL ROCK 97

fishing dogger, flat-bottomed and rounded at the
stem and stern, was purchased to be a floating
lightship, and re-named the Pharos. By July
1807 she was overhauled, rigged for her new pur-
pose, and turned into the lee of the Isle of May.
' It was proposed that the whole party should meet
in her and pass the night ; but she rolled from
side to side in so extraordinary a manner, that
even the most seahardy fled. It was humorously
observed of this vessel that she was in danger of
making a round turn and appearing with her keel
uppermost ; and that she would even turn a half-
penny if laid upon deck.' By two o'clock on the
morning of the 15th July this purgatorial vessel
was moored by the Bell Rock.

A sloop of forty tons had been in the meantime
built at Leith, and named the Smeaton ; by the
7th of August my grandfather set sail in her —

f carrying with him Mr. Peter Logan, foreman builder,
and five artificers selected from their having been
somewhat accustomed to the sea, the writer being
aware of the distressing trial which the floating light
would necessarily inflict upon landsmen from her
rolling motion. Here he remained till the 10th, and,
as the weather was favourable,, a landing was effected
daily, when the workmen were employed in cutting
the large seaweed from the sites of the lighthouse and
beacon, which were respectively traced with pickaxes
upon the rock. In the meantime the crew of the
Smeaton was employed in laying down the several
sets of moorings within about half a mile of the rock

G

98 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

for the convenience of vessels. The artificers, having,
fortunately, experienced moderate weather, returned
to the workyard of Arbroath with a good report of
their treatment afloat; when their comrades ashore
began to feel some anxiety to see a place of which
they had heard so much, and to change the constant
operations with the iron and mallet in the process of
hewing for an occasional tide's work on the rock, which
they figured to themselves as a state of comparative
ease and comfort.'

I am now for many pages to let my grandfather
speak for himself, and tell in his own words the
story of his capital achievement. The tall quarto
of 583 pages from which the following narrative
has been dug out is practically unknown to the
general reader, yet good judges have perceived its
merit, and it has been named (with flattering wit)
* The Romance of Stone and Lime ' and * The
Robinson Crusoe of Civil Engineering.' The tower
was but four years in the building ; it took Robert
Stevenson, in the midst of his many avocations,
no less than fourteen to prepare the Account. The
title-page is a solid piece of literature of upwards
of a hundred words ; the table of contents runs to
thirteen pages ; and the dedication (to that revered
monarch, George iv) must have cost him no little
study and correspondence. Walter Scott was
called in council, and offered one miscorrection
which still blots the page. In spite of all this
pondering and filing, there remain pages not easy

THE BELL ROOK 99

to construe, and inconsistencies not easy to explain
away. I have sought to make these disappear,
and to lighten a little the baggage with which my
grandfather marches ; here and there I have
rejointed and rearranged a sentence, always with
his own words, and all with a reverent and faithful
hand ; and I offer here to the reader the true
Monument of Robert Stevenson with a little of
the moss removed from the inscription, and the
Portrait of the artist with some superfluous canvas
cut away.

100

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807

Sunday,
1 6th Aug.

Monday,
lyth Aug.

I

OPERATIONS OF 1807

Everything being arranged for sailing to the rock on
Saturday the 15th, the vessel might have proceeded
on the Sunday ; but understanding that this would
not be so agreeable to the artificers it was deferred
until Monday. Here we cannot help observing that
the men allotted for the operations at the rock seemed
to enter upon the undertaking with a degree of con-
sideration which fully marked their opinion as to the
hazardous nature of the undertaking on which they
were about to enter. They went in a body to church
on Sunday, and whether it was in the ordinary course,
or designed for the occasion, the writer is not certain,
but the service was, in many respects, suitable to their
circumstances.

The tide happening to fall late in the evening of
Monday the 17th, the party, counting twenty-four in
number, embarked on board of the Smeaton about ten
o'clock p.m., and sailed from Arbroath with a gentle
breeze at west. Our ship's colours having been flying
all day in compliment to the commencement of the
work, the other vessels in the harbour also saluted,
which made a very gay appearance. A number of the
friends and acquaintances of those on board having
been thus collected, the piers, though at a late hour,
were perfectly crowded, and just as the Smeaton
cleared the harbour, all on board united in giving
three hearty cheers, which were returned by those on
shore in such good earnest, that, in the still of the
evening, the sound must have been heard in all parts
of the town, re-echoing from the walls and lofty

THE BELL

turrets of the venerable Abbey of Aberbrothwick. 1807
The writer felt much satisfaction at the manner of this
parting scene, though he must own that the present
rejoicing was, on his part, mingled with occasional
reflections upon the responsibility of his situation,
which extended to the safety of all who should be
engaged in this perilous work. With such sensations
he retired to his cabin ; but as the artificers were
rather inclined to move about the deck than to remain
in their confined berths below, his repose was transient,
and the vessel being small every motion was neces-
sarily heard. Some who were musically inclined
occasionally sung; but he listened with peculiar
pleasure to the sailor at the helm, who hummed over
Dibdin's characteristic air : —

( They say there 's a Providence sits up aloft,
To keep watch for the life of poor Jack.'

The weather had been very gentle all night, and, Tuesday,
about four in the morning of the 18th, the Smeaton l8thAu£-
anchored. Agreeably to an arranged plan of opera-
tions, all hands were called at five o'clock a.m., just as
the highest part of the Bell Rock began to show its
sable head among the light breakers, which occasion-
ally whitened with the foaming sea. The two boats
belonging to the floating light attended the Smeaton,
to carry the artificers to the rock, as her boat could
only accommodate about six or eight sitters. Every
one was more eager than his neighbour to leap into
the boats, and it required a good deal of management
on the part of the coxswains to get men unaccustomed
to a boat to take their places for rowing and at the
same time trimming her properly. The landing-
master and foreman went into one boat, while the
writer took charge of another, and steered it to and

•5 OS A J'AJW-LY OF ENGINEERS

1807 from the rock. This became the more necessary in
the early stages of the work, as places could not be
spared for more than two, or at most three, seamen to
each boat, who were always stationed, one at the bow,
to use the boat-hook in fending or pushing off, and
the other at the aftermost oar, to give the proper time
in rowing, while the middle oars were double-banked,
and rowed by the artificers.

As the weather was extremely fine, with light airs
of wind from the east, we landed without difficulty
upon the central part of the rock at half-past five, but
the water had not yet sufficiently left it for commenc-
ing the work. This interval, however, did not pass
unoccupied. The first and last of all the principal
operations at the Bell Rock were accompanied by three
hearty cheers from all hands, and, on occasions like the
present, the steward of the ship attended, when each
man was regaled with a glass of rum. As the water
left the rock about six, some began to bore the holes
for the great bats or holdfasts, for fixing the beams of
the Beacon-house, while the smith was fully attended
in laying out the site of his forge, upon a somewhat
sheltered spot of the rock, which also recommended
itself from the vicinity of a pool of water for temper-
ing his irons. These preliminary steps occupied about
an hour, and as nothing further could be done during
this tide towards fixing the forge, the workmen grati-
fied their curiosity by roaming about the rock, which
they investigated with great eagerness till the tide
overflowed it. Those who had been sick picked dulse
(Fucus palmatus], which they ate with much seeming
appetite; others were more intent upon collecting
limpets for bait, to enjoy the amusement of fishing
when they returned on board of the vessel. Indeed,
none came away empty-handed, as everything found

THE BELL ROCK 10S

upon the Bell Rock was considered valuable, being 1807
connected with some interesting association. Several
coins, and numerous bits of shipwrecked iron, were
picked up, of almost every description ; and, in par-
ticular, a marking-iron lettered JAMES — a circumstance
of which it was thought proper to give notice to the
public, as it might lead to the knowledge of some
unfortunate shipwreck, perhaps unheard of till this
simple occurrence led to the discovery. When the
rock began to be overflowed, the landing-master
arranged the crews of the respective boats, appointing
twelve persons to each. According to a rule which
the writer had laid down to himself, he was always the
last person who left the rock.

In a short time the Bell Rock was laid completely
under water, and the weather being extremely fine,
the sea was so smooth that its place could not be
pointed out from the appearance of the surface — a
circumstance which sufficiently demonstrates the
dangerous nature of this rock, even during the day,
and in the smoothest and calmest state of the sea.
During the interval between the morning and the
evening tides, the artificers were variously employed
in fishing and reading; others were busy in drying
and adjusting their wet clothes, and one or two
amused their companions with the violin and German
flute.

About seven in the evening the signal bell for
landing on the rock was again rung, when every man
was at his quarters. In this service it was thought
more appropriate to use the bell than to pipe to
quarters, as the use of this instrument is less known
to the mechanic than the sound of the bell. The
landing, as in the morning, was at the eastern harbour.
During this tide the seaweed was pretty well cleared

104 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 from the site of the operations, and also from the
tracks leading to the different landing-places; for
walking upon the rugged surface of the Bell Rock,
when covered with seaweed, was found to be ex-
tremely difficult and even dangerous. Every hand
that could possibly be occupied was now employed in
assisting the smith to fit up the apparatus for his
forge. At 9 p.m. the boats returned to the tender, after
other two hours' work, in the same order as formerly —
perhaps as much gratified with the success that
attended the work of this day as with any other in the
whole course of the operations. Although it could
not be said that the fatigues of this day had been
great, yet all on board retired early to rest. The sea
being calm, and no movement on deck, it was pretty
generally remarked in the morning that the bell
awakened the greater number on board from their
first sleep; and though this observation was not
altogether applicable to the writer himself, yet he
was not a little pleased to find that thirty people could
all at once become so reconciled to a night's quarters
within a few hundred paces of the Bell Rock.
Wednes- Being extremely anxious at this time to get forward

ioth Aug with fixing the smith's forge, on which the progress of
the work at present depended, the writer requested
that he might be called at daybreak to learn the
landing-master's opinion of the weather from the
appearance of the rising sun, a criterion by which
experienced seamen can generally judge pretty accu-
rately of the state of the weather for the following
day. About five o'clock, on coming upon deck, the
sun's upper limb or disc had just begun to appear as if
rising from the ocean, and in less than a minute he
was seen in the fullest splendour ; but after a short
interval he was enveloped in a soft cloudy sky, which

THE BELL ROCK 105

was considered emblematical of fine weather. His 1807
rays had not yet sufficiently dispelled the clouds which
hid the land from view, and the Bell Rock being still
overflowed, the whole was one expanse of water. This
scene in itself was highly gratifying; and, when the
morning bell was tolled, we were gratified with the
happy forebodings of good weather and the expecta-
tion of having both a morning and an evening tide's
work on the rock.

The boat which the writer steered happened to be
the last which approached the rock at this tide ; and,
in standing up in the stern, while at some distance, to
see how the leading boat entered the creek, he was
astonished to observe something in the form of a
human figure, in a reclining posture, upon one of the
ledges of the rock. He immediately steered the boat
through a narrow entrance to the eastern harbour,
with a thousand unpleasant sensations in his mind.
He thought a vessel or boat must have been wrecked
upon the rock during the night ; and it seemed
probable that the rock might be strewed with dead
bodies, a spectacle which could not fail to deter the
artificers from returning so freely to their work. In
the midst of these reveries the boat took the ground
at an improper landing-place ; but, without waiting to
push her off, he leapt upon the rock, and making his
way hastily to the spot which had privately given him
alarm, he had the satisfaction to ascertain that he had
only been deceived by the peculiar situation and
aspect of the smith's anvil and block, which very
completely represented the appearance of a lifeless
body upon the rock. The writer carefully suppressed
his feelings, the simple mention of which might have
had a bad effect upon the artificers, and his haste
passed for an anxiety to examine the apparatus of the

106 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807- smith's forge, left in an unfinished state at evening
tide.

In the course of this morning's work two or three
apparently distant peals of thunder were heard, and
the atmosphere suddenly became thick and foggy.
But as the Sme.aton, our present tender, was moored at
no great distance from the rock, the crew on board
continued blowing with a horn, and occasionally fired
a musket, so that the boats got to the ship without
difficulty.

Thursday, The wind this morning inclined from the north-
aot ug. eas^ an(j the sky had a heavy and cloudy appearance,
but the sea was smooth, though there was an un-
dulating motion on the surface, which indicated
easterly winds, and occasioned a slight surf upon the
rock. But the boats found no difficulty in landing at
the western creek at half-past seven, and, after a good
tide's work, left it again about a quarter from eleven.
In the evening the artificers landed at half-past seven,
and continued till half-past eight, having completed
the fixing of the smith's forge, his vice, and a wooden
board or bench, which were also batted to a ledge of
the rock, to the great joy of all, under a salute of
three hearty cheers. From an oversight on the part
of the smith, who had neglected to bring his tinder-
box and matches from the vessel, the work was pre-
vented from being continued for at least an hour
longer.

The smith's shop was. of course, in open space : the
large bellows were carried to and from the rock every
tide, for the serviceable condition of which, together
with the tinder-box, fuel, and embers of the former
fire, the smith was held responsible. Those who have
been placed in situations to feel the inconvemency
and want of this useful artisan, will be able to ap-

THE BELL ROCK 107

predate his value in a case like the present. It often 1807
happened, to our annoyance and disappointment, in
the early state of the work, when the smith was in
the middle of a favourite heat in making some useful
article, or in sharpening the tools, after the flood-tide
had obliged the pickmen to strike work, a sea would
come rolling over the rocks, dash out the fire, and
endanger his indispensable^implement, the bellows. If
the sea was smooth, while the smith often stood at
work knee-deep in water, the tide rose by imper-
ceptible degrees, first cooling the exterior of the
fireplace, or hearth, and then quietly blackening
and extinguishing the fire from below. The
writer has frequently been amused at the per-
plexing anxiety of the blacksmith when coaxing his
fire and endeavouring to avert the effects of the rising
tide.

Everything connected with the forge being now Friday,
completed, the artificers found no want of sharp tools, 2ist ugt
and the work went forward with great alacrity and
spirit. It was also alleged that the rock had a more
habitable appearance from the volumes of smoke which
ascended from the smith's shop and the busy noise of
his anvil, the operations of the masons, the movements
of the boats, and shipping at a distance — all contri-
buted to give life and activity to the scene. This
noise and traffic had, however, the effect of almost
completely banishing the herd of seals which had
hitherto frequented the rock as a resting-place during
the period of low water. The rock seemed to be
peculiarly adapted to their habits, for, excepting two
or three days at neap-tides, a part of it always dries at
low water — at least, during the summer season — and
as there was good fishing-ground in the neighbour-
hood, without a human being to disturb or molest

108 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 them, it had become a very favourite residence of
these amphibious animals, the writer having occasion-
ally counted from fifty to sixty playing about the rock
at a time. But when they came to be disturbed every
tide, and their seclusion was broken in upon by the
kindling of great fires, together with the beating of
hammers and picks during low water, after hovering
about for a time, they changed their place, and seldom
more than one or two were to be seen about the rock
upon the more detached outlayers which dry partially,
whence they seemed to look with that sort of curiosity
which is observable in these animals when following a
boat.

Saturday, Hitherto the artificers had remained on board the
1 ug' Smeaton, which was made fast to one of the mooring
buoys at a distance only of about a quarter of a mile
from the rock, and, of course, a very great conveniency
to the work. Being so near, the seamen could never
be mistaken as to the progress of the tide, or state of
the sea upon the rock, nor could the boats be much at
a loss to pull on board of the vessel during fog, or
even in very rough weather ; as she could be cast loose
from her moorings at pleasure, and brought to the lee
side of the rock. But the Smeaton being only about
forty register tons, her accommodations were extremely
limited. It may, therefore, be easily imagined that
an addition of twenty-four persons to her own crew
must have rendered the situation of those on board
rather uncomfortable. The only place for the men's
hammocks on board being in the hold, they were
unavoidably much crowded : and if the weather had
required the hatches to be fastened down, so great a
number of men could not possibly have been accom-
modated. To add to this evil, the co-boose or cooking-
place being upon deck, it would not have been possible

THE BELT, ROCK 109

to have cooked for so large a company in the event of 1807
bad weather.

The stock of water was now getting short, and some
necessaries being also wanted for the floating light,
the Smeaton was despatched for Arbroath ; and the
writer, with the artificers, at the same time shifted
their quarters from her to the floating light.

Although the rock barely made its appearance at
this period of the tides till eight o'clock, yet, having
now a full mile to row from the floating light to the
rock, instead of about a quarter of a mile from the
moorings of the Smeaton, it was necessary to be earlier
astir, and to form different arrangements ; breakfast
was accordingly served up at seven o'clock this morning.
From the excessive motion of the floating light, the
writer had looked forward rather with anxiety to the
removal of the workmen to this ship. Some among
them, who had been congratulating themselves upon
having become sea-hardy while on board the Smeaton }
had a complete relapse upon returning to the floating
light. This was the case with the writer. From the
spacious and convenient berthage of the floating light,
the exchange to the artificers was, in this respect,
much for the better. The boats were also commodious,
measuring sixteen feet in length on the keel, so that,
in fine weather, their complement of sitters was sixteen
persons for each, with which, however, they were rather
crowded, but she could not stow two boats of larger
dimensions. When there was what is called a breeze
of wind, and a swell in the sea, the proper number for
each boat could not, with propriety, be rated at more
than twelve persons.

When the tide-bell rung the boats were hoisted out,
and two active seamen were employed to keep them
from receiving damage alongside. The floating light

110 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 being very buoyant, was so quick in her motions that
\vhen those who were about to step from her gunwale
into a boat, placed themselves upon a cleat or step on
the ship's side, with the man or rail ropes in their
hands, they had (often to wait for some time till a
favourable opportunity occurred for stepping into the
boat. While in this situation, with the vessel rolling
from side to side, watching the proper time for letting
go the man-ropes, it required the greatest dexterity
and presence of mind to leap into the boats. One
who was rather awkward would often wait a consider-
able period in this position : at one time his side of
the ship would be so depressed that he would touch
the boat to which he belonged, while the next sea
would elevate him so much that he would see his
comrades in the boat on the opposite side of the ship,
his friends in the one boat calling to him to ' Jump/
while those in the boat on the other side, as he came
again and again into their view, would jocosely say,
'Are you there yet? You seem to enjoy a swing.'
In this situation it was common to see a person upon
each side of the ship for a length of time, waiting to
quit his hold.

On leaving the rock to-day a trial of seamanship
was proposed amongst the rowers, for by this time the
artificers had become tolerably expert in this exercise.
By inadvertency some of the oars provided had been
made of fir instead of ash, and although a considerable
stock had been laid in, the workmen, being at first
awkward in the art, were constantly breaking their
oars; indeed it was no uncommon thing to see the
broken blades of a pair of oars floating astern, in the
course of a passage from the rock to the vessel. The
men, upon the whole, had but little work to perform
in the course of a day ; for though they exerted them-

THE BELL ROCK 111

selves extremely hard while on the rock, yet, in the 1807
early state of the operations, this could not be continued
for more than three or four hours at a time, and as
their rations were large — consisting of one pound and
a half of beef, one pound of ship biscuit, eight ounces
oatmeal, two ounces barley, two ounces butter, three
quarts of small beer, with vegetables and salt — they
got into excellent spirits when free of sea-sickness.
The rowing of the boats against each other became a
favourite amusement, which was rather a fortunate
circumstance, as it must have been attended with
much inconvenience had it been found necessary to
employ a sufficient number of sailors for this purpose.
The writer, therefore, encouraged the spirit of emula-
tion, and the speed of their respective boats became a
favourite topic. Premiums for boat-races were insti-
tuted, which were contended for with great eagerness,
and the respective crews kept their stations in the
boats with as much precision as they kept their beds
on board of the ship. With these and other pastimes,
when the weather was favourable, the time passed
away among the inmates of the forecastle and waist of
the ship. The writer looks back with interest upon
the hours of solitude which he spent in this lonely
ship with his small library.

This being the first Saturday that the artificers were
afloat, all hands were served with a glass of rum and
water at night, to drink the sailors' favourite toast of
( Wives and Sweethearts/ It was customary, upon
these occasions, for the seamen and artificers to collect
in the galley, when the musical instruments were put
in requisition : for, according to invariable practice,
every man must play a tune, sing a song, or tell a
story.

Having, on the previous evening, arranged matters 23^ Aug.

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 with the landing-master as to the business of the day,
the signal was rung for all hands at half-past seven
this morning. In the early state of the spring-tides
the artificers went to the rock before breakfast, but as
the tides fell later in the day, it became necessary
to take this meal before leaving the ship. At eight
o'clock all hands were assembled on the quarter-deck
for prayers, a solemnity which was gone through in
as orderly a manner as circumstances would admit.
When the weather permitted, the flags of the ship
were hung up as an awning or screen, forming the
quarter-deck into a distinct compartment ; the pendant
was also hoisted at the mainmast, and a large ensign
flag was displayed over the stern ; and lastly, the ship's
companion, or top of the staircase, was covered with
the flag proper of the Lighthouse Service, on which
the Bible was laid. A particular toll of the bell called
all hands to the quarter-deck, when the writer read a
chapter of the Bible, and, the whole ship's company
being uncovered, he also read the impressive prayer
composed by the Reverend Dr. Brunton, one of the
ministers of Edinburgh.

Upon concluding this service, which was attended
with becoming reverence and attention, all on board
retired to their respective berths to breakfast, and, at
half-past nine, the bell again rung for the artificers to
take their stations in their respective boats. Some
demur having been evinced on board about the
propriety of working on Sunday, which had hitherto
been touched upon as delicately as possible, all hands
being called aft, the writer, from the quarter-deck,
stated generally the nature of the service, expressing
his hopes that every man would feel himself called
upon to consider the erection of a lighthouse on the
Bell Rock, in every point of view, as a work of neces-

THE BELL ROCK US

sity and mercy. He knew that scruples had existed 1807
with some, and these had, indeed, been fairly and
candidly urged before leaving the shore; but it was
expected that, after having seen the critical nature of
the rock, and the necessity of the measure, every man
would now be satisfied of the propriety of embracing
all opportunities of landing on the rock when the state
of the weather would permit. The writer further
took them to witness that it did not proceed from
want of respect for the appointments and established
forms of religion that he had himself adopted the
resolution of attending the Bell Rock works on the
Sunday; but, as he hoped, from a conviction that it
was his bound en duty, on the strictest principles of
morality. At the same time it was intimated that, if
any were of a different opinion, they should be perfectly
at liberty to hold their sentiments without the imputa-
tion of contumacy or disobedience ; the only difference
would be in regard to the pay.

Upon stating this much, he stepped into his boat,
requesting all who were so disposed to follow him.
The sailors, from their habits, found no scruple on this
subject, and all of the artificers, though a little tardy,
also embarked, excepting four of the masons, who,
from the beginning, mentioned that they would
decline working on Sundays. It may here be noticed
that throughout the whole of the operations it was
observable that the men wrought, if possible, with
more keenness upon the Sundays than at other times,
from an impression that they were engaged in a work
of imperious necessity, which required every possible
exertion. On returning to the floating light, after
finishing the tide's work, the boats were received by
the part of the ship's crew left on board with the
usual attention of handing ropes to the boats and

H

114 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 helping the artificers on board ; but the four masons
who had absented themselves from the work did not
appear upon deck.

Monday, The boats left the floating light at a quarter-past
ug" nine o'clock this morning, and the work began at
three-quarters past nine; but as the neap-tides were
approaching the working time at the rock became
gradually shorter, and it was now with difficulty that
two and a half hours' work could be got. But so
keenly had the workmen entered into the spirit of
the beacon-house operations, that they continued to
bore the holes in the rock till some of them were knee-
deep in water.

The operations at this time were entirely directed
to the erection of the beacon, in which every man felt
an equal interest, as at this critical period the slightest
casualty to any of the boats at the rock might have
been fatal to himself individually, while it was perhaps
peculiar to the writer more immediately to feel for the
safety of the whole. Each log or upright beam of the
beacon was to be fixed to the rock by two strong and
massive bats or stanchions of iron. These bats, for the
fixture of the principal and diagonal beams and bracing
chains, required fifty-four holes, each measuring two
inches in diameter and eighteen inches in depth.
There had already been so considerable a progress
made in boring and excavating the holes that the
writer's hopes of getting the beacon erected this year
began to be more and more confirmed, although it was
now advancing towards what was considered the latter
end of the proper working season at the Bell Rock.
The foreman joiner, Mr. Francis Watt, was accordingly
appointed to attend at the rock to-day, when the
necessary levels were taken for the step or seat of
each particular beam of the beacon, that they might

THE BELL ROCK 115

be cut to their respective lengths, to suit the 1807
inequalities of the rock; several of the stanchions
were also tried into their places, and other necessary
observations made, to prevent mistakes on the applica-
tion of the apparatus, and to facilitate the operations
when the beams came to be set up, which would
require to be done in the course of a single tide.

We had now experienced an almost unvaried tract Tuesday.
of light airs of easterly wind, with clear weather in the 2S
fore-part of the day and fog in the evenings. To-day,
however, it sensibly changed; when the wind came
to the south-west, and blew a fresh breeze. At nine
a.m. the bell rung, and the boats were hoisted out, and
though the artificers were now pretty well accustomed
to tripping up and down the sides of the floating light,
yet it required more seamanship this morning than
usual. It therefore afforded some merriment to those
who had got fairly seated in their respective boats to
see the difficulties which attended their companions,
and the hesitating manner in which they quitted hold
of the man-ropes in leaving the ship. The passage to
the rock was tedious, and the boats did not reach it
till half-past ten.

It being now the period of neap-tides, the water
only partially left the rock, and some of the men who
were boring on the lower ledges of the site of the
beacon stood knee-deep in water. The situation of
the smith to-day was particularly disagreeable, but his
services were at all times indispensable. As the tide
did not leave the site of the forge, he stood in the
water, and as there was some roughness on the surface
it was with considerable difficulty that, with the
assistance of the sailors, he was enabled to preserve
alive his fire ; and, while his feet were immersed in
water, his face was not only scorched but continually

116 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 exposed to volumes of smoke, accompanied with sparks
from the fire, which were occasionally set up owing to
the strength and direction of the wind.

Wednes- The wind had shifted this morning to N.N.W., with

26th Aug. rain, and was blowing what sailors call a fresh breeze.
To speak, perhaps, somewhat more intelligibly to the
general reader, the wind was such that a fishing-boat
could just carry full sail. But as it was of importance,
specially in the outset of the business, to keep up
the spirit of enterprise for landing on all practicable
occasions, the writer, after consulting with the landing-
master, ordered the bell to be rung for embarking, and
at half-past eleven the boats reached the rock, and left
it again at a quarter-past twelve, without, however,
being able to do much work, as the smith could not
be set to work from the smallness of the ebb and the
strong breach of sea, which lashed with great force
among the bars of the forge.

Just as we were about to leave the rock the wind
shifted to the S.W., and, from a fresh gale, it became
what seamen term a hard gale, or such as would have
required the fisherman to take in two or three reefs in
his sail. It is a curious fact that the respective tides
of ebb and flood are apparent upon the shore about an
hour and a half sooner than at the distance of three or
four miles in the offing. But what seems chiefly inter-
esting here is that the tides around this small sunken
rock should follow exactly the same laws as on the
extensive shores of the mainland. When the boats
left the Bell Rock to-day it was overflowed by the
flood-tide, but the floating light did not swing round
to the flood-tide for more than an hour afterwards.
Under this disadvantage the boats had to struggle with
the ebb-tide and a hard gale of wind, so that it was
with the greatest difficulty that they reached the

THE BELL ROCK 117

floating light. Had this gale happened in spring-tides 1807
when the current was strong we must have been driven
to sea in a very helpless condition.

The boat which the writer steered was considerably
behind the other, one of the masons having unluckily
broken his oar. Our prospect of getting on board, of
course, became doubtful, and our situation was rather
perilous, as the boat shipped so much sea that it
occupied two of the artificers to bale and clear her of
water. When the oar gave way we were about half a
mile from the ship, but, being fortunately to windward,
we got into the wake of the floating light, at about
250 fathoms astern, just as the landing-master's boat
reached the vessel. He immediately streamed or
floated a life-buoy astern, with a line which was always
in readiness, and by means of this useful implement
the boat was towed alongside of the floating light,
where, from her rolling motion, it required no small
management to get safely on board, as the men were
much worn out with their exertions in pulling from
the rock. On the present occasion the crews of both
boats were completely drenched with spray, and those
who sat upon the bottom of the boats to bale them
were sometimes pretty deep in the water before it
could be cleared out. After getting on board, all
hands were allowed an extra dram, and, having shifted
and got a warm and comfortable dinner, the affair, it
is believed, was little more thought of.

The tides were now in that state which sailors term Thursday,
the dead of the neap, and it was not expected that any 27th Au8-
part of the rock would be seen above water to-day ; at
any rate, it was obvious, from the experience of yester-
day, that no work could be done upon it, and therefore
the artificers were not required to land. The wind
was at west, with light breezes, and fine clear weather;

118 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 aiid as it was an object with the writer to know the
actual state of the Bell Rock at neap-tides^ he got one
of the boats manned, and, being accompanied by the
landing-master, went to it at a quarter-past twelve.
The parts of the rock that appeared above water being
very trifling, were covered by every wave, so that no
landing was made. Upon trying the depth of water
with a boathook, particularly on the sites of the light-
house and beacon, on the former, at low water, the
depth was found to be three feet, and on the central
parts of the latter it was ascertained to be two feet
eight inches. Having made these remarks, the boat
returned to the ship at two p.m., and the weather
being good, the artificers were found amusing them-
selves with fishing. The Smeaton came from Arbroath
this afternoon, and made fast to her moorings, having
brought letters and newspapers, with parcels of clean
linen, etc., for the workmen, who were also made
happy by the arrival of three of their comrades from
the workyard ashore. From these men they not only
received all the news of the workyard, but seemed
themselves to enjoy great pleasure in communicating
whatever they considered to be interesting with regard
to the rock. Some also got letters from their friends
at a distance, the postage of which for the men afloat
was always free, so that they corresponded the more
readily.

The site of the building having already been care-
fully traced out with the pick-axe, the artificers this
day commenced the excavation of the rock for the
foundation or first course of the lighthouse. Four
men only were employed at this work, while twelve
continued at the site of the beacon-house, at which
every possible opportunity was embraced, till this
essential part of the operations should be completed.

THE BELL ROCK 119

The floating light's bell rung this morning at half- 1807
past four o'clock, as a signal for the boats to be got Wednes-
ready, and the landing took place at half-past five. In 2nd'sept.
passing the Smeaton at her moorings near the rock, her
boat followed with eight additional artificers who had
come from Arbroath with her at last trip, but there
being no room for them in the floating light's boats,
they had continued on board. The weather did not
look very promising in the morning, the wind blowing
pretty fresh from W.S.W. : and had it not been that
the writer calculated upon having a vessel so much
at command, in all probability he would not have
ventured to land. The Smeaton rode at what sailors
call a salvagee, with a cross-head made fast to the
floating buoy. This kind of attachment was found to
be more convenient than the mode of passing the
hawser through the ring of the buoy when the vessel
was to be made fast. She had then only to be steered
very close to the buoy, when the salvagee was laid
hold of with a boat-hook, and the bite of the hawser
thrown over the cross-head. But the salvagee, by this
method, was always left at the buoy, and was, of
course, more liable to chafe and wear than a hawser
passed through the ring, which could be wattled with
canvas, and shifted at pleasure. The salvagee and
cross method is, however, much practised ; but the
experience of this morning showed it to be very
unsuitable for vessels riding in an exposed situation
for any length of time.

Soon after the artificers landed they commenced
work; but the wind coming to blow hard, the
Smeaton' s boat and crew, who had brought their com-
plement of eight men to the rock, went off to examine
her riding ropes, and see that they were in proper
order. The boat had no sooner reached the vessel

120 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 than she went adrift, carrying the boat along with
her. By the time that she was got round to make a
tack towards the rock, she had drifted at least three
miles to leeward, with the praam-boat astern ; and,
having both the wind and a tide against her, the
writer perceived, with no little anxiety, that she could
not possibly return to the rock till long after its being
overflowed ; for, owing to the anomaly of the tides
formerly noticed, the Bell Rock is completely under
water when the ebb abates to the offing.

In this perilous predicament, indeed, he found him-
self placed between hope and despair — but certainly
the latter was by much the most predominant feeling
of his mind — situate upon a sunken rock in the middle
of the ocean, which, in the progress of the flood-tide,
was to be laid under water to the depth of at least
twelve feet in a stormy sea. There were this morning
thirty-two persons in all upon the rock, with only two
boats, whose complement, even in good weather, did
not exceed twenty-four sitters ; but to row to the
floating light with so much wind, and in so heavy a
sea, a complement of eight men for each boat was as
much as could, with propriety, be attempted, so that,
in this way, about one-half of our number was un-
provided for. Under these circumstances, had the
writer ventured to despatch one of the boats in
expectation of either working the Smeaton sooner up
towards the rock, or in hopes of getting her boat
brought to our assistance, this must have given an
immediate alarm to the artificers, each of whom would
have insisted upon taking to his own boat, and leaving
the eight artificers belonging to the Smeaton to their
chance. Of course a scuffle might have ensued, and
it is hard to say, in the ardour of men contending for
life, where it might have ended. It has even been

THE BELL ROCK

hinted to the writer that a party of the pickmen were 1807
determined to keep exclusively to their own boat
against all haaards.

The unfortunate circumstance of the Smeaton and
her boat having drifted was, for a considerable time,
only known to the writer and to the landing-master,,
who removed to the farther point of the rock, where
he kept his eye steadily upon the progress of the
vessel. While the artificers were at work, chiefly in
sitting or kneeling postures, excavating the rock, or
boring with the jumpers, and while their numerous
hammers, with the sound of the smith's anvil, con-
tinued, the situation of things did not appear so awful.
In this state of suspense, with almost certain destruc-
tion at hand, the water began to rise upon those who
were at work on the lower parts of the sites of the
beacon and lighthouse. From the run of sea upon the
rock, the forge fire was also sooner extinguished this
morning than usual, and the volumes of smoke having
ceased, objects in every direction became visible from
all parts of the rock. After having had about three
hours' work, the men began, pretty generally, to make
towards their respective boats for their jackets and
stockings, when, to their astonishment, instead of
three, they found only two boats, the third being
adrift with the Smeaton. Not a word was uttered by
any one, but all appeared to be silently calculating
their numbers, and looking to each other with evident
marks of perplexity depicted in their countenances.
The landing-master, conceiving that blame might be
attached to him for allowing the boat to leave the
rock, still kept at a distance. At this critical moment
the author was standing upon an elevated part of
Smith's Ledge, where he endeavoured to mark the
progress of the Smeaton, not a little surprised that her

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 crew did riot cut the praam adrift, which greatly
retarded her way, and amazed that some effort was
not making to bring at least the boat, and attempt
our relief. The workmen looked steadfastly upon the
writer, and turned occasionally towards the vessel,
still far to leeward.1 All this passed in the most
perfect silence, and the melancholy solemnity of the
group made an impression never to be effaced from his
mind.

The writer had all along been considering of various
schemes — providing the men could be kept under
command — which might be put in practice for the
general safety, in hopes that the Smeaton might be
able to pick up the boats to leeward, when they were
obliged to leave the rock. He was, accordingly,
about to address the artificers on the perilous nature
of their circumstances, and to propose that all hands
should unstrip their upper clothing when the higher
parts of the rock were laid under water; that the
seamen should remove every unnecessary weight and
encumbrance from the boats ; that a specified number
of men should go into each boat, and that the
remainder should hang by the gunwales, while the
boats were to be rowed gently towards the Smeaton,
as the course to the Pharos, or floating light, lay rather
to windward of the rock. But when he attempted to
speak his mouth was so parched that his tongue
refused utterance, and he now learned by experience
that the saliva is as necessary as the tongue itself for
speech. He turned to one of the pools on the rock
and lapped a little water, which produced immediate
relief. But what was his happiness, when on rising
from this unpleasant beverage, some one called out,

1 'Nothing was said, but I was looked out of countenance,' he says
in a letter.

THE BELL ROCK 123

'A boat ! a boat ! ' and, on looking around, at no great 1807
distance, a large boat was seen through the haze
making towards the rock. This at once enlivened
and rejoiced every heart. The timeous visitor proved
to be James Spink, the Bell Rock pilot, who had come
express from Arbroath with letters. Spink had for
some time seen the Smeaton, and had even supposed,
from the state of the weather, that all hands were on
board of her till he approached more nearly and
observed people upon the rock; but not supposing
that the assistance of his boat was necessary to carry
the artificers oft' the rock, he anchored on the lee-side
and began to fish, waiting, as usual, till the letters
were sent for, as the pilot-boat was too large and un-
wieldy for approaching the rock when there was any
roughness or run of the sea at the entrance of the
landing creeks.

Upon this fortunate change of circumstances, sixteen
of the artificers were sent, at two trips, in one of the
boats, with instructions for Spink to proceed with
them to the floating light. This being accomplished,
the remaining sixteen followed in the two boats
belonging to the service of the rock. Every one felt
the most perfect happiness at leaving the Bell Rock
this morning, though a very hard and even dangerous
passage to the floating light still awaited us, as the
wind by this time had increased to a pretty hard gale,
accompanied with a considerable swell of sea. Every
one was as completely drenched in water as if he had
been dragged astern of the boats. The writer, in
particular, being at the helm, found, on getting on
board, that his face and ears were completely coated
with a thin film of salt from the sea spray, which
broke constantly over the bows of the boat. After
much baling of water and severe work at the oars, the

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 three boats reached the floating light, where some
new difficulties occurred in getting on board in safety,
owing partly to the exhausted state of the men, and
partly to the violent rolling of the vessel.

As the tide flowed, it was expected that the Smealon
would have got to windward ; but, seeing that all was
safe, after tacking for several hours and making little
progress, she bore away for Arbroath, with the praam-
boat. As there was now too much wind for the
pilot-boat to return to Arbroath, she was made fast
astern of the floating light, and the crew remained on
board till next day, when the weather moderated.
There can be very little doubt that the appearance of
James Spink with his boat on this critical occasion
was the means of preventing the loss of lives at the
rock this morning. When these circumstances, some
years afterwards, came to the knowledge of the Board,
a small pension was ordered to our faithful pilot, then
in his seventieth year ; and he still continues to wear
the uniform clothes and badge of the Lighthouse
service. Spink is a remarkably strong man, whose
tout ensemble is highly characteristic of a North-country
fisherman. He usually dresses in a pi-jacket, cut after
a particular fashion, and wears a large, flat, blue
bonnet. A striking likeness of Spink in his pilot-
dress, with the badge or insignia on his left arm
which is characteristic of the boatmen in the service
of the Northern Lights, has been taken by Howe, and
is in the writer's possession.

Thursday, The bell rung this morning at five o'clock, but the
writer must acknowledge, from the circumstances of
yesterday, that its sound was extremely unwelcome.
This appears also to have been the feelings of the
artificers, for when they came to be mustered, out of
twenty-six, only eight, besides the foreman and sea-

THE BELL ROCK 125

men, appeared upon deck to accompany the writer to 1807
the rock. Such are the baneful effects of anything
like misfortune or accident connected with a work of
this description. The use of argument to persuade
the men to embark in cases of this kind would have
been out of place, as it is not only discomfort, or even
the risk of the loss of a limb,, but life itself that
becomes the question. The boats, notwithstanding
the thinness of our ranks, left the vessel at half-past
five. The rough weather of yesterday having proved
but a summer's gale, the wind came to-day in gentle
breezes ; yet, the atmosphere being cloudy, it had not
a very favourable appearance. The boats reached the
rock at six a.m., and the eight artificers who landed
were employed in clearing out the bat-holes for the
beacon-house, and had a very prosperous tide of four
hours' work, being the longest yet experienced by
half an hour.

The boats left the rock again at ten o'clock, and the
weather having cleared up as we drew near the vessel,
the eighteen artificers who had remained on board
were observed upon deck, but as the boats approached
they sought their way below, being quite ashamed of
their conduct. This was the only instance of refusal
to go to the rock which occurred during the whole
progress of the work, excepting that of the four men
who declined working upon Sunday, a case which the
writer did not conceive to be at all analogous to the
present. It may here be mentioned, much to the
credit of these four men, that they stood foremost in
embarking for the rock this morning.

It was fortunate that a landing was not attempted Saturday,
this evening, for at eight o'clock the wind shifted to 5th Sept<
E.S.E., and at ten it had become a hard gale, when
fifty fathoms of the floating light's hempen cable were

126 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 veered out. The gale still increasing, the ship rolled
and laboured excessively, and at midnight eighty
fathoms of cable were veered out ; while the sea con-
tinued to strike the vessel with a degree of force which
had not before been experienced.

Sunday, During the last night there was little rest on board

ept' of the Pharos, and daylight, though anxiously wished
for, brought no relief, as the gale continued with
unabated violence. The sea struck so hard upon the
vessel's bows that it rose in great quantities, or in
( green seas,' as the sailors termed it, which were
carried by the wind as far aft as the quarter-deck, and
not infrequently over the stern of the ship altogether.
It fell occasionally so heavily on the skylight of the
writer's cabin, though so far aft as to be within five
feet of the helm, that the glass was broken to pieces
before the dead-light could be got into its place, so
that the water poured down in great quantities. In
shutting out the water, the admission of light was
prevented, and in the morning all continued in the
most comfortless state of darkness. About ten o'clock
a.m. the wind shifted to N.E., and blew, if possible,
harder than before, and it was accompanied by a much
heavier swell of sea. In the course of the gale, the
part of the cable in the hause-hole had been so often
shifted that nearly the whole length of one of her
hempen cables, of 120 fathoms, had been veered out,
besides the chain-moorings. The cable, for its
preservation, was also carefully served or wattled with
pieces of canvas round the windlass, and with leather
well greased in the hause-hole. In this state things
remained during the whole day, every sea which struck
the vessel — and the seas followed each other in close
succession — causing her to shake, and all on board
occasionally to tremble. At each of these strokes of

THE BELT. ROCK 127

the sea the rolling and pitching of the vessel ceased 1807
for a time, and her motion was felt as if she had either
broke adrift before the wind or were in the act of
sinking; but, when another sea came, she ranged up
against it with great force, and this became the regular
intimation of our being still riding at anchor.

About eleven o'clock, the writer with some difficulty
got out of bed, but, in attempting to dress, he was
thrown twice upon the floor at the opposite end of
the cabin. In an undressed state he made shift to
get about half-way up the companion-stairs, with an
intention to observe the state of the sea and of the
ship upon deck ; but he no sooner looked over the
companion than a heavy sea struck the vessel, which
fell on the quarter-deck, and rushed downstairs in the
officers' cabin in so considerable a quantity that it was
found necessary to lift one of the scuttles in the floor,
to let the water into the limbers of the ship, as it
dashed from side to side in such a manner as to run
into the lower tier of beds. Having been foiled in this
attempt, and being completely wetted, he again got
below and went to bed. In this state of the weather
the seamen had to move about the necessary or indis-
pensable duties of the ship with the most cautious use
both of hands and feet, while it required all the art of
the landsman to keep within the precincts of his bed.
The writer even found himself so much tossed about
that it became necessary, in some measure, to shut
himself in bed, in order to avoid being thrown upon
the floor. Indeed, such was the motion of the ship
that it seemed wholly impracticable to remain in any
other than a lying posture. On deck the most stormy
aspect presented itself, while below all was wet and
comfortless.

About two o'clock p.m. a great alarm was given

128 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 throughout the ship from the effects of a very heavy
sea which struck her, and almost filled the waist,
pouring down into the berths below, through every
chink and crevice of the hatches and skylights. From
the motion of the vessel being thus suddenly deadened
or checked, and from the flowing in of the water above,
it is believed there was not an individual on board who
did not think, at the moment, that the vessel had
foundered, and was in the act of sinking. The writer
could withstand this no longer, and as soon as she again
began to range to the sea he determined to make
another effort to get upon deck. In the first instance,
however, he groped his way in darkness from his own
cabin through the berths of the officers, where all was
quietness. He next entered the galley and other
compartments occupied by the artificers. Here also
all was shut up in darkness, the fire having been
drowned out in the early part of the gale. Several of
the artificers were employed in prayer, repeating
psalms and other devotional exercises in a full tone
of voice ; others protesting that, if they should for-
tunately get once more on shore, no one should ever see
them afloat again. With the assistance of the landing-
master, the writer made his way, holding on step
by step, among the numerous impediments which lay
in the way. Such was the creaking noise of the bulk-
heads or partitions, the dashing of the water, and the
whistling noise of the winds, that it was hardly possible
to break in upon such a confusion of sounds. In one
or two instances, anxious and repeated inquiries were
made by the artificers as to the state of things upon
deck, to which the captain made the usual answer,
that it could not blow long in this way, and that we
must soon have better weather. The next berth in
succession, moving forward in the ship, was that

THE BELL ROCK 129

allotted for the seamen. Here the scene was consider- 1807
ably different. Having reached the middle of this
darksome berth without its inmates being aware of any
intrusion, the writer had the consolation of remarking
that, although they talked of bad weather and the
cross accidents of the sea, yet the conversation was
carried on in that sort of tone and manner which
bespoke an ease and composure of mind highly credit-
able to them and pleasing to him. The writer
immediately accosted the seamen about the state of
the ship. To these inquiries they replied that the
vessel being light, and having but little hold of the
water, no top-rigging, with excellent ground-tackle,
and everything being fresh and new, they felt perfect
confidence in their situation.

It being impossible to open any of the hatches in the
fore part of the ship in communicating with the deck,
the watch was changed by passing through the several
berths to the companion-stair leading to the quarter-
deck. The writer, therefore, made the best of his way
aft, and, on a second attempt to look out, he succeeded,
and saw indeed an astonishing sight. The sea or waves
appeared to be ten or fifteen feet in height of unbroken
water, and every approaching billow seemed as if it
would overwhelm our vessel, but she continued to rise
upon the waves and to fall between the seas in a very
wonderful manner. It seemed to be only those seas
which caught her in the act of rising which struck her
with so much violence and threw such quantities of
water aft. On deck there was only one solitary
individual looking out, to give the alarm in the event
of the ship breaking from her moorings. The seaman
on watch continued only two hours; he who kept
watch at this time was a tall, slender man of a black
complexion ; he had no greatcoat nor over-all of any

i

130 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 kind, but was simply dressed in his ordinary jacket and
trousers; his hat was tied under his chin with a
napkin, and he stood aft the foremast, to which he had
lashed himself with a gasket or small rope round his
waist, to prevent his falling upon deck or being washed
overboard. When the writer looked up, he appeared
to smile, which afforded a further symptom of the
confidence of the crew in their ship. This person on
watch was as completely wetted as if he had been
drawn through the sea, which was given as a reason
for his not putting on a greatcoat, that he might wet
as few of his clothes as possible, and have a dry shift
when he went below. Upon deck everything that was
movable was out of sight, having either been stowed
below, previous to the gale, or been washed overboard.
Some trifling parts of the quarter boards were damaged
by the breach of the sea ; and one of the boats upon
deck was about one-third full of water, the oyle-liole
or drain having been accidently stopped up, and part
of her gunwale had received considerable injury.
These observations were hastily made, and not without
occasionally shutting the companion, to avoid being
wetted by the successive seas which broke over the
bows and fell upon different parts of the deck accord-
ing to the impetus with which the waves struck the
vessel. By this time it was about three o'clock in the
afternoon, and the gale, which had now continued
with unabated force for twenty-seven hours, had not
the least appearance of going off.

In the dismal prospect of undergoing another night
like the last, and being in imminent hazard of parting
from our cable, the writer thought it necessary to
advise with the master and officers of the ship as to
the probable event of the vessel's drifting from her
moorings. They severally gave it as their opinion that

THE BELL ROCK 131

we had now every chance of riding out the gale, which, 1807
in all probability, could not continue with the same
fury many hours longer ; and that even if she should
part from her anchor, the storm-sails had been laid to
hand, and could be bent in a very short time. They
further stated that from the direction of the wind
being N.E., she would sail up the Firth of Forth to
Leith Roads. But if this should appear doubtful, after
passing the Island and Light of May, it might be advis-
able at once to steer for Tyningham Sands, on the
western side of Dunbar, and there run the vessel
ashore. If this should happen at the time of high-
water, or during the ebbing of the tide, they were of
opinion, from the flatness and strength of the floating
light, that no danger would attend her taking the
ground, even with a very heavy sea. The writer,
seeing the confidence which these gentlemen possessed
with regard to the situation of things, found himself
as much relieved with this conversation as he had
previously been with the seeming indifference of the
forecastle men, and the smile of the watch upon deck,
though literally lashed to the foremast. From this
time he felt himself almost perfectly at ease ; at any
rate, he was entirely resigned to the ultimate result.

About six o'clock in the evening the ship's company
was heard moving upon deck, which on the present
occasion was rather the cause of alarm. The writer
accordingly rang his bell to know what was the matter,
when he was informed by the steward that the weather
looked considerably better, and that the men upon
deck were endeavouring to ship the smoke-funnel of
the galley that the people might get some meat.
This was a more favourable account than had been
anticipated. During the last twenty-one hours he
himself had not only had nothing to eat, but he had

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 almost never passed a thought on the subject. Upon
the mention of a change of weather, he sent the
steward to learn how the artificers felt, and on his
return he stated that they now seemed to be all very
happy, since the cook had begun to light the galley-
fire and make preparations for the suet-pudding of
Sunday, which was the only dish to be attempted for
the mess, from the ease with which it could both be
cooked and served up.

The principal change felt upon the ship as the wind
abated was her increased rolling motion, but the
pitching was much diminished, and now hardly any
sea came farther aft than the foremast : but she rolled
so extremely hard as frequently to dip and take in
water over the gunwales and rails in the waist. By
nine o'clock all hands had been refreshed by the
exertions of the cook and steward, and were happy in
the prospect of the worst of the gale being over. The
usual complement of men was also now set on watch,
and more quietness was experienced throughout the
ship. Although the previous night had been a very
restless one, it had not the effect of inducing repose in
the writer's berth on the succeeding night; for having
been so much tossed about in bed during the last
thirty hours, he found no easy spot to turn to, and his
body was all sore to the touch, which ill accorded
with the unyielding materials witli which his bed-place
was surrounded.

Monday, This morning, about eight o'clock, the writer was

yth Sept. agreeably surprised to see the scuttle of his cabin sky-
light removed, and the bright rays of the sun admitted.
Although the ship continued to roll excessively, and
the sea was still running very high, yet the ordinary
business on board seemed to be going forward on deck.
It was impossible to steady a telescope, so as to look

THE BELL ROCK 133

minutely at the progress of the waves and trace their 18*7
breach upon the Bell Rock ; but the height to which
the cross-running waves rose in sprays when they met
each other was truly grand, and the continued roar
and noise of the sea was very perceptible to the ear.
To estimate the height of the sprays at forty or fifty
feet would surely be within the mark. Those of the
workmen who were not much afflicted with sea-sick-
ness, came upon deck, and the wetness below being
dried up, the cabins were again brought into a habit-
able state. Every one seemed to meet as if after a
long absence, congratulating his neighbour upon the
return of good weather. Little could be said as to the
comfort of the vessel, but after riding out such a gale,
no one feit the least doubt or hesitation as to the
safety arid good condition of her moorings. The
master and mate were extremely anxious, however, to
heave in the hempen cable, and see the state of the
clinch or iron ring of the chain-cable. But the vessel
rolled at such a rate that the seamen could not possibly
keep their feet at the windlass nor work the hand-
spikes, though it had been several times attempted
since the gale took off.

About twelve noon, however, the vessel's motion
was observed to be considerably less, and the sailors
were enabled to walk upon deck with some degree of
freedom. But, to the astonishment of every one,
it was soon discovered that the floating light was
adrift ! The windlass was instantly manned, and the
men soon gave out that there was no strain upon the
cable. The mizzen sail, which was bent for the
occasional purpose of making the vessel ride more
easily to the tide, was immediately set, and the other
sails were also hoisted in a short time, when, in no
small consternation, we bore away about one mile to

134 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 the south-westward of the former station, and there
let go the best bower anchor and cable in twenty
fathoms water, to ride until the swell of the sea should
fall, when it might be practicable to grapple for the
moorings, and find a better anchorage for the ship.
Tuesday, This morning, at five a.m., the bell rung as a signal
for landing upon the rock, a sound which, after a lapse
of ten days, it is believed was welcomed by every one
on board. There being a heavy breach of sea at the
eastern creek, we landed, though not without difficulty,
on the western side, every one seeming more eager
than another to get upon the rock; and never did
hungry men sit down to a hearty meal with more
appetite than the artificers began to pick the dulse
from the rocks. This marine plant had the effect of
reviving the sickly, and seemed to be no less relished
by those who were more hardy.

While the water was ebbing, and the men were
roaming in quest of their favourite morsel, the writer
was examining the effects of the storm upon the forge
and loose apparatus left upon the rock. Six large blocks
of granite which had been landed, by way of experi-
ment, on the 1st instant, were now removed from their
places and, by the force of the sea, thrown over a
rising ledge into a hole at the distance of twelve or
fifteen paces from the place on which they had been
landed. This was a pretty good evidence both of the
violence of the storm and the agitation of the sea upon
the rock. The safety of the smith's forge was always
an object of essential regard. The ash-pan of the
hearth or fireplace, with its weighty cast-iron back,
had been washed from their places of supposed
security ; the chains of attachment had been broken,
and these ponderous articles were found at a very
considerable distance in a hole on the western side

THE BELL ROCK 135

of the rock; while the tools and picks of the Aberdeen 1807
masons were scattered about in every direction. It is,
however, remarkable that not a single article was
ultimately lost.

This being the night on which the floating light was
advertised to be lighted, it was accordingly exhibited,
to the great joy of every one.

The writer was made happy to-day by the return of Wednes-
the Lighthouse yacht from a voyage to the Northern J|Jj Sept
Lighthouses. Having immediately removed on board
of this fine vessel of eighty-one tons register, the
artificers gladly followed; for, though they found
themselves more pinched for accommodation on board
of the yacht, and still more so in the Smeaton, yet they
greatly preferred either of these to the Pharos, or
floating light, on account of her rolling motion, though
in all respects fitted up for their conveniency.

The writer called them to the quarter-deck and
informed them that, having been one month afloat, in
terms of their agreement they were now at liberty to
return to the workyard at Arbroath if they preferred
this to continuing at the Bell Rock. But they replied
that, in the prospect of soon getting the beacon erected
upon the rock, and having made a change from the
floating light, they were now perfectly reconciled to
their situation, and would remain afloat till the end
of the working season.

The wind was at N.E. this morning, and though they Thursday,
were only light airs, yet there was a pretty heavy swell I7th Septt
coming ashore upon the rock. The boats landed at
half-past seven o'clock a.m., at the creek on the
southern side of the rock, marked Port Hamilton. But
as one of the boats was in the act of entering this creek,
the seaman at the bow-oar, who had just entered the
service, having inadvertently expressed some fear from

136 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 a heavy sea which came rolling towards the boat, and
one of the artificers having at the same time looked
round and missed a stroke with his oar, such a pre-
ponderance was thus given to the rowers upon the
opposite side that when the wave struck the boat it
threw her upon a ledge of shelving rocks, where the
water left her, and she having kanted to seaward, the
next wave completely filled her with water. After
making considerable efforts the boat was again got
afloat in the proper track of the creek, so that we
landed without any other accident than a complete
ducking. There being no possibility of getting a shift
of clothes, the artificers began with all speed to work,
so as to bring themselves into heat, while the writer
and his assistants kept as much as possible in motion.
Having remained more than an hour upon the rock,
the boats left it at half-past nine ; and, after getting
on board, the writer recommended to the artificers, as
the best mode of getting into a state of comfort, to
strip off their wet clothes and go to bed for an hour or
two. No further inconvenieiicy was felt, and no one
seemed to complain of the affection called ' catching
cold/

Friday, An important occurrence connected with the opera

i8th Sept. tiong Q£ tnig season was tne arrival of the Smeaton at

four p.m., having in tow the six principal beams of the
beacon-house, together with all the stanchions and
other work on board for fixing it on the rock. The
mooring of the floating light was a great point gained,
but in the erection of the beacon at this late period of
the season new difficulties presented themselves. The
success of such an undertaking at any season was pre-
carious, because a single day of bad weather occurring
before the necessary fixtures could be made might
sweep the whole apparatus from the rock. Notwith-

THE BELL ROCK 137

standing these difficulties, the writer had determined 1807
to make the trial, although he could almost have
wished, upon looking at the state of the clouds and
the direction of the wind, that the apparatus for the
beacon had been still in the workyard.

The main beams of the beacon were made up in Saturday,
two separate rafts, fixed with bars and bolts of iron. I9th ^^
One of these rafts, not being immediately wanted,
was left astern of the floating light, and the other was
kept in tow by the Smeaton, at the buoy nearest to
the rock. The Lighthouse yacht rode at another
buoy with all hands on board that could possibly
be spared out of the floating light. The party of
artificers and seamen which landed on the rock
counted altogether forty in number. At half-past
eight o'clock a derrick, or mast of thirty feet in
height, was erected and properly supported with
guy-ropes, for suspending the block for raising the
first principal beam of the beacon ; and a winch
machine was also bolted down to the rock for work-
ing the purchase-tackle.

Upon raising the derrick, all hands on the rock
spontaneously gave three hearty cheers, as a favour-
able omen of our future exertions in pointing out
more permanently the position of the rock. Even
to this single spar of timber, could it be preserved,
a drowning man might lay hold. When the Smeaton
drifted on the 2nd of this month such a spar would
have been sufficient to save us till she could have
come to our relief.

The wind this morning was variable, but the Sunday,
weather continued extremely favourable for the 20tl
operations throughout the whole day. At six a.m.
the boats were in motion, and the raft, consisting
of four of the six principal beams of the beacon-house,

138 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807 each measuring about sixteen inches square, and fifty
feet in length, was towed to the rock, where it was
anchored, that it might ground upon it as the water
ebbed. The sailors and artificers, including all hands,
to-day counted no fewer than fifty-two, being perhaps
the greatest number of persons ever collected upon
the Bell Rock. It was early in the tide when the
boats reached the rock, and the men worked a
considerable time up to their middle in water, every
one being more eager than his neighbour to be useful.
Even the four artificers who had hitherto declined
working on Sunday were to-day most zealous in their
exertions. They had indeed become so convinced of
the precarious nature and necessity of the work that
they never afterwards absented themselves from the
rock on Sunday when a landing was practicable.

Having made fast a piece of very good new line, at
about two-thirds from the lower end of one of the
beams, the purchase-tackle of the derrick was hooked
into the turns of the line, and it was speedily raised
by the number of men on the rock and the power of
the winch tackle. When this log was lifted to a
sufficient height, its foot, or lower end, was stepped
into the spot which had been previously prepared for
it. Two of the great iron stanchions were then set in
their respective holes on each side of the beam, when
a rope was passed round them and the beam, to
prevent it from slipping till it could be more per-
manently fixed. The derrick, or upright spar used
for carrying the tackle to raise the first beam, was
placed in such a position as to become useful for
supporting the upper end of it, which now became,
in its turn, the prop of the tackle for raising the
second beam. The whole difficulty of this operation
was in the raising and propping of the first beam,

THE BELL ROCK 139

which became a convenient derrick for raising the 1807
second, these again a pair of shears for lifting the
third, and the shears a triangle for raising the fourth.
Having thus got four of the six principal beams set on
end, it required a considerable degree of trouble to
get their upper ends to fit. Here they formed the
apex of a cone, and were all together mortised into a
large piece of beechwood, and secured, for the present,
with ropes, in a temporary manner. During the short
period of one tide all that could further be done for
their security was to put a single screw-bolt through
the great kneed bats or stanchions on each side of the
beams, and screw the nut home.

In this manner these four principal beams were
erected, and left in a pretty secure state. The men
had commenced while there was about two or three
feet of water upon the side of the beacon, and as the
sea was smooth they continued the work equally long
during flood-tide. Two of the boats being left at the
rock to take off the joiners, who were busily employed
on the upper parts till two o'clock p.m., this tide's
work may be said to have continued for about seven
hours, which was the longest that had hitherto been
got upon the rock by at least three hours.

When the first boats left the rock with the artificers
employed on the lower part of the work during the
flood-tide, the beacon had quite a novel appearance.
The beams erected formed a common base of about
thirty-three feet, meeting at the top, which was about
forty-five feet above the rock, and here half a dozen
of the artificers were still at work. After clearing the
rock the boats made a stop, when three hearty cheers
were given, which were returned with equal good-
will by those upon the beacon, from the personal
interest which every one felt in the prosperity

140

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807

Monday,
2ist Sept.

Tuesday,
22nd Sept.

Wednes-
day,
23rd Sept.

of this work, so intimately connected with his
safety.

All hands having returned to their respective ships,
they got a shift of dry clothes and some refreshment.
Being Sunday, they were afterwards convened by
signal on board of the Lighthouse yacht, when prayers
were read ; for every heart upon this occasion felt
gladness, and every mind was disposed to be thankful
for the happy and successful termination of the opera-
tions of this day.

The remaining two principal beams were erected
in the course of this tide, which, with the assistance
of those set up yesterday, was found to be a very
simple operation.

The six principal beams of the beacon were thus
secured, at least in a temporary manner, in the course
of two tides, or in the short space of about eleven
hours and a half. Such is the progress that may be
made when active hands and willing minds set
properly to work in operations of this kind. Having
now got the weighty part of this work over, and being
thereby relieved of the difficulty both of landing and
victualling such a number of men, the Smeaton could
now be spared, and she was accordingly despatched to
Arbroath for a supply of water and provisions, and
carried with her six of the artificers who could best
be spared.

In going out of the eastern harbour, the boat which
the writer steered shipped a sea, that filled her about
one-third with water. She had also been hid for a
short time, by the waves breaking upon the rock,
from the sight of the crew of the preceding boat,
who were much alarmed for our safety, imagining
for a time that she had gone down.

The Smeaton returned from Arbroath this afternoon,

THE BELL ROCK 141

but there was so much sea that she could not be made 1807
fast to her moorings, and the vessel was obliged to
return to Arbroath without being able either to deliver
the provisions or take the artificers on board. The
Lighthouse yacht was also soon obliged to follow her
example, as the sea was breaking heavily over her
bows. After getting two reefs in the mainsail, and
the third or storm-jib set, the wind being S.W., she
bent to windward, though blowing a hard gale, and
got into St. Andrews Bay, where we passed the night
under the lee of Fifeness.

At two o'clock this morning we were in St. Andrews Thursday,
Bay, standing off and on shore, with strong gales of 24th Sept<
wind at S.W. ; at seven we were off the entrance of
the Tay ; at eight stood towards the rock, and at ten
passed to leeward of it, but could not attempt a
landing. The beacon, however, appeared to remain
in good order, and by six p.m. the vessel had again
beaten up to St. Andrews Bay, and got into somewhat
smoother water for the night.

At seven o'clock bore away for the Bell Rock, but Friday,
finding a heavy sea running on it were unable to land. 25th Sept'
The writer, however, had the satisfaction to observe,
with his telescope, that everything about the beacon
appeared entire : and although the sea had a most
frightful appearance, yet it was the opinion of every
one that, since the erection of the beacon, the Bell
Rock was divested of many of its terrors, and had it
been possible to have got the boats hoisted out and
manned, it might have even been found practicable
to land. At six it blew so hard that it was found
necessary to strike the topmast and take in a third
reef of the mainsail, and under this low canvas we
soon reached St. Andrews Bay, and got again under
the lee of the land for the night. The artificers,

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807

Saturday,
26th Sept.

Saturday,
3rd Oct.

being sea-hardy, were quite reconciled to their quarters
on board of the Lighthouse yacht ; but it is believed
that hardly any consideration would have induced
them again to take up their abode in the floating
light.

At daylight the yacht steered towards the Bell
Rock, and at eight a.m. made fast to her moorings ;
at ten, all hands, to the amount of thirty, landed,
when the writer had the happiness to find that the
beacon had withstood the violence of the gale and
the heavy breach of sea, everything being found in
the same state in which it had been left on the 21st.
The artificers were now enabled to work upon the
rock throughout the whole day, both at low and high
water, but it required the strictest attention to the
state of the weather, in case of their being overtaken
with a gale, which might prevent the possibility of
getting them off the rock.

Two somewhat memorable circumstances in the
annals of the Bell Rock attended the operations of
this day : one was the removal of Mr. James Dove,
the foreman smith, with his apparatus, from the rock
to the upper part of the beacon, where the forge was
now erected on a temporary platform, laid on the cross
beams or upper framing. The other was the artificers
having dined for the first time upon the rock, their
dinner being cooked on board of the yacht, and sent
to them by one of the boats. But what afforded the
greatest happiness and relief was the removal of the
large bellows, which had all along been a source of
much trouble and perplexity, by their hampering and
incommoding the boat which carried the smiths and
their apparatus.

The wind being west to-day, the weather was very
favourable for operations at the rock, and during the

THE BELL ROCK 143

morning and evening tides, with the aid of torchlight, 1807
the masons had seven hours' work upon the site of the
building. The smiths and joiners, who landed at half-
past six a.m., did not leave the rock till a quarter-past
eleven p.m., having been at work, with little inter-
mission, for sixteen hours and three-quarters. When
the water left the rock, they were employed at the
lower parts of the beacon, and as the tide rose or fell,
they shifted the place of their operations. From
these exertions, the fixing and securing of the beacon
made rapid advancement, as the men were now landed
in the morning and remained throughout the day.
But, as a sudden change of weather might have
prevented their being taken off at the proper time of
tide, a quantity of bread and water was always kept
on the beacon.

During this period of working at the beacon all the
day, and often a great part of the night, the writer
was much on board of the tender; but, while the
masons could work on the rock, and frequently also
while it was covered by the tide, he remained on the
beacon ; especially during the night, as he made a
point of being on the rock to the latest hour, and was
generally the last person who stepped into the boat.
He had laid this down as part of his plan of procedure ;
and in this way had acquired, in the course of the first
season, a pretty complete knowledge and experience
of what could actually be done at the Bell Rock, under
all circumstances of the weather. By this means also
his assistants, and the artificers and mariners, got into
a systematic habit of proceeding at the commencement
of the work, which, it is believed, continued throughout
the whole of the operations.

The external part of the beacon was now finished, Sunday,
with its supports and bracing-chains, and whatever else 4th Oct*

144

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1807

Monday,
5th Oct.

Tuesday,
6th Oct.

was considered necessary for its stability, in so far as
the season would permit ; and although much was still
wanting to complete this fabric, yet it was in such a
state that it could be left without much fear of the
consequences of a storm. The painting of the upper
part was nearly finished this afternoon ; and the
Smeaton had brought off a quantity of brushwood and
other articles, for the purpose of heating or charring
the lower part of the principal beams, before being
laid over with successive coats of boiling pitch, to the
height of from eight to twelve feet, or as high as the
rise of spring-tides. A small flagstaff having also been
erected to-day, a flag was displayed for the first time
from the beacon, by which its perspective effect was
greatly improved. On this, as on all like occasions at
the Bell Rock, three hearty cheers were given ; and
the steward served out a dram of rum to all hands,
while the Lighthouse yacht, Smeaton, and floating light,
hoisted their colours in compliment to the erection.

In the afternoon, and just as the tide's work was
over, Mr. John Rennie, engineer, accompanied by his
son Mr. George, on their way to the harbour works of
Fraserburgh, in Aberdeenshire, paid a visit to the
Bell Rock, in a boat from Arbroath. It being then
too late in the tide for landing, they remained on
board of the Lighthouse yacht all night, when the
writer, who had now been secluded from society for
several weeks, enjoyed much of Mr. Rennie' s interest-
ing conversation, both on general topics, and profes-
sionally upon the progress of the Bell Rock works, on
which he was consulted as chief engineer.

The artificers landed this morning at nine, after
which one of the boats returned to the ship for the
writer and Messrs. Rennie, who, upon landing, were
saluted with a display of the colours from the beacon

THE BELL ROCK 145

and by three cheers from the workmen. Everything 1807
was now in a prepared state for leaving the rock, and
giving up the works afloat for this season, excepting
some small articles, which would still occupy the smiths
and joiners for a few days longer. They accordingly
shifted on board of the Smeaton, while the yacht left
the rock for Arbroath, with Messrs. Rennie, the writer,
and the remainder of the artificers. But, before taking
leave, the steward served out a farewell glass, when
three hearty cheers were given, and an earnest wish
expressed that everything, in the spring of 1808, might
be found in the same state of good order as it was now
about to be left.

II

OPERATIONS OF 1808

The writer sailed from Arbroath at one a.m. in the 1808
Lighthouse yacht. At seven the floating light was Monday,
hailed, and all on board found to be well. The crew 29t e '
were observed to have a very healthy-like appearance,
and looked better than at the close of the works upon
the rock. They seemed only to regret one thing,
which was the secession of their cook, Thomas Elliot —
not on account of his professional skill, but for his
facetious and curious manner. Elliot had something
peculiar in his history, and was reported by his
comrades to have seen better days. He was, however^
happy with his situation on board of the floating light,
and, having a taste for music, dancing, and acting
plays, he contributed much to the amusement of the
ship's company in their dreary abode during the
winter months. He had also recommended himself to

H6 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 their notice as a good shipkeeper, for as it did not
answer Elliot to go often ashore, he had always given
up his turn of leave to his neighbours. At his own
desire he was at length paid off, when he had a
considerable balance of wages to receive, which he
said would be sufficient to carry him to the West
Indies, and he accordingly took leave of the Lighthouse
service.

Tuesday, At daybreak the Lighthouse yacht, attended by a
boat from the floating light, again stood towards the
Bell Rock. The weather felt extremely cold this
morning, the thermometer being at 34 degrees, with
the wind at east, accompanied by occasional showers
of snow, and the marine barometer indicated 29 '80.
At half-past seven the sea ran with such force upon
the rock that it seemed doubtful if a landing could be
effected. At half-past eight, when it was fairly above
water, the writer took his place in the floating light's
boat with the artificers, while the yacht's boat followed,
according to the general rule of having two boats
afloat in landing expeditions of this kind, that, in case
of accident to one boat, the other might assist. In
several unsuccessful attempts the boats were beat back
by the breach of the sea upon the rock. On the
eastern side it separated into two distinct waves,
which came with a sweep round to the western side,
where they met ; and at the instance of their confluence
the water rose in spray to a considerable height.
Watching what the sailors term a smooth, we caught a
favourable opportunity, and in a very dexterous
manner the boats were rowed between the two seas,
and made a favourable landing at the western creek.

At the latter end of last season, as was formerly
noticed, the beacon was painted white, and from the
bleaching of the weather and the sprays of the sea

THE BELL ROCK 147

the upper parts were kept clean ; but within the 1808
range of the tide the principal beams were observed
to be thickly coated with a green stuff, the conferva of
botanists. Notwithstanding the intrusion of these
works, which had formerly banished the numerous
seals that played about the rock, they were now seen
in great numbers, having been in an almost undisturbed
state for six months. It had now also, for the first
time, got some inhabitants of the feathered tribe : in
particular the scarth or cormorant, and the large
herring-gull, had made the beacon a resting-place,
from its vicinity to their fishing-grounds. About a
dozen of these birds had rested upon the cross-beams,
which, in some places, were coated with their dung ;
and their flight, as the boats approached, was a very
unlooked-for indication of life and habitation on the
Bell Rock, conveying the momentary idea of the
conversion of this fatal rock, from being a terror to
the mariner, into a residence of man and a safeguard
to shipping.

Upon narrowly examining the great iron stanchions
with which the beams were fixed to the rock, the
writer had the satisfaction of finding that there was
not the least appearance of working or shifting at any
of the joints or places of connection ; and, excepting
the loosening of the bracing-chains, everything was
found in the same entire state in which it had been
left in the month of October. This, in the estimation
of the writer, was a matter of no small importance to
the future success of the work. He from that moment
saw the practicability and propriety of fitting up the
beacon, not only as a place of refuge in case of accident
to the boats in landing, but as a residence for the
artificers during the working months.

While upon the top of the beacon the writer was

148

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808

Wednes-
day,
25th May.

Thursday,
a6th May.

reminded by the landing-master that the sea was
running high, and that it would be necessary to set
off while the rock afforded anything like shelter to
the boats, which by this time had been made fast by
a long line to the beacon, and rode with much agita-
tion, each requiring two men with boat-hooks to keep
them from striking each other, or from ranging up
against the beacon. But even under these circum-
stances the greatest confidence was felt by every one,
from the security afforded by this temporary erection.
For, supposing the wind had suddenly increased to a
gale, and that it had been found unadvisable to go
into the boats ; or, supposing they had drifted or
sprung a leak from striking upon the rocks ; in any of
these possible and not at all improbable cases, those
who might thus have been left upon the rock had
now something to lay hold of, and, though occupying
this dreary habitation of the sea-gull and the cormor-
ant, affording only bread and water, yet life would be
preserved, and the mind would still be supported by
the hope of being ultimately relieved.

On the 25th of May the writer embarked at
Arbroath, on board of the Sir Joseph Banks, for the
Bell Rock, accompanied by Mr. Logan senior, foreman
builder, with twelve masons and two smiths, together
with thirteen seamen, including the master, mate,
and steward.

Mr. James Wilson, now commander of the Pharos,
floating light, and landing-master, in the room of Mr.
Sinclair, who had left the service, came into the
writer's cabin this morning at six o'clock, and intimated
that there was a good appearance of landing on the
rock. Everything being arranged, both boats pro-
ceeded in company, and at eight a.m. they reached
the rock. The lighthouse colours were immediately

THE BELL ROCK 149

hoisted upon the flagstaff of the beacon, a compliment 1808
which v/as duly returned by the tender and floating
light, when three hearty cheers were given, and a
glass of rum was served out to all hands to drink
success to the operations of 1808.

This morning the wind was at east, blowing a fresh Friday,
gale, the weather being hazy, with a considerable 2?i
breach of sea setting in upon the rock. The morning
bell was therefore rung, in some doubt as to the
practicability of making a landing. After allowing
the rock to get fully up, or to be sufficiently left by
the tide, that the boats might have some shelter from
the range of the sea, they proceeded at 8 a.m., and
upon the whole made a pretty good landing ; and
after two hours and three-quarters' work returned to
the ship in safety.

In the afternoon the wind considerably increased,
and, as a pretty heavy sea was still running, the
tender rode very hard, when Mr. Taylor, the com-
mander, found it necessary to take in the bowsprit,
and strike the fore and main topmasts, that she might
ride more easily. After consulting about the state of
the weather, it was resolved to leave the artificers on
board this evening, and carry only the smiths to the
rock, as the sharpening of the irons was rather behind,
from their being so much broken and blunted by the
hard and tough nature of the rock, which became
much more compact and hard as the depth of ex-
cavation was increased. Besides avoiding the risk of
encumbering the boats with a number of men who
had not yet got the full command of the oar in a
breach of sea, the writer had another motive for
leaving them behind. He wanted to examine the
site of the building without interruption, and to take
the comparative levels of the different inequalities of

150 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 its area; and as it would have been painful to have
seen men standing idle upon the Bell Rock, where all
moved with activity, it was judged better to leave
them on board. The boats landed at half-past seven
p.m., and the landing-master, with the seamen, was
employed during this tide in cutting the seaweeds
from the several paths leading to the landing-places,
to render walking more safe, for, from the slippery
state of the surface of the rock, many severe tumbles
had taken place. In the meantime the writer took
the necessary levels, and having carefully examined
the site of the building and considered all its parts,
it still appeared to be necessary to excavate to the
average depth of fourteen inches over the whole area
of the foundation.

Saturday, The wind still continued from the eastward with
28th ay. a neavy swen ; and to-day it was accompanied with
foggy weather and occasional showers of rain. Not-
withstanding this, such was the confidence which the
erection of the beacon had inspired that the boats
landed the artificers on the rock under very unpromis-
ing circumstances, at half-past eight, and they con-
tinued at work till half-past eleven, being a period of
three hours, which was considered a great tide's work
in the present low state of the foundation. Three of
the masons on board were so afflicted with sea-sickness
that they had not been able to take any food for
almost three days, and they were literally assisted into
the boats this morning by their companions. It was,
however, not a little surprising to see how speedily
these men revived upon landing on the rock and
eating a little dulse. Two of them afterwards assisted
the sailors in collecting the chips of stone and carrying
them out of the way of the pickmen ; but the third
complained of a pain in his head, and was still unable

THE BELL ROCK 151

to do anything. Instead of returning to the tender 1808
with the boats, these three men remained on the
beacon all day, and had their victuals sent to them
along with the smiths'. From Mr. Dove, the foreman
smith, they had much sympathy, for he preferred
remaining on the beacon at all hazards, to be himself
relieved from the malady of sea-sickness. The wind
continuing high, with a heavy sea, and the tide falling
late, it was not judged proper to land the artificers
this evening, but in the twilight the boats were sent
to fetch the people on board who had been left on the
rock.

The wind was from the S.W. to-day, and the Sunday,
signal-bell rung, as usual, about an hour before the 29t
period for landing on the rock. The writer was rather
surprised, however, to hear the landing-master re-
peatedly call, ' All hands for the rock ! ' and, coming
on deck, he was disappointed to find the seamen only
in the boats. Upon inquiry, it appeared that some
misunderstanding had taken place about the wages of
the artificers for Sundays. They had preferred wages
for seven days statedly to the former mode of allowing
a day for each tide's work on Sunday, as they did not
like the appearance of working for double or even
treble wages on Sunday, and would rather have it
understood that their work on that day arose more
from the urgency of the case than with a view to
emolument. This having been judged creditable to
their religious feelings, and readily adjusted to their
wish, the boats proceeded to the rock, and the work
commenced at nine a.m.

Mr. Francis Watt commenced, with five joiners, to Monday,
fit up a temporary platform upon the beacon, about 3°th M*?-
twenty-five feet above the highest part of the rock.
This platform was to be used as the site of the smith's

152 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 forge, after the beacon should be fitted up as a barrack ;
and here also the mortar was to be mixed and pre-
pared for the building, and it was accordingly termed
the Mortar Gallery.

The landing-master's crew completed the discharg-
ing from the Smeaton of her cargo of the cast-iron
rails and timber. It must not here be omitted to
notice that the Smeaton took in ballast from the Bell
Rock, consisting of the shivers or chips of stone pro-
duced by the workmen in preparing the site of the
building, which were now accumulating in great
quantities on the rock. These the boats loaded, after
discharging the iron. The object in carrying off these
chips, besides ballasting the vessel, was to get them
permanently out of the way, as they were apt to shift
about from place to place with every gale of wind ;
and it often required a considerable time to clear the
foundation a second time of this rubbish. The cir-
cumstance of ballasting a ship at the Bell Rock
afforded great entertainment, especially to the sailors ;
and it was perhaps with truth remarked that the
Smeaton was the first vessel that had ever taken on
board ballast at the Bell Rock. Mr. Pool, the com-
mander of this vessel, afterwards acquainted the writer
that, when the ballast was landed upon the quay at
Leith, many persons carried away specimens of it, as
part of a cargo from the Bell Rock ; when he added,
that such was the interest excited, from the number of
specimens carried away, that some of his friends
suggested that he should have sent the whole to the
Cross of Edinburgh, where each piece might have sold
for a penny.

Tuesday, In the evening the boats went to the rock, and

3*st ay. brought the joiners and smiths, and their sickly com-
panions, on board of the tender. These also brought

THE BELL ROCK 153

with them two baskets full of fish, which they had 1808
caught at high-water from the beacon, reporting, at
the same time, to their comrades, that the fish were
swimming in such numbers over the rock at high-
water that it was completely hid from their sight, and
nothing seen but the movement of thousands of fish.
They were almost exclusively of the species called the
podlie, or young coal-fish. This discovery, made for
the first time to-day by the workmen, was considered
fortunate, as an additional circumstance likely to
produce an inclination among the artificers to take up
their residence in the beacon, when it came to be
fitted up as a barrack.

At three o'clock in the morning the ship's bell was Tuesday,
rung as the signal for landing at the rock. When the 7th June*
landing was to be made before breakfast, it was
customary to give each of the artificers and seamen a
dram and a biscuit, and coffee was prepared by the
steward for the cabins. Exactly at four o'clock the
whole party landed from three boats, including one of
those belonging to the floating light, with a part of
that ship's crew, which always attended the works in
moderate weather. The landing-master's boat, called
the Seaman, but more commonly called the Lifeboat,
took the lead. The next boat, called the Mason, was
generally steered by the writer; while the floating
light's boat, Pharos, was under the management of the
boatswain of that ship.

Having now so considerable a party of workmen
and sailors on the rock, it may be proper here to
notice how their labours were directed. Preparations
having been made last month for the erection of a
second forge upon the beacon, the smiths commenced
their operations both upon the lower and higher
platforms. They were employed in sharpening the

154 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 picks and irons for the masons, and in making bats
and other apparatus of various descriptions connected
with the fitting of the railways. The landing-master's
crew were occupied in assisting the millwrights in
laying the railways to hand. Sailors, of all other
descriptions of men, are the most accommodating in
the use of their hands. They worked freely with the
boring-irons., and assisted in all the operations of the
railways, acting by turns as boatmen, seamen, and
artificers. We had no such character on the Bell
Rock as the common labourer. All the operations of
this department were cheerfully undertaken by the
seamen, who, both on the rock and on shipboard, were
the inseparable companions of every work connected
with the erection of the Bell Rock Lighthouse. It
will naturally be supposed that about twenty-five
masons, occupied with their picks in executing and
preparing the foundation of the lighthouse, in the
course of a tide of about three hours, would make a
considerable impression upon an area even of forty-two
feet in diameter. But in proportion as the foundation
was deepened, the rock was found to be much more
hard and difficult to work, while the baling and
pumping of water became much more troublesome.
A joiner was kept almost constantly employed in
fitting the picks to their handles, which, as well as the
points to the irons, were very frequently broken.

The Bell Rock this morning presented by far the
most busy and active appearance it had exhibited
since the erection of the principal beams of the
beacon. The surface of the rock was crowded with
men, the two forges flaming, the one above the other,
upon the beacon, while the anvils thundered with the
rebounding noise of their wooden supports, and formed
a curious contrast with the occasional clamour of the

THE BELL ROCK 155

surges. The wind was westerly, and the weather 1808
being extremely agreeable, as soon after breakfast as
the tide had sufficiently overflowed the rock to float
the boats over it, the smiths, with a number of the
artificers, returned to the beacon, carrying their
fishing-tackle along with them. In the course of the
forenoon, the beacon exhibited a still more extra-
ordinary appearance than the rock had done in the
morning. The sea being smooth, it seemed to be
afloat upon the water, with a number of men support-
ing themselves in all the variety of attitude and
position : while, from the upper part of this wooden
house, the volumes of smoke which ascended from the
forges gave the whole a very curious and fanciful
appearance.

In the course of this tide it was observed that a
heavy swell was setting in from the eastward, and the
appearance of the sky indicated a change of weather,
while the wind was shifting about. The barometer
also had fallen from 30 in. to 29-6. It was, therefore,
judged prudent to shift the vessel to the S.W. or
more distant buoy. Her bowsprit was also soon after-
wards taken in, the topmasts struck, and everything
made snug, as seamen term it, for a gale. During the
course of the night the wind increased and shifted to
the eastward, when the vessel rolled very hard, and
the sea often broke over her bows with great force.

Although the motion of the tender was much less Wednes-
than that of the floating light — at least, in regard to
the rolling motion — yet she sended, or pitched, much.
Being also of a very handsome build, and what seamen
term very clean aft, the sea often struck the counter
with such force that the writer, who possessed the
aftermost cabin, being unaccustomed to this new
vessel, could not divest himself of uneasiness; for

156 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 when her stern fell into the sea, it struck with so much
violence as to be more like the resistance of a rock
than the sea. The water, at the same time, often
rushed with great force up the rudder-case, and,
forcing up the valve of the water-closet, the floor of
his cabin was at times laid under water. The gale
continued to increase, and the vessel rolled and pitched
in such a manner that the hawser by which the tender
was made fast to the buoy snapped, and she went
adrift. In the act of swinging round to the wind she
shipped a very heavy sea, which greatly alarmed the
artificers, who imagined that we had got upon the
rock; but this, from the direction of the wind, was
impossible. The writer, however, sprung upon deck,
where he found the sailors busily employed in rigging
* out the bowsprit and in setting sail. From the
easterly direction of the wind, it was considered most
advisable to steer for the Firth of Forth, and there
wait a change of weather. At two p.m. we accord-
ingly passed the Isle of May, at six anchored in Leith
Roads, and at eight the writer landed, when he came
in upon his friends, who were not a little surprised
at his unexpected appearance, which gave an instan-
taneous alarm for the safety of things at the Bell
Rock.

Thursday, The wind still continued to blow very hard at E. by
9t *une* N., and the Sir Joseph Batiks rode heavily, and even
drifted with both anchors ahead, in Leith Roads. The
artificers did not attempt to leave the ship last night ;
but there being upwards of fifty people on board, and
the decks greatly lumbered with the two large boats,
they were in a very crowded and impatient state on
board. But to-day they got ashore, and amused them-
selves by walking about the streets of Edinburgh, some
in very humble apparel, from having only the worst of

THE BELL ROCK 157

their jackets with them, which, though quite suitable 1808
for their work, were hardly fit for public inspection,
being not only tattered, but greatly stained with the
red colour of the rock.

To-day the wind was at S.E., with light breezes and Friday,
foggy weather. At six a.m. the writer again embarked
for the Bell Rock, when the vessel immediately sailed.
At eleven p.m., there being no wind, the kedge-
anchor was let go off Anstruther, one of the numerous
towns on the coast of Fife, where we waited the
return of the tide.

At six a.m. the Sir Joseph got under weigh, and at Saturday,
eleven was again made fast to the southern buoy at r
the Bell Rock. Though it was now late in the tide,
the writer, being anxious to ascertain the state of
things after the gale, landed with the artificers to the
number of forty-four. Everything was found in an
entire state; but, as the tide was nearly gone, only
half an hour's work had been got when the site of the
building was overflowed. In the evening the boats
again landed at nine, and after a good tide's work of
three hours with torchlight, the work was left off at
midnight. To the distant shipping the appearance of
things under night on the Bell Rock, when the work
was going forward, must have been very remarkable,
especially to those who were strangers to the opera-
tions. Mr. John Reid, principal lightkeeper, who
also acted as master of the floating light during the
working months at the rock, described the appearance
of numerous lights situated so low in the water, when
seen at the distance of two or three miles, as putting
him in mind of Milton's description of the fiends in
the lower regions, adding, ' for it seems greatly to
surpass Will-o' -the- Wisp, or any of those earthly
spectres of which we have so often heard.'

158 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 From the difficulties attending the landing on the

Monday, rock, owing to the breach of sea which had for days
past been around it, the artificers showed some back-
wardness at getting into the boats this morning ; but
after a little explanation this was got over. It was
always observable that for some time after anything
like danger had occurred at the rock, the workmen
became much more cautious, and on some occasions
their timidity was rather troublesome. It fortunately
happened, however, that along with the writer's
assistants and the sailors there were also some of the
artificers themselves who felt 110 such scruples, and in
this way these difficulties were the more easily sur-
mounted. In matters where life is in danger it
becomes necessary to treat even unfounded prejudices
with tenderness, as an accident, under certain circum-
stances, would not only have been particularly painful
to those giving directions, but have proved highly
detrimental to the work, especially in the early stages
of its advancement.

At four o'clock fifty-eight persons landed ; but the
tides being extremely languid, the water only left the
higher parts of the rock, and no work could be done
at the site of the building. A third forge was, how-
ever, put in operation during a short time, for the
greater conveniency of sharpening the picks and
irons, and for purposes connected with the prepara-
tions for fixing the railways on the rock. The
weather towards the evening became thick and foggy,
and there was hardly a breath of wind to ruffle the
surface of the water. Had it not, therefore, been for
the noise from the anvils of the smiths who had been
left on the beacon throughout the day, which afforded
a guide for the boats, a landing could not have been
attempted this evening, especially with such a com-

THE BELL ROCK 159

pany of artificers. This circumstance confirmed the 1808
writer's opinion with regard to the propriety of con-
necting large bells to be rung with machinery in the
lighthouse, to be tolled day and night during the
continuance of foggy weather.

The boats landed this evening, when the artificers Thursday,
had again two hours' work. The weather still con- 23rdJune-
tinuing very thick and foggy, more difficulty was
experienced in getting on board of the vessels to-night
than had occurred on any previous occasion, owing to
a light breeze of wind which carried the sound of the
bell, and the other signals made on board of the
vessels, away from the rock. Having fortunately
made out the position of the sloop Smeaton at the
N.E. buoy — to which we were much assisted by the
barking of the ship's dog, — we parted with the
Smeaton s boat, when the boats of the tender took a
fresh departure for that vessel, which lay about half
a mile to the south-westward. Yet such is the very
deceiving state of the tides, that, although there was
a small binnacle and compass in the landing-master's
boat, we had, nevertheless, passed the Sir Joseph a
good way, when, fortunately, one of the sailors
catched the sound of a blowing-horn. The only fire-
arms on board were a pair of swivels of one-inch
calibre; but it is quite surprising how much the
sound is lost in foggy weather, as the report was heard
but at a very short distance. The sound from the
explosion of gunpowder is so instantaneous that the
effect of the small guns was not so good as either the
blowing of a horn or the tolling of a bell, which
afforded a more constant and steady direction for the
pilot.

Landed on the rock with the three boats belonging Wednes-
to the tender at five p.m., and began immediately to 6t§July.

160 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 bale the water out of the foundation-pit with a num-
ber of buckets, while the pumps were also kept in
action with relays of artificers and seamen. The work
commenced upon the higher parts of the foundation
as the water left them, but it was now pretty
generally reduced to a level. About twenty men
could be conveniently employed at each pump, and it
is quite astonishing in how short a time so great a
body of water could be drawn off. The water in the
foundation-pit at this time measured about two feet in
depth, on an area of forty-two feet in diameter, and
yet it was drawn off in the course of about half an
hour. After this the artificers commenced with their
picks and continued at work for two hours and a half,
some of the sailors being at the same time busily
employed in clearing the foundation of chips and in
conveying the irons to and from the smiths on the
beacon, where they were sharped. At eight o'clock
the sea broke in upon us and overflowed the foundation-
pit, when the boats returned to the tender.

Thursday, The landing-master's bell rung this morning about
four o'clock, and at half-past five, the foundation being
cleared, the work commenced on the site of the build-
ing. But from the moment of landing, the squad of
joiners and millwrights was at work upon the higher
parts of the rock in laying the railways, while the
anvils of the smith resounded on the beacon, and such
columns of smoke ascended from the forges that they
were often mistaken by strangers at a distance for a
ship on fire. After continuing three hours at work
the foundation of the building was again overflowed,
and the boats returned to the ship at half-past eight
o'clock. The masons and pickmen had, at this
period, a pretty long day on board of the tender, but
the smiths and joiners were kept constantly at work

THE BELL ROCK 161

upon the beacon, the stability and great conveniency 1808
of which had now been so fully shown that no doubt
remained as to the propriety of fitting it up as a
barrack. The workmen were accordingly employed,
during the period of high-water, in making prepara-
tions for this purpose.

The foundation-pit now assumed the appearance of
a great platform, and the late tides had been so favour-
able that it became apparent that the first course,
consisting of a few irregular and detached stones for
making up certain inequalities in the interior parts of
the site of the building, might be laid in the course of
the present spring-tides. Having been enabled to-day
to get the dimensions of the foundation, or first stone,
accurately taken, a mould was made of its figure, when
the writer left the rock, after the tide's work of this
morning, in a fast rowing-boat for Arbroath; and, upon
landing, two men were immediately set to work upon
one of the blocks from Mylnefield quarry, which was
prepared in the course of the following day, as the
stone-cutters relieved each other, and worked both
night and day, so that it was sent off in one of the
stone-lighters without delay.

The site of the foundation-stone was very difficult to Saturday,
work, from its depth in the rock; but being now nearly 9th July-
prepared, it formed a very agreeable kind of pastime
at high-water for all hands to land the stone itself upon
the rock, The landing-master's crew and artificers
accordingly entered with great spirit into this operation.
The stone was placed upon the deck of the Hedderwick
praam-boat, which had just been brought from Leith,
and was decorated with colours for the occasion. Flags
were also displayed from the shipping in the offing,
and upon the beacon. Here the writer took his station
with the greater part of the artificers, who supported

L

162

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808

Sundav,
xoth July.

Tuesday,
26th July,

Wednes-
day,
2/th July.

themselves in every possible position while the boats
towed the praam from her moorings and brought her
immediately over the site of the building, where her
grappling anchors were let go. The stone was then
lifted off the deck by a tackle hooked into a Lewis bat
inserted into it, when it was gently lowered into the
water and grounded on the site of the building, amidst
the cheering acclamations of about sixty persons.

At eleven o'clock the foundation-stone was laid to
hand. It was of a square form, containing about twenty
cubic feet, and had the figures, or date, of 1808 simply
cut upon it with a chisel. A derrick, or spar of timber,
having been erected at the edge of the hole and guyed
with ropes, the stone was then hooked to the tackle and
lowered into its place, when the writer, attended by
his assistants — Mr. Peter Logan, Mr. Francis Watt, and
Mr. James Wilson, — applied the square, the level, and
the mallet, and pronounced the following benediction :
' May the great Architect of the Universe complete
and bless this building/ on which three hearty cheers
were given, and success to the future operations was
drunk with the greatest enthusiasm.

The wind being at S.E. this evening, we had a pretty
heavy swell of sea upon the rock, and some difficulty at-
tended our getting off in safety, as the boats got aground
in the creek and were in danger of being upset. Upon
extinguishing the torchlights, about twelve in number,
the darkness of the night seemed quite horrible ; the
water being also much charged with the phosphores-
cent appearance which is familiar to every one on
shipboard, the waves, as they dashed upon the rock,
were in some degree like so much liquid flame. The
scene, upon the whole, was truly awful !

In leaving the rock this evening everything, after
the torches were extinguished, had the same dismal

THE BELL ROCK 16S

appearance as last night, but so perfectly acquainted 1808
were the landing-master and his crew with the position
of things at the rock, that comparatively little incon-
veniency was experienced on these occasions when the
weather was moderate; such is the effect of habit, even
in the most unpleasant situations. If, for example, it
had been proposed to a person accustomed to a city
life, at once to take up his quarters off a sunken reef
and land upon it in boats at all hours of the night, the
proposition must have appeared quite impracticable
and extravagant; but this practice coming progressively
upon the artificers, it was ultimately undertaken with
the greatest alacrity. Notwithstanding this, however,
it must be acknowledged that it was not till after much
labour and peril, and many an anxious hour, that the
writer is enabled to state that the site of the Bell Rock
Lighthouse is fully prepared for the first entire course
of the building.

The artificers landed this morning at half-past ten, Friday,
and after an hour and a half's work eight stones were T2th Aus>
laid, which completed the first entire course of the
building, consisting of 123 blocks, the last of which
was laid with three hearty cheers.

Landed at nine a.m., and by a quarter- past twelve Saturday,
noon twenty-three stones had been laid. The works loth Sept'
being now somewhat elevated by the lower courses, we
got quit of the very serious inconvenience of pumping
water to clear the foundation-pit. This gave much
facility to the operations, and was noticed with ex-
pressions of as much happiness by the artificers as the
seamen had shown when relieved of the continual
trouble of carrying the smith's bellows off the rock
prior to the erection of the beacon.

Mr. Thomas Macurich, mate of the Smeaton, and Wednes-
James Scott, one of the crew, a young man about 2istSept.

164 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 eighteen years of age,, immediately went into their
boat to make fast a hawser to the ring in the top of
the floating buoy of the moorings, and were forthwith
to proceed to land their cargo, so much wanted, at the
rock. The tides at this period were very strong, and
the mooring-chain, when sweeping the ground, had
caught hold of a rock or piece of wreck by which the
chain was so shortened that when the tide flowed the
buoy got almost under water, and little more than the
ring appeared at the surface. When Macurich and Scott
were in the act of making the hawser fast to the ring,
the chain got suddenly disentangled at the bottom,
and this large buoy, measuring about seven feet in
height and three feet in diameter at the middle,
tapering to both ends, being what seamen term a Nun-
buoy, vaulted or sprung up with such force that it
upset the boat, which instantly filled with water. Mr.
Macurich, with much exertion, succeeded in getting
hold of the boat's gunwale, still above the surface of
the water, and by this means was saved ; but the young
man Scott was unfortunately drowned. He had in
all probability been struck about the head by the
ring of the buoy, for although surrounded with the
oars and the thwarts of the boat which floated near
him, yet he seemed entirely to want the power of
availing himself of such assistance, and appeared to be
quite insensible, while Pool, the master of the Smeaton,
called loudly to him ; and before assistance could be
got from the tender, he was carried away by the
strength of the current and disappeared.

The young man Scott was a great favourite in the
service, having had something uncommonly mild and
complaisant in his manner; and his loss was therefore
universally regretted. The circumstances of his case
were also peculiarly distressing to his mother, as her

THE BELL ROCK 165

husband, who was a seaman, had for three years past 1808
been confined to a French prison, and the deceased
was the chief support of the family. In order in some
measure to make up the loss to the poor woman for
the monthly aliment regularly allowed her by her late
son, it was suggested that a younger boy, a brother of
the deceased, might be taken into the service. This
appeared to be rather a delicate proposition, but it
was left to the landing-master to arrange according to
circumstances ; such was the resignation, and at the
same time the spirit, of the poor woman, that she
readily accepted the proposal, and in a few days the
younger Scott was actually afloat in the place of his
brother. On representing this distressing case to the
Board, the Commissioners were pleased to grant an
annuity of £5 to Scott's mother.

The Smealon, not having been made fast to the buoy,
had, with the ebb-tide, drifted to leeward a consider-
able way eastward of the rock, and could not, till the
return of the flood-tide, be worked up to her moorings^
so that the present tide was lost, notwithstanding all
exertions which had been made both ashore and afloat
with this cargo. The artificers landed at six a.m. ; but,
as no materials could be got upon the rock this morning,
they were employed in boring trenail holes and in
various other operations, and after four hours' work
they returned on board the tender. When the Smeaton
got up to her moorings, the landing-master's crew
immediately began to unload her. There being too
much wind for towing the praams in the usual way,
they were warped to the rock in the most laborious
manner by their windlasses, with successive grapplings
and hawsers laid out for this purpose. At six p.m.
the artificers landed, and continued at work till half-
past ten, when the remaining seventeen stones were

166

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1808 laid which completed the third entire course, or fourth
of the lighthouse, with which the building operations
were closed for the season.

1809

Wednes-
day,
24th May.

Wednes-
day,
3ist May.

Ill

OPERATIONS OF 1809

The last night was the first that the writer had
passed in his old quarters on board of the floating light
for about twelve months, when the weather was so fine
and the sea so smooth that even here he felt but little
or no motion, excepting at the turn of the tide, when
the vessel gets into what the seamen term the trough
of the sea. At six a.m. Mr. Watt, who conducted the
operations of the railways and beacon-house, had
landed with nine artificers. At half-past one p.m. Mr.
Peter Logan had also landed with fifteen masons, and
immediately proceeded to set up the crane. The sheer-
crane or apparatus for lifting the stones out of the
praam-boats at the eastern creek had been already
erected, and the railways now formed about two-thirds
of an entire circle round the building : some progress
had likewise been made with the reach towards the
western landing-place. The floors being laid, the
beacon now assumed the appearance of a habitation.
The Smeaton was at her moorings, with the Fernie
praam-boat astern, for which she was laying down
moorings, and the tender being also at her station, the
Bell Rock had again put on its former busy aspect.

The landing-master's bell, often no very favourite
sound, rung at six this morning ; but on this occasion,
it is believed, it was gladly received by all on board,
as the welcome signal of the return of better weather.

THE BELL ROCK 167

The masons laid thirteen stones to-day, which the 1809
seamen had landed, together with other building
materials. During these twenty-four hours the wind
was from the south, blowing fresh breezes, accom-
panied with showers of snow. In the morning the
snow showers were so thick that it was with difficulty
the landing-master, who always steered the leading
boat, could make his way to the rock through the
drift. But at the Bell Rock neither snow nor rain,
nor fog nor wind, retarded the progress of the work,
if unaccompanied by a heavy swell or breach of the
sea.

The weather during the months of April and May
had been uncommonly boisterous, and so cold that
the thermometer seldom exceeded 40°, while the
barometer was generally about 29'50. We had not
only hail and sleet, but the snow on the last day of
May lay on the decks and rigging of the ship to the
depth of about three inches ; and, although now
entering upon the month of June, the length of the
day was the chief indication of summer. Yet such is
the effect of habit, and such was the expertness of the
landing-master's crew, that, even in this description
of weather, seldom a tide's work was lost. Such
was the ardour and zeal of the heads of the several
departments at the rock, including Mr. Peter Logan,
foreman builder, Mr. Francis Watt, foreman mill-
wright, and Captain WTilson, landing-master, that it
was 011 no occasion necessary to address them,
excepting in the way of precaution or restraint.
Under these circumstances, however, the writer not
unfrequently felt considerable anxiety, of which this
day's experience will afford an example.

This morning, at a quarter-past eight, the artificers Thursday,
were landed as usual, and, after three hours and three- Ist June*

168 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 quarters' work, five stones were laid, the greater part
of this tide having been taken up in completing the
boring and trenailing of the stones formerly laid. At
noon the writer, with the seamen and artificers, pro-
ceeded to the tender, leaving on the beacon the
joiners, and several of those who were troubled with
sea-sickness — among whom was Mr. Logan, who
remained with Mr. Watt — counting altogether eleven
persons. During the first and middle parts of these
twenty-four hours the wind was from the east, blowing
what the seamen term ' fresh breezes ' ; but in the
afternoon it shifted to E.N.E., accompanied with so
heavy a swell of sea that the Smeaton and tender
struck their topmasts, launched in their bolt-sprits,
and 'made all snug' for a gale. At four p.m. the
Smeaton was obliged to slip her moorings, and passed
the tender, drifting before the wind, with only the
foresail set. In passing, Mr. Pool hailed that he
must run for the Firth of Forth to prevent the
vessel from ' riding under/

On board of the tender the writer's chief concern
was about the eleven men left upon the beacon.
Directions were accordingly given that everything
about the vessel should be put in the best possible
state, to present as little resistance to the wind as
possible, that she might have the better chance of
riding out the gale. Among these preparations the
best bower cable was bent, so as to have a second
anchor in readiness in case the mooring-hawser
should give way, that every means might be used
for keeping the vessel within sight of the prisoners
on the beacon, and thereby keep them in as good
spirits as possible. From the same motive the boats
were kept afloat that they might be less in fear of the
vessel leaving her station. The landing-master had,

THE BELL ROCK 169

however, repeatedly expressed his anxiety for the
safety of the boats, and wished much to have them
hoisted on board. At seven p.m. one of the boats,
as he feared, was unluckily filled with sea from a
wave breaking into her, and it was with great difficulty
that she could be baled out and got on board, with
the loss of her oars, rudder, and loose thwarts. Such
was the motion of the ship that in taking this boat on
board her gunwale was stove in, and she otherwise
received considerable damage. Night approached,
but it was still found quite impossible to go near
the rock. Consulting, therefore, the safety of the
second boat, she also was hoisted on board of the
tender.

At this time the cabins of the beacon were only
partially covered, and had neither been provided
with bedding nor a proper fireplace, while the stock
of provisions was but slender. In these uncomfortable
circumstances the people on the beacon were left for
the night, nor was the situation of those on board of
the tender much better. The rolling and pitching
motion of the ship was excessive ; and, excepting to
those who had been accustomed to a residence in the
floating light, it seemed quite intolerable. Nothing
was heard but the hissing of the winds and the
creaking of the bulkheads or partitions of the ship ;
the night was, therefore, spent in the most unpleasant
reflections upon the condition of the people on the
beacon, especially in the prospect of the tender being
driven from her moorings. But, even in such a case,
it afforded some consolation that the stability of the
fabric was never doubted, and that the boats of the
floating light were at no great distance, and ready to
render the people on the rock the earliest assistance
which the weather would permit. The writer's cabin

170 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 being in the sternmost part of the 'ship, which had
what sailors term a good entry, or was sharp built, the
sea, as before noticed, struck her counter with so much
violence that the water, with a rushing noise, con-
tinually forced its way up the rudder-case, lifted
the valve of the water-closet, and overran the cabin
floor. In these circumstances daylight was eagerly
looked for, and hailed with delight, as well by those
afloat as by the artificers upon the rock.

Friday, In the course of the night the writer held repeated

conversations with the officer on watch, who reported
that the weather continued much in the same state,
and that the barometer still indicated 29*20 inches.
At six a.m. the landing-master considered the weather
to have somewhat moderated ; and, from certain
appearances of the sky, he was of opinion that a
change for the better would soon take place. He
accordingly proposed to attempt a landing at low-
water, and either get the people off the rock, or at
least ascertain what state they were in. At nine a.m.
he left the vessel with a boat well manned, carrying
with him a supply of cooked provisions and a tea-
kettle full of mulled port wine for the people on the
beacon, who had not had any regular diet for about
thirty hours, while they were exposed during that
period, in a great measure, both to the winds and
the sprays of the sea. The boat having succeeded
in landing, she returned at eleven a.m. with the
artificers, who had got off with considerable difficulty,
and who were heartily welcomed by all on board.

Upon inquiry it appeared that three of the stones
last laid upon the building had been partially lifted
from their beds by the force of the sea, and were now
held only by the trenails, and that the cast-iron sheer-
crane had again been thrown down and completely

THE BELL ROCK 171

broken. With regard to the beacon, the sea at high- i«
water had lifted part of the mortar gallery or lowest
floor, and washed away all the lime-casks and other
movable articles from it ; but the principal parts of
this fabric had sustained no damage. On pressing
Messrs. Logan and Watt on the situation of things in
the course of the night, Mr. Logan emphatically said :
< That the beacon had an ill-faured l twist when the sea
broke upon it at high-water, but that they were not
very apprehensive of danger.' On inquiring as to how
they spent the night, it appeared that they had made
shift to keep a small fire burning, and by means of
some old sails defended themselves pretty well from
the sea sprays.

It was particularly mentioned that by the exertions
of James Glen, one of the joiners, a number of articles
were saved from being washed off the mortar gallery.
Glen was also very useful in keeping up the spirits of
the forlorn party. In the early part of life he had
undergone many curious adventures at sea, which he
now recounted somewhat after the manner of the tales
of the Arabian Nights. When one observed that the
beacon was a most comfortless lodging, Glen would
presently introduce some of his exploits and hardships,
in comparison with which the state of things at the
beacon bore an aspect of comfort and happiness.
Looking to their slender stock of provisions, and
their perilous and uncertain chance of speedy relief,
he would launch out into an account of one of his
expeditions in the North Sea, when the vessel, being
much disabled in a storm, was driven before the wind
with the loss of almost all their provisions ; and the
ship being much infested with rats, the crew hunted
these vermin with great eagerness to help their scanty
1 Ill-formed— ugly.— [R. L. S.]

172 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 allowance. By such means Glen had the address to
make his companions, in some measure, satisfied, or
at least passive, with regard to their miserable
prospects upon this half-tide rock in the middle of
the ocean. This incident is noticed, more particularly,
to show the effects of such a happy turn of mind, even
under the most distressing and ill-fated circumstances.
Saturday, At eight a.m. the artificers and sailors, forty-five in
17 june. numijer, landed on the rock, and after four hours'
work seven stones were laid. The remainder of this
tide, from the threatening appearance of the weather,
was occupied in trenailing and making all things as
secure as possible. At twelve noon the rock and
building were again overflowed, when the masons
and seamen went on board of the tender, but Mr.
Watt, with his squad of ten men, remained on the
beacon throughout the day. As it blew fresh from
the N.W. in the evening, it was found impracticable
either to land the building artificers or to take the
artificers off the beacon, and they were accordingly
left there all night, but in circumstances very different
from those of the 1st of this month. The house, being
now in a more complete state, was provided with
bedding, and they spent the night pretty well, though
they complained of having been much disturbed at the
time of high-water by the shaking and tremulous
motion of their house and by the plashing noise of
the sea upon the mortar gallery. Here James Glen's
versatile powers were again at work in cheering up
those who seemed to be alarmed, and in securing
everything as far as possible. On this occasion he
had only to recall to the recollections of some of
them the former night which they had spent on the
beacon, the wind and sea being then much higher, and
their habitation in a far less comfortable state.

THE BELL ROCK 173

The wind still continuing to blow fresh from the 1809
N.W., at five p.m. the writer caused a signal to be
made from the tender for the Smeaton and Patriot to
slip their moorings, when they ran for Lunan Bay, an
anchorage on the east side of the Redhead. Those on
board of the tender spent but a very rough night, and
perhaps slept less soundly than their companions on
the beacon, especially as the wind was at N.W., which
caused the vessel to ride with her stem towards the
Bell Rock ; so that, in the event of anything giving
way, she could hardly have escaped being stranded
upon it.

The weather having moderated to-day, the wind Sunday,
shifted to the westward. At a quarter-past nine a.m.
the artificers landed from the tender and had the
pleasure to find their friends who had been left on
the rock quite hearty, alleging that the beacon was
the preferable quarters of the two.

Mr. Peter Logan, the foreman builder, and his Saturday,
squad, twenty-one in number, landed this morning 24th •'une>
at three o'clock, and continued at work four hours
and a quarter, and after laying seventeen stones
returned to the tender. At six a.m. Mr. Francis
Watt and his squad of twelve men landed, and pro-
ceeded with their respective operations at the beacon
and railways, and were left on the rock during the
whole day without the necessity of having any com-
munication with the tender, the kitchen of the beacon-
house being now fitted up. It was to-day, also, that
Peter Fortune — a most obliging and well-known
character in the Lighthouse service — was removed
from the tender to the beacon as cook and steward,
with a stock of provisions as ample as his limited store-
room would admit.

When as many stones were built as comprised this

174 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 day's work, the demand for mortar was proportionally
increased, and the task of the mortar-makers on these
occasions was both laborious and severe. This opera-
tion was chiefly performed by John Watt — a strong,
active quarrier by profession, — who was a perfect
character in his way, and extremely zealous in his
department. While the operations of the mortar-
makers continued, the forge upon the gallery was
not generally in use ; but, as the working hours of
the builders extended with the height of the building,
the forge could not be so long wanted, and then a sad
confusion often ensued upon the circumscribed floor of
the mortar gallery, as the operations of Watt and his
assistants trenched greatly upon those of the smiths.
Under these circumstances the boundary of the smiths
was much circumscribed, and they were personally
annoyed, especially in blowy weather, with the dust
of the lime in its powdered state. The mortar-makers,
on the other hand, were often not a little distressed
with the heat of the fire and the sparks elicited on
the anvil, and not unaptly complained that they
were placed between the 'devil and the deep
sea/

Sunday, The work being now about ten feet in height,

asth June. a(jmitted of a rOpe-ladder being distended l between
the beacon and the building. By this ( Jacob's
Ladder,' as the seamen termed it, a communication
was kept up with the beacon while the rock was
considerably under water. One end of it being
furnished with tackle-blocks, was fixed to the beams
of the beacon, at the level of the mortar gallery, while
the further end was connected with the upper course
of the building by means of two Lewis bats which

1 This is an incurable illusion of my grandfather's ; he always
writes ' distended ' for 'extended.'— [R. L. S.]

THE BELL ROCK 175

were lifted from course to course as the work advanced. 1809
In the same manner a rope furnished with a travelling
pulley was distended for the purpose of transporting
the mortar-buckets, and other light articles between
the beacon and the building, which also proved a great
conveniency to the work. At this period the rope-
ladder and tackle for the mortar had a descent from
the beacon to the building ; by and by they were on a
level, and towards the end of the season, when the
solid part had attained its full height, the ascent was
from the mortar gallery to the building.

The artificers landed on the rock this morning at Friday,
a quarter-past six, and remained at work five hours. 3° ^ur
The cooking apparatus being now in full operation,
all hands had breakfast on the beacon at the usual
hour, and remained there throughout the day. The
crane upon the building had to be raised to-day from
the eighth to the ninth course, an operation which
now required all the strength that could be mustered
for working the guy-tackles ; for as the top of the
crane was at this time about thirty-five feet above the
rock, it became much more unmanageable. While
the beam was in the act of swinging round from one
guy to another, a great strain was suddenly brought
upon the opposite tackle, with the end of which the
artificers had very improperly neglected to take a turn
round some stationary object, which would have given
them the complete command of the tackle. Owing
to this simple omission, the crane got a preponderancy
to one side, and fell upon the building with a terrible
crash. The surrounding artificers immediately flew in
every direction to get out of its way; but Michael
Wishart, the principal builder, having unluckily
stumbled upon one of the uncut trenails, fell upon
his back. His body fortunately got between the

176 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 movable beam and the upright shaft of the crane,
and was thus saved ; but his feet got entangled with
the wheels of the crane and were severely injured.
Wishart, being a robust young man, endured his
misfortune with wonderful firmness ; he was laid
upon one of the narrow framed beds of the beacon
and despatched in a boat to the tender, where the
writer was when this accident happened, not a little
alarmed on missing the crane froni the top of the
building, and at the same time seeing a boat rowing
towards the vessel with great speed. When the boat
came alongside with poor Wishart, stretched upon
a bed covered with blankets, a moment of great
anxiety followed, which was, however, much relieved
when, on stepping into the boat, he was accosted by
Wish art, though in a feeble voice, and with an aspect
pale as death from excessive bleeding. Directions
having been immediately given to the coxswain to
apply to Mr. Kennedy at the workyard to procure
the best surgical aid, the boat was sent off with-
out delay to Arbroath. The writer then landed
at the rock, when the crane was in a very short
time got into its place and again put in a working
state.

Monday, The writer having come to Arbroath with the yacht,

3rd July. jia(j an opportunity of visiting Michael Wishart, the
artificer who had met with so severe an accident at
the rock on the 30th ult., and had the pleasure to find
him in a state of recovery. From Dr. Stevenson's
account, under whose charge he had been placed,
hopes were entertained that amputation would not
be necessary, as his patient still kept free of fever
or any appearance of mortification ; and Wishart
expressed a hope that he might, at least, be ultimately
capable of keeping the light at the Bell Rock, as it

THE BELL ROCK 177

was not now likely that he would assist further in 1809
building the house.

It was remarked to-day, with no small demonstra- Saturday,
tion of joy, that the tide, being neap, did not, for the 8th July-
first time,, overflow the building at high-water. Flags
were accordingly hoisted on the beacon-house, and
crane on the top of the building, which were repeated
from the floating light, Lighthouse yacht, tender,
Smeaton, Patriot, and the two praams. A salute of
three guns was also fired from the yacht at high-
water, when, all the artificers being collected on the
top of the building, three cheers were given in
testimony of this important circumstance. A glass
of rum was then served out to all hands 011 the rock
and on board of the respective ships.

Besides laying, boring, trenailing, wedging, and Sunday,
grouting thirty-two stones, several other operations x
were proceeded with on the rock at low-water, when
some of the artificers were employed at the railways,
and at high-water at the beacon-house. The seamen
having prepared a quantity of tarpaulin, or cloth laid
over with successive coats of hot tar, the joiners had
just completed the covering of the roof with it.
This sort of covering was lighter and more easily
managed than sheet-lead in such a situation. As a
further defence against the weather the whole
exterior of this temporary residence was painted
with three coats of white-lead paint. Between the
timber framing of the habitable part of the beacon
the interstices were to be stuffed with moss, as a light
substance that would resist dampness and check sift-
ing winds ; the whole interior was then to be lined
with green baize cloth, so that both without and
within the cabins were to have a very comfortable
appearance.

M

178 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 Although the building artificers generally remained

on the rock throughout the day, and the millwrights,
joiners, and smiths, while their number was consider-
able, remained also during the night, yet the tender
had hitherto been considered as their night quarters.
But the wind having in the course of the day shifted
to the N.W., and as the passage to the tender, in the
boats, was likely to be attended with difficulty, the
whole of the artificers, with Mr. Logan, the foreman,
preferred remaining all night on the beacon, which
had of late become the solitary abode of George
Forsyth, a jobbing upholsterer, who had been
employed in lining the beacon-house with cloth
and in fitting up the bedding. Forsyth was a tall,
thin, and rather loose-made man, who had an utter
aversion at climbing upon the trap-ladders of the
beacon, but especially at the process of boating, and
the motion of the ship, which he said fwas death
itself.' He therefore pertinaciously insisted with the
landing-master in being left upon the beacon, with a
small black dog as his only companion. The writer,
however, felt some delicacy in leaving a single indi-
vidual upon the rock, who must have been so very
helpless in case of accident. This fabric had, from
the beginning, been rather intended by the writer to
guard against accident from the loss or damage of a
boat, and as a place for making mortar, a smith's shop,
and a store for tools during the working months, than
as permanent quarters ; nor was it at all meant to be
possessed until the joiner- work was completely finished,
and his own cabin, and that for the foreman, in readi-
ness, when it was still to be left to the choice of the
artificers to occupy the tender or the beacon. He,
however, considered Forsyth's partiality and confidence
in the latter as rather a fortunate occurrence.

THE BELL ROCK 179

The whole of the artificers, twenty-three in num- 1809
her, now removed of their own accord from the Wednes-
tender, to lodge in the beacon, together with Peter I9th July.
Fortune, a person singularly adapted for a residence of
this kind, both from the urbanity of his manners and
the versatility of his talents. Fortune, in his person,
was of small stature, and rather corpulent. Besides
being a good Scots cook, he had acted both as groom
and house-servant ; he had been a soldier, a sutler, a
writer's clerk, and an apothecary, from which he
possessed the art of writing and suggesting recipes,
and had hence, also, perhaps, acquired a turn for
making collections in natural history. But in his
practice in surgery on the Bell Rock, for which he
received an annual fee of three guineas, he is supposed
to have been rather partial to the use of the lancet.
In short, Peter was the factotum of the beacon-house,
where he ostensibly acted in the several capacities of
cook, steward, surgeon, and barber, and kept a state-
ment of the rations or expenditure of the provisions
with the strictest integrity.

In the present important state of the building,
when it had just attained the height of sixteen feet,
and the upper courses, and especially the imperfect
one, were in the wash of the heaviest seas, an express
boat arrived at the rock with a letter from Mr.
Kennedy, of the workyard, stating that in conse-
quence of the intended expedition to Walcheren, an
embargo had been laid on shipping at all the ports of
Great Britain : that both the Smeaton and Patriot were
detained at Arbroath, and that but for the proper
view which Mr. Ramsey, the port officer, had taken of
his orders, neither the express boat nor one which had
been sent with provisions and necessaries for the
floating light would have been permitted to leave the

180 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 harbour. The writer set off without delay for Arbroath,
and on landing used every possible means with the
official people, but their orders were deemed so per-
emptory that even boats were not permitted to sail
from any port upon the coast. In the meantime, the
collector of the Customs at Montrose applied to the
Board at Edinburgh, but could, of himself, grant no
relief to the Bell Rock shipping.

At this critical period Mr. Adam Duff, then Sheriff
of Forfarshire, now of the county of Edinburgh, and
ex qfficio one of the Commissioners of the Northern
Lighthouses, happened to be at Arbroath. Mr. Duff
took an immediate interest in representing the circum-
stances of the case to the Board of Customs at Edin-
burgh. But such were the doubts entertained 011 the
subject that, on having previously received the appeal
from the collector at Montrose, the case had been
submitted to the consideration of the Lords of the
Treasury, whose decision was now waited for.

In this state of things the writer felt particularly
desirous to get the thirteenth course finished, that the
building might be in a more secure state in the event
of bad weather. An opportunity was therefore em-
braced on the 25th, in sailing with provisions for the
floating light, to carry the necessary stones to the rock
for this purpose, which were landed and built on the
26th and 27th. But so closely was the watch kept up
that a Custom-house officer was always placed on board
of the Smeaton and Patriot while they were afloat, till
the embargo was especially removed from the light-
house vessels. The artificers at the Bell Rock had
been reduced to fifteen, who were regularly supplied
with provisions, along with the crew of the floating
light, mainly through the port officer's liberal interpre-
tation of his orders.

THE BELL ROCK 181

There being a considerable swell and breach of sea 1809
upon the rock yesterday, the stones could not be got Tuesday,
landed till the day following, when the wind shifted
to the southward and the weather improved. But to-
day no less than seventy-eight blocks of stone were
landed, of which forty were built, which completed
the fourteenth and part of the fifteenth courses. The
number of workmen now resident in the beacon-house
was augmented to twenty-four, including the landing-
master's crew from the tender and the boat's crew
from the floating light, who assisted at landing the
stones. Those daily at work upon the rock at this
period amounted to forty-six. A cabin had been laid
out for the writer on the beacon, but his apartment
had been the last which was finished, and he had not
yet taken possession of it ; for though he generally
spent the greater part of the day, at this time,
upon the rock, yet he always slept on board of the
tender.

The wind was at S.E. on the llth, and there was so Friday,
very heavy a swell of sea upon the rock that no boat IIth Aug*
could approach it.

The gale still continuing from the S.E., the sea Saturday,
broke with great violence both upon the building and I2th Aug'
the beacon. The former being twenty-three feet in
height, the upper part of the crane erected on it
having been lifted from course to course as the build-
ing advanced, was now about thirty-six feet above the
rock. From observations made on the rise of the sea
by this crane, the artificers were enabled to estimate
its height to be about fifty feet above the rock, while
the sprays fell with a most alarming noise upon their
cabins. At low-water, in the evening, a signal was
made from the beacon, at the earnest desire of some
of the artificers, for the boats to come to the rock ;

182

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809

Tuesday,
1 5th Aug.

Saturday,
igth Aug.

and although this could not be effected without con-
siderable hazard, it was, however, accomplished, when
twelve of their number, being much afraid, applied to
the foreman to be relieved, and went on board of the
tender. But the remaining fourteen continued on the
rock, with Mr. Peter Logan, the foreman builder.
Although this rule of allowing an option to every man
either to remain on the rock or return to the tender
was strictly adhered to, yet, as it would have been
extremely inconvenient to have the men parcelled out
in this manner, it became necessary to embrace the
first opportunity of sending those who had left the
beacon to the workyard, with as little appearance of
intention as possible, lest it should hurt their feelings,
or prevent others from acting according to their
wishes, either in landing on the rock or remaining on
the beacon.

The wind had fortunately shifted to the S.W. this
morning, and though a considerable breach was still
upon the rock, yet the landing-master's crew were
enabled to get one praam-boat, lightly loaded with
five stones, brought in safety to the western creek ;
these stones were immediately laid by the artificers,
who gladly embraced the return of good weather to
proceed with their operations. The writer had this
day taken possession of his cabin in the beacon-house.
It was small, but commodious, and was found particu-
larly convenient in coarse and blowing weather,
instead of being obliged to make a passage to the
tender in an open boat at all times, both during the
day and the night, which was often attended with
much difficulty and danger.

For some days past the weather had been occa-
sionally so thick and foggy that no small difficulty
was experienced in going even between the rock and

THE BELL ROCK 183

the tender,, though quite at hand. But the floating 1809
light's boat lost her way so far in returning on board
that the first land she made, after rowing all night,
was Fifeness, a distance of about fourteen miles. The
weather having cleared in the morning, the crew
stood off again for the floating light, and got on board
in a half-famished and much exhausted state, having
been constantly rowing for about sixteen hours.

The weather being very favourable to-day, fifty- Sunday,
three stones were landed, and the builders were not 2
a little gratified in having built the twenty-second
course, consisting of fifty-one stones, being the first
course which had been completed in one day. This,
as a matter of course, produced three hearty cheers.
At twelve noon prayers were read for the first time on
the Bell Rock ; those present, counting thirty, were
crowded into the upper apartment of the beacon,
where the writer took a central position, while two of
the artificers, joining hands, supported the Bible.

To-day the artificers laid forty-five stones, which Friday,
completed the twenty-fourth course, reckoning above 25t ug'
the first entire one, and the twenty-sixth above the
rock. This finished the solid part of the building,
and terminated the height of the outward casing of
granite, which is thirty-one feet six inches above the
rock or site of the foundation-stone, and about seven-
teen feet above high-water of spring-tides. Being a
particular crisis in the progress of the lighthouse, the
landing and laying of the last stone for the season was
observed with the usual ceremonies.

From observations often made by the writer, in so
far as such can be ascertained, it appears that no wave
in the open seas, in an unbroken state, rises more than
from seven to nine feet above the general surface of
the ocean. The Bell Rock Lighthouse may therefore

184 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1809 now be considered at from eight to ten feet above the
height of the waves ; and, although the sprays and
heavy seas have often been observed, in the present
state of the building, to rise to the height of fifty feet,
and fall with a tremendous noise on the beacon- house,
yet such seas were not likely to make any impression
on a mass of solid masonry, containing about 1400
tons.

Wednes- The whole of the artificers left the rock at mid-day,

Sot^Aug. when the tender made sail for Arbroath, which she
reached about six p.m. The vessel being decorated
with colours, and having fired a salute of three guns
on approaching the harbour, the workyard artificers,
with a multitude of people, assembled at the harbour,
when mutual cheering and congratulations took place
between those afloat and those on the quays. The
tender had now, with little exception, been six months
on the station at the Bell Rock, and during the last
four months few of the squad of builders had been
ashore. In particular, Mr. Peter Logan, the foreman,
and Mr. Robert Selkirk, principal builder, had never
once left the rock. The artificers, having made good
wages during their stay, like seamen upon a return
voyage, were extremely happy, and spent the evening
with much innocent mirth and jollity.

In reflecting upon the state of the matters at the
Bell Rock during the working months, when the writer
was much with the artificers, nothing can equal the
happy manner in which these excellent workmen spent
their time. They always went from Arbroath to their
arduous task cheering, and they generally returned in
the same hearty state. While at the rock, between
the tides, they amused themselves in reading, fishing,
music, playing cards, draughts, etc., or in sporting with
one another. In the workyard at Arbroath the young

THE BELL ROCK 185

men were almost, without exception, employed in the 1809
evening at school, in writing and arithmetic, and not a
few were learning architectural drawing, for which they
had every convenience and facility, and were, in a very
obliging manner, assisted in their studies by Mr. David
Logan, clerk of the works. It therefore affords the
most pleasing reflections to look back upon the pursuits
of about sixty individuals who for years conducted
themselves, on all occasions, in a sober and rational
manner.

IV
OPERATIONS OF 1810

The wind had shifted to-day to W.N.W., when the 1810
writer, with considerable difficulty, was enabled to land Thursday,
upon the rock for the first time this season, at ten a.m.
Upon examining the state of the building, and appar-
atus in general, he had the satisfaction to find every-
thing in good order. The mortar in all the joints was
perfectly entire. The building, now thirty feet in
height, was thickly coated with fuci to the height of
about fifteen feet, calculating from the rock : on the
eastern side, indeed, the growth of seaweed was observ-
able to the full height of thirty feet, and even on the
top or upper bed of the last-laid course, especially
towards the eastern side, it had germinated, so as to
render walking upon it somewhat difficult.

The beacon-house was in a perfectly sound state,
and apparently just as it had been left in the month
of November. But the tides being neap, the lower
parts, particularly where the beams rested on the rock,
could not now be seen. The floor of the mortar
gallery having been already laid down by Mr. Watt

186 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 and his men on a former visit, was merely soaked with
the sprays ; but the jois ting-beams which supported it
had, in the course of the winter, been covered with a
fine downy conferva produced by the range of the sea.
They were also a good deal whitened with the mute
of the cormorant and other sea-fowls, which had roosted
upon the beacon in winter. Upon ascending to the
apartments, it was found that the motion of the sea
had thrown open the door of the cook-house : this was
only shut with a single latch, that in case of shipwreck
at the Bell Rock the mariner might find ready access
to the shelter of this forlorn habitation, where a supply
of provisions was kept; and being within two miles
and a half of the floating light, a signal could readily
be observed, when a boat might be sent to his relief
as the weather permitted. An arrangement for this
purpose formed one of the instructions on board of the
floating light, but happily no instance occurred for
putting it in practice. The hearth or fireplace of the
cook-house was built of brick in as secure a manner as
possible, to prevent accident from fire ; but some of
the plaster- work had shaken loose, from its damp state
and the tremulous motion of the beacon in stormy
weather. The writer next ascended to the floor which
was occupied by the cabins of himself and his assistants,
which were in tolerably good order, having only a damp
and musty smell. The barrack for the artificers, over
all, was next visited ; it had now a very dreary and
deserted appearance when its former thronged state
was recollected. In some parts the water had come
through the boarding, and had discoloured the lining
of green cloth, but it was, nevertheless, in a good
habitable condition. While the seamen were employed
in landing a stock of provisions, a few of the artificers
set to work with great eagerness to sweep and clean

THE BELL ROCK 187

the several apartments. The exterior of the beacon 1810
was, in the meantime, examined, and found in perfect
order. The painting, though it had a somewhat
blanched appearance, adhered firmly both on the sides
and roof, and only two or three panes of glass were
broken in the cupola, which had either been blown
out by the force of the wind, or perhaps broken by
sea-fowl.

Having on this occasion continued upon the building
and beacon a considerable time after the tide had
begun to flow, the artificers were occupied in removing
the forge from the top of the building, to which the
gangway or wooden bridge gave great facility ; and,
although it stretched or had a span of forty-two feet,
its construction was extremely simple, while the road-
way was perfectly firm and steady. In returning from
this visit to the rock every one was pretty well soused
in spray before reaching the tender at two o'clock p.m.,
where things awaited the landing party in as comfort-
able a way as such a situation would admit.

The wind was still easterly, accompanied with rather Friday,
a heavy swell of sea for the operations in hand. A IIthMa)"
landing was, however, made this morning, when the
artificers were immediately employed in scraping the
seaweed off the upper course of the building, in order
to apply the moulds of the first course of the staircase,
that the joggle-holes might be marked off in the upper
course of the solid. This was also necessary previously
to the writer's fixing the position of the entrance door,
which was regulated chiefly by the appearance of the
growth of the seaweed on the building, indicating the
direction of the heaviest seas, on the opposite side of
which the door was placed. The landing-master's
crew succeeded in towing into the creek on the
western side of the rock the praam-boat with the

188 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 balance-crane, which had now been on board of the
praam for five days. The several pieces of this
machine, having been conveyed along the railways
upon the waggons to a position immediately under the
bridge, were elevated to its level, or thirty feet above
the rock, in the following manner. A chain-tackle was
suspended over a pulley from the cross-beam con-
necting the tops of the kingposts of the bridge, which
was worked by a winch -machine with wheel, pinion,
and barrel, round which last the chain was wound.
This apparatus was placed on the beacon side of the
bridge, at the distance of about twelve feet from the
cross-beam and pulley in the middle of the bridge.
Immediately under the cross-beam a hatch was formed
in the roadway of the bridge, measuring seven feet in
length and five feet in breadth, made to shut with
folding boards like a double door, through which stones
and other articles were raised ; the folding doors were
then let down, and the stone or load was gently
lowered upon a waggon which was wheeled on railway
trucks towards the lighthouse. In this manner the
several castings of the balance-crane were got up to the
top of the solid of the building.

The several apartments of the beacon-house having
been cleaned out and supplied with bedding, a suffici-
ent stock of provisions was put into the store, when
Peter Fortune, formerly noticed, lighted his fire in the
beacon for the first time this season. Sixteen artificers
at the same time mounted to their barrack-room, and
all the foremen of the works also took possession
of their cabin, all heartily rejoiced at getting rid of
the trouble of boating and the sickly motion of the
tender.

Saturday, The wind was at E.N.E., blowing so fresh, and
i2th May. acconipanied with so much sea, that no stones could

THE BELL ROCK 189

be landed to-day. The people on the rock, however, 1810
were busily employed in screwing together the balance-
crane, cutting out the joggle-holes in the upper course,
and preparing all things for commencing the building
operations.

The weather still continues boisterous, although the Sunday,
barometer has all the while stood at about 30 inches. 13
Towards evening the wind blew so fresh at E. by S.
that the boats both of the Smeaton and tender were
obliged to be hoisted in, and it was feared that the
Smeaton would have to slip her moorings. The people
on the rock were seen busily employed, and had the
balance-crane apparently ready for use, but no com-
munication could be had with them to-day.

The wind continued to blow so fresh, and the Monday,
Smeaton rode so heavily with her cargo, that at noon a I4t
signal was made for her getting under weigh, when
she stood towards Arbroath ; and on board of the
tender we are still without any communication with
the people on the rock, where the sea was seen breaking
over the top of the building in great sprays, and
raging with much agitation among the beams of the
beacon.

The wind, in the course of the clay, had shifted from Thursday,
north to west ; the sea being also considerably less, a I7t L ay'
boat landed on the rock at six p.m., for the first time
since the llth, with the provisions and water brought
off by the Patriot. The inhabitants of the beacon were
all well, but tired above measure for want of employ-
ment, as the balance-crane and apparatus was all in
readiness. Under these circumstances they felt no
less desirous of the return of good weather than those
afloat, who were continually tossed with the agitation
of the sea. The writer, in particular, felt himself
almost as much fatigued and worn-out as he had been

190 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 at any period since the commencement of the work.
The very backward state of the weather at so advanced
a period of the season unavoidably created some alarm,
lest he should be overtaken with bad weather at a
late period of the season, with the building operations
in an unfinished state. These apprehensions were, no
doubt, rather increased by the inconveniences of his
situation afloat, as the tender rolled and pitched excess-
ively at times. This being also his first off-set for the
season, every bone of his body felt sore with preserving
a sitting posture while he endeavoured to pass away
the time in reading ; as for writing, it was wholly
impracticable. He had several times entertained
thoughts of leaving the station for a few days and
going into Arbroath with the tender till the weather
should improve ; but as the artificers had been landed
on the rock he was averse to this at the commencement
of the season, knowing also that he would be equally
uneasy in every situation till the first cargo was landed :
and he therefore resolved to continue at his post until
this should be effected.

Friday, The wind being now N.W., the sea was considerably

i8th May. run (jowllj all(| thjs mOrning at five o'clock the landing-
master's crew, thirteen in number, left the tender ;
and having now no detention with the landing of
artificers, they proceeded to unmoor the Heddermck
praam-boat, and towed her alongside of the Smeaion :
and in the course of the day twenty-three blocks of
stone, three casks of pozzolano, three of sand, three of
lime, and one of Roman cement, together with three
bundles of trenails and three of wedges, were all
landed on the rock and raised to the top of the
building by means of the tackle suspended from the
cross-beam on the middle of the bridge. The stones
were then moved along the bridge on the waggon to

THE BELL ROCK 191

the building within reach of the balance-crane, with 1810
which they were laid in their respective places on the
building. The masons immediately thereafter pro-
ceeded to bore the trenail-holes into the course below,
and otherwise to complete the one in hand. When
the first stone was to be suspended by the balance-
crane, the bell on the beacon was rung, and all the
artificers and seamen were collected on the building.
Three hearty cheers were given while it was lowered
into its place, and the steward served round a glass of
rum, when success was drunk to the further progress
of the building.

The wind was southerly to-day, but there was much Sunday,
less sea than yesterday, and the landing-master's crew 20th Ma)
were enabled to discharge and land twenty-three pieces
of stone and other articles for the work. The artificers
had completed the laying of the twenty-seventh or
first course of the staircase this morning, and in the
evening they finished the boring, trenailing, wedging,
and grouting it with mortar. At twelve o'clock noon
the beacon-house bell was rung, and all hands were
collected 011 the top of the building, where prayers
were read for the first time on the lighthouse, which
forcibly struck every one, and had, upon the whole,
a very impressive effect.

From the hazardous situation of the beacon-house
with regard to fire, being composed wholly of timber,
there was no small risk from accident : and on this
account one of the most steady of the artificers was
appointed to see that the fire of the cooking-house, and
the lights in general, were carefully extinguished at
stated hours.

This being the birthday of our much-revered Monday,
Sovereign King George in, now in the fiftieth year 4th June.
of his reign, the shipping of the Lighthouse service

192 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 were this morning decorated with colours according to
the taste of their respective captains. Flags were also
hoisted upon the beacon-house and balance-crane on
the top of the building. At twelve noon a salute was
fired from the tender, when the King's health was
drunk, with all the honours, both on the rock and on
board of the shipping.

Tuesday, As the lighthouse advanced in height, the cubical
5th June. contents of the stones were less, but they had to be
raised to a greater height; and the walls, being thinner,
were less commodious for the necessary machinery and
the artificers employed, which considerably retarded
the work. Inconvenience was also occasionally experi-
enced from the men dropping their coats, hats, mallets,
and other tools, at high-water, which were carried away
by the tide ; and the danger to the people themselves
was now greatly increased. Had any of them fallen
from the beacon or building at high-water, while the
landing-master's crew were generally engaged with the
craft at a distance, it must have rendered the accident
doubly painful to those on the rock, who at this time
had no boat, and consequently no means of rendering
immediate and prompt assistance. In such cases it
would have been too late to have got a boat by signal
from the tender. A small boat, which could be lowered
at pleasure, was therefore suspended by a pair of davits
projected from the cook-house, the keel being about
thirty feet from the rock. This boat, with its tackle,
was put under the charge of James Glen, of whose
exertions on the beacon mention has already been made,
and who, having in early life been a seaman, was also
very expert in the management of a boat. A life-buoy
was likewise suspended from the bridge, to which a coil
of line two hundred fathoms in length was attached,
which could be let out to a person falling into the

THE BELT, ROCK 193

water, or to the people in the boat, should they not be 1810
able to work her with the oars.

To-day twelve stones were landed on the rock, being Thursday,
the remainder of the Patriot's cargo ; and the artificers 7th June"
built the thirty-ninth course, consisting of fourteen
stones. The Bell Rock works had now a very busy
appearance, as the lighthouse was daily getting more
into form. Besides the artificers and their cook, the
writer and his servant were also lodged on the beacon,
counting in all twenty-nine ; and at low-water the land-
ing-master's crew, consisting of from twelve to fifteen
seamen, were employed in transporting the building
materials, working the landing apparatus on the rock,
and dragging the stone waggons along the railways.

In the course of this day the weather varied Friday,
much. In the morning it was calm, in the middle •'une'
part of the day there were light airs of wind from the
south, and in the evening fresh breezes from the
east. The barometer in the writer's cabin in the
beacon-house oscillated from 30 inches to 30-42, and
the weather was extremely pleasant. This, in any
situation, forms one of the chief comforts of life ; but,
as may easily be conceived, it was doubly so to people
stuck, as it were, upon a pinnacle in the middle of
the ocean.

One of the praam-boats had been brought to the Sunday,
rock with eleven stones, notwithstanding the per- I0lh June-
plexity which attended the getting of those formerly
landed taken up to the building. Mr. Peter Logan,
the foreman builder, interposed, and prevented this
cargo from being delivered ; but the landing-master's
crew were exceedingly averse to this arrangement,
from an idea that " ill luck " would in future attend
the praam, her cargo, and those who navigated her,
from thus reversing her voyage. It may be noticed

N

194

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

i Bio that this was the first instance of a praam-boat having
been sent from the Bell Rock with any part of her
cargo on board, and was considered so uncommon an
occurrence that it became a topic of conversation
among the seamen and artificers.

Tuesday, To-day the stones formerly sent from the rock were
1 •'une' safely landed, notwithstanding the augury of the sea-
men in consequence of their being sent away two
days before.

Thursday, To-day twenty-seven stones and eleven joggle-pieces
were landed, part of which consisted of the forty-
seventh course, forming the storeroom floor. The
builders were at work this morning by four o'clock, in
the hopes of being able to accomplish the laying of
the eighteen stones of this course. But at eight o'clock
in the evening they had still two to lay, and as the
stones of this course were very unwieldy, being six
feet in length, they required much precaution and care
both in lifting and laying them. It was only on the
writer's suggestion to Mr. Logan that the artificers
were induced to leave off, as they had intended to
complete this floor before going to bed. The two
remaining stones were, however, laid in their places
without mortar when the bell on the beacon was rung,
and, all hands being collected on the top of the
building, three hearty cheers were given on covering
the first apartment. The steward then served out
a dram to each, when the whole retired to their
barrack much fatigued, but with the anticipation of the
most perfect repose even in the "hurricane-house,"
amidst the dashing seas on the Bell Rock.

While the workmen were at breakfast and dinner it
was the writer's usual practice to spend his time on
the walls of the building, which, notwithstanding the
narrowness of the track, nevertheless formed his

THE BELL ROCK 195

principal walk when the rock was under water, But 1810
this afternoon he had his writing-desk set upon the
storeroom floor, when he wrote to Mrs. Stevenson —
certainly the first letter dated from the Bell Rock
Lighthouse — giving a detail of the fortunate progress
of the work, with an assurance that the lighthouse
would soon be completed at the rate at which it now
proceeded ; and, the Patriot having sailed for Arbroath
in the evening, he felt no small degree of pleasure in
despatching this communication to his family.

The weather still continuing favourable for the
operations at the rock, the work proceeded with much
energy, through the exertions both of the seamen and
artificers. For the more speedy and effectual working
of the several tackles in raising the materials as the
building advanced in height, and there being a great
extent of railway to attend to, which required constant
repairs, two additional millwrights were added to the
complement on the rock, which, including the writer,
now counted thirty-one in all. So crowded was the
men's barrack that the beds were ranged five tier in
height, allowing only about one foot eight inches for
each bed. The artificers commenced this morning at
five o'clock, and, in the course of the day, they laid the
forty-eighth and forty-ninth courses, consisting each
of sixteen blocks. From the favourable state of the
weather, and the regular manner in which the work
now proceeded, the artificers had generally from four
to seven extra hours' work, which, including their
stated wages of 3s. 4d., yielded them from 5s. 4d. to
about 6s. lOd. per day besides their board; even the
postage of their letters was paid while they were at
the Bell Rock. In these advantages the foremen also
shared, having about double the pay and amount of
premiums of the artificers. The seamen being less out

196 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 of their element in the Bell Rock operations than the
landsmen, their premiums consisted in a slump sum
payable at the end of the season, which extended from
three to ten guineas.

As the laying of the floors was somewhat tedious,
the landing-master and his crew had got considerably
beforehand with the building artificers in bringing
materials faster to the rock than they could be built.
The seamen having, therefore, some spare time, were
occasionally employed during fine weather in dredging
or grappling for the several mushroom anchors and
mooring-chains which had been lost in the vicinity of
the Bell Rock during the progress of the work by the
breaking loose and drifting of the floating buoys. To
encourage their exertions in this search, five guineas
were offered as a premium for each set they should
find ; and, after much patient application, they
succeeded to-day in hooking one of these lost
anchors with its chain.

It was a general remark at the Bell Rock, as before
noticed, that fish were never plenty in its neighbour-
hood excepting in good weather. Indeed, the seamen
used to speculate about the state of the weather from
their success in fishing. When the fish disappeared
at the rock, it was considered a sure indication that a
gale was not far off, as the fish seemed to seek shelter
in deeper water from the roughness of the sea during
these changes in the weather. At this time the rock,
at high-water, was completely covered with podlies,
or the fry of the coal-fish, about six or eight inches in
length. The artificers sometimes occupied half an
hour after breakfast and dinner in catching these
little fishes, but were more frequently supplied from
the boats of the tender.
rich June. The landing-master having this day discharged the

THE BELL ROCK 197

Smealon and loaded the Hedderwick and Dickie praam- 1810
boats with nineteen stones, they were towed to their
respective moorings, when Captain Wilson, in con-
sequence of the heavy swell of sea, came in his boat to
the beacon-house to consult with the writer as to the
propriety of venturing the loaded praam-boats with
their cargoes to the rock while so much sea was
running. After some dubiety expressed on the subject,
in which the ardent mind of the landing-master
suggested many arguments in favour of his being able
to convey the praams in perfect safety, it was acceded
to. In bad weather, and especially on occasions of
difficulty like the present, Mr. Wilson, who was an
extremely active seaman, measuring about five feet
three inches in height, of a robust habit, generally
dressed himself in what he called a monkey jacket) made
of thick duffle cloth, with a pair of Dutchman's petti-
coat trousers, reaching only to his knees, where they
were met with a pair of long water-tight boots ; with
this dress, his glazed hat, and his small brass speaking-
trumpet in his hand, he bade defiance to the weather.
When he made his appearance in this most suitable
attire for the service his crew seemed to possess
additional life, never failing to use their utmost
exertions when the captain put on his storm rigging.
They had this morning commenced loading the praam-
boats at four o'clock, and proceeded to tow them into
the eastern landing-place, which was accomplished
with much dexterity, though not without the risk of
being thrown, by the force of the sea, on certain
projecting ledges of the rock. In such a case the loss
even of a single stone would have greatly retarded the
work. For the greater safety in entering the creek it
was necessary to put out several warps and guy-ropes
to guide the boats into its narrow and intricate

198 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 entrance; and it frequently happened that the sea
made a clean breach over the praams, which not only
washed their decks, but completely drenched the crew
in water.

Sunday, It was fortunate, in the present state of the weather,

that the fiftieth course was in a sheltered spot, within
the reach of the tackle of the winch-machine upon the
bridge; a few stones were stowed upon the bridge
itself, and the remainder upon the building, which
kept the artificers at work. The stowing of the
materials upon the rock was the department of
Alexander Brebuer, mason, who spared no pains in
attending to the safety of the stones, and who, in the
present state of the work, when the stones were
landed faster than could be built, generally worked
till the water rose to his middle. At one o'clock
to-day the bell rung for prayers, and all hands were
collected into the upper barrack-room of the beacon-
house, when the usual service was performed.

The wind blew very hard in the course of last night
from N.E., and to-day the sea ran so high that no boat
could approach the rock. During the dinner-hour,
when the writer was going to the top of the building
as usual, but just as he had entered the door and was
about to ascend the ladder, a great noise was heard
overhead, and in an instant he was soused in water
from a sea which had most unexpectedly come over
the walls, though now about fifty-eight feet in height.
On making his retreat he found himself completely
whitened by the lime, which had mixed with the
water while dashing down through the different floors ;
and, as nearly as he could guess, a quantity equal to
about a hogshead had come over the walls, and now
streamed out at the door. After having shifted him-
self, he again sat down in his cabin, the sea continuing

THE BELL ROCK 199

to run so high that the builders did not resume their 1810
operations on the walls this afternoon. The incident
just noticed did not create more surprise in the mind
of the writer than the sublime appearance of the waves
as they rolled majestically over the rock. This scene
he greatly enjoyed while sitting at his cabin window ;
each wave approached the beacon like a vast scroll
unfolding ; and in passing discharged a quantity of
air, which he not only distinctly felt, but was even
sufficient to lift the leaves of a book which lay before
him. These waves might be ten or twelve feet in
height, and about 250 feet in length, their smaller end
being towards the north, where the water was deep,
and they were opened or cut through by the inter-
position of the building and beacon. The gradual
manner in which the sea, upon these occasions, is
observed to become calm or to subside, is a very
remarkable feature of this phenomenon. For example,
when a gale is succeeded by a calm, every third or
fourth wave forms one of these great seas, which occur
in spaces of from three to five minutes, as noted by
the writer's watch ; but in the course of the next tide
they become less frequent, and take off so as to occur
only in ten or fifteen minutes ; and, singular enough,
at the third tide after such gales, the writer has
remarked that only one or two of these great waves
appear in the course of the whole tide.

The 19th was a very unpleasant and disagreeable Tuesday,
day, both for the seamen and artificers, as it rained X9th June-
throughout with little intermission from four a.m. till
eleven p.m., accompanied with thunder and lightning,
during which period the work nevertheless continued
unremittingly, and the builders laid the fifty-first and
fifty-second courses. This state of weather was no less
severe upon the mortar-makers, who required to temper

200 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 or prepare the mortar of a thicker or thinner consistency,
in some measure, according to the state of the weather.
From the elevated position of the building, the mortar
gallery on the beacon was now much lower, and the
lime-buckets were made to traverse upon a rope dis-
tended between it and the building. On occasions
like the present, however, there was often a difference
of opinion between the builders and the mortar-makers.
John Watt, who had the principal charge of the
mortar, was a most active worker, but, being some-
what of an irascible temper, the builders occasionally
amused themselves at his expense ; for while he was
eagerly at work with his large iron-shod pestle in the
mortar-tub, they often sent down contradictory orders,
some crying, ' Make it a little stiffer, or thicker, John/
while others called out to make it e thinner,' to which
he generally returned very speedy and sharp replies,
so that these conversations at times were rather
amusing.

During wet weather the situation of the artificers
on the top of the building was extremely disagreeable ;
for although their work did not require great exertion,
yet, as each man had his particular part to perform,
either in working the crane or in laying the stones, it
required the closest application and attention, not only
on the part of Mr. Peter Logan, the foreman, who
was constantly on the walls, but also of the chief
workmen. Robert Selkirk, the principal builder, for
example, had every stone to lay in its place. David
Gumming, a mason, had the charge of working the
tackle of the balance-weight, and James Scott, also a
mason, took charge of the purchase with which the
stones were laid ; while the pointing the joints of the
walls with cement was intrusted to William Reid and
William Kennedy, who stood upon a scaffold suspended

THE BELL ROCK 201

over the walls in rather a frightful manner. The least 1810
act of carelessness or inattention on the part of any of
these men might have been fatal, not only to them-
selves, but also to the surrounding workmen, especially
if any accident had happened to the crane itself, while
the material damage or loss of a single stone would
have put an entire stop to the operations until another
could have been brought from Arbroath. The artificers,
having wrought seven and a half hours of extra time
to-day, had 3s. 9d. of extra pay, while the foremen
had 7s. 6d. over and above their stated pay and board.
Although, therefore, the work was both hazardous and
fatiguing, yet, the encouragement being considerable,
they were always very cheerful, and perfectly recon-
ciled to the confinement and other disadvantages of
the place.

During fine weather, and while the nights were
short, the duty on board of the floating light was
literally nothing but a waiting on, and therefore one
of her boats, with a crew of five men, daily attended
the rock, but always returned to the vessel at night.
The carpenter, however, was one of those who was
left on board of the ship, as he also acted in the
capacity of assistant lightkeeper, being, besides, a
person who was apt to feel discontent and to be averse
to changing his quarters, especially to work with the
millwrights and joiners at the rock, who often, for
hours together, wrought knee-deep, and not un-
frequently up to the middle, in water. Mr. Watt
having about this time made a requisition for another
hand, the carpenter was ordered to attend the rock
in the floating light's boat. This he did with great
reluctance, and found so much fault that he soon got
into discredit with his messmates. On this occasion
he left the Lighthouse service, and went as a sailor

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 in a vessel bound for America — a step which, it is
believed, he soon regretted, as, in the course of things,
he would, in all probabilit}?, have accompanied Mr.
John Reid, the principal lightkeeper of the floating
light, to the Bell Rock Lighthouse as his principal
assistant. The writer had a wish to be of service to
this man, as he was one of those who came off to the
floating light in the month of September 1 807, while
she was riding at single anchor after the severe gale
of the 7th, at a time when it was hardly possible to
make up this vessel's crew ; but the crossness of his
manner prevented his reaping the benefit of such
intentions.

Friday, The building operations had for some time pro-

ceeded more slowly, from the higher parts of the
lighthouse requiring much longer time than an equal
tonnage of the lower courses. The duty of the
landing-master's crew had, upon the whole, been easy
of late ; for though the work was occasionally irregular,
yet the stones being lighter, they were more speedily
lifted from the hold of the stone vessel to the deck
of the praam-boat, and again to the waggons on the
railway, after which they came properly under the
charge of the foreman builder. It is, however, a
strange, though not an uncommon, feature in the
human character, that, when people have least to
complain of, they are most apt to become dissatisfied,
as was now the case with the seamen employed in the
Bell Rock service about their rations of beer. Indeed,
ever since the carpenter of the floating light, formerly
noticed, had been brought to the rock, expressions of
discontent had been manifested upon various occasions.
This being represented to the writer, he sent for
Captain Wilson, the landing-master, and Mr. Taylor,
commander of the tender, with whom he talked over

THE BELL ROCK 205

the subject. They stated that they considered the 1810
daily allowance of the seamen in every respect ample,
and that, the work being now much lighter than
formerly, they had no just ground for complaint ; Mr.
Taylor adding that, if those who now complained
' were even to be fed upon soft bread and turkeys, they
Avould not think themselves right/ At twelve noon
the work of the landing-master's crew was completed
for the day ; but at four o'clock, while the rock was
under water, those on the beacon were surprised by
the arrival of a boat from the tender without any
signal having been made from the beacon. It brought
the following note to the writer from the landing-
master's crew : —

' Sir Joseph Banks Tender.

'SiR, — We are informed by our masters that our
allowance is to be as before, and it is not sufficient to
serve us, for we have been at work since four o'clock
this morning, and we have come on board to dinner,
and there is no beer for us before to-morrow morning,
to which a sufficient answer is required before we go
from the beacon ; and we are, Sir, your most obedient
servants/

On reading this, the writer returned a verbal
message, intimating that an answer would be sent on
board of the tender, at the same time ordering the
boat instantly to quit the beacon. He then addressed
the following note to the landing-master : —

e Beacon-house, 22nd June 1810,
Five o'clock p.m.

' SIR, — I have just now received a letter purporting
to be from the landing-master's crew and seamen on

204 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 board of the Sir Joseph Banks, though without either
date or signature ; in answer to which I enclose a
statement of the daily allowance of provisions for the
seamen in this service, which you will post up in the
ship's galley, and at seven o'clock this evening I will
come on board to inquire into this unexpected and
most unnecessary demand for an additional allowance
of beer. In the enclosed you will not find any altera-
tion from the original statement, fixed in the galley at
the beginning of the season. I have, however, judged
this mode of giving your people an answer preferable
to that of conversing with them on the beacon. — I am,
Sir, your most obedient servant, ROBERT STEVENSON.

' To CAPTAIN WILSON.'

'Beacon House, ZZnd June 1810. — Schedule of the
daily allowance of provisions to be served out on board
of the Sir Joseph Banks tender: " 1| Ib. beef; 1 Ib. bread;
8 oz. oatmeal ; 2 oz. barley ; 2 oz. butter ; 3 quarts
beer; vegetables and salt no stated allowance. When
the seamen are employed in unloading the Smeaton
and Patriot, a draught of beer is, as formerly, to be
allowed from the stock of these vessels. Further, in
wet and stormy weather, or when the work commences
very early in the morning, or continues till a late hour
at night, a glass of spirits will also be served out to the
crew as heretofore, on the requisition of the landing-
master." ROBERT STEVENSON.'

On writing this letter and schedule, a signal was
made on the beacon for the landing-master's boat,
which immediately came to the rock, and the schedule
was afterwards stuck up in the tender's galley. When
sufficient time had been allowed to the crew to

THE BELL ROCK 205

consider of their conduct, a second signal was made
for a boat, and at seven o'clock the writer left the
Bell Rock, after a residence of four successive weeks
in the beacon-house. The first thing which occupied
his attention on board of the tender was to look round
upon the lighthouse, which he saw, with some degree
of emotion and surprise, now vying in height with the
beacon-house ; for although he had often viewed it
from the extremity of the western railway on the rock,
yet the scene, upon the whole, seemed far more
interesting from the tender's moorings at the distance
of about half a mile.

The Smeaton having just arrived at her moorings
with a cargo, a signal was made for Captain Pool to
come on board of the tender, that he might be at hand
to remove from the service any of those who might
persist in their discontented conduct. One of the two
principal leaders in this affair, the master of one of the
praam-boats, who had also steered the boat which
brought the letter to the beacon, was first called upon
deck, and asked if he had read the statement fixed up
in the galley this afternoon, and whether he was
satisfied with it. He replied that he had read the
paper, but was not satisfied, as it held out no alteration
in the allowance, on which he was immediately ordered
into the Smeaton s boat. The next man called had but
lately entered the service, and, being also interrogated
as to his resolution, he declared himself to be of the
same mind with the praam-master, and was also forth-
with ordered into the boat. The writer, without
calling any more of the seamen, went forward to the
gangway, where they were collected and listening to
what was passing upon deck. He addressed them at
the hatchway, and stated that two of their companions
had just been dismissed the service and sent on board

206 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 of the Smeaton to be conveyed to Arbroath. He
therefore wished each man to consider for himself how
far it would be proper, by any unreasonableness of
conduct, to place themselves in a similar situation,
especially as they were aware that it was optional in
him either to dismiss them or send them on board a
man-of-war. It might appear that much incon-
veniency would be felt at the rock by a change of
hands at this critical period, by checking for a time
the progress of a building so intimately connected
with the best interests of navigation ; yet this would
be but of a temporary nature, while the injury to
themselves might be irreparable. It was now, therefore,
required of any man who, in this disgraceful manner,
chose to leave the service, that he should instantly
make his appearance on deck while the Smeaton 's boat
was alongside. But those below having expressed
themselves satisfied with their situation — viz., William
Brown, George Gibb, Alexander Scott, John Dick,
Robert Couper, Alexander Shephard, James Grieve,
David Carey, William Pearson, Stuart Eaton, Alexander
Lawrence, and John Spink — were accordingly con-
sidered as having returned to their duty. This
disposition to mutiny, which had so strongly manifested
itself, being now happily suppressed, Captain Pool got
orders to proceed for Arbroath Bay, and land the two
men he had on board, and to deliver the following
letter at the office of the workyard : —

< On board of the Tender off the Bell Rock,
ZZnd June 1810, eight o'clock p.m.

' DEAR SIR, — A discontented and mutinous spirit
having manifested itself of late among the landing-
master's crew, they struck work to-day and demanded

THE BELL ROCK 207

an additional allowance of beer, and I have found it 1810

necessary to dismiss D d and M e, who are

now sent on shore with the Smeaton. You will there-
fore be so good as to pay them their wages, including
this day only. Nothing can be more unreasonable
than the conduct of the seamen on this occasion, as
the landing-master's crew not only had their allowance
on board of the tender, but, in the course of this day,
they had drawn no fewer than twenty-four quart pots
of beer from the stock of the Patriot while unloading
her. — I remain, yours truly, ROBERT STEVENSON.

fTo Mr. LACHLAN KENNEDY,

Bell Rock Office, Arbroath.'

On despatching this letter to Mr. Kennedy, the
writer returned to the beacon about nine o'clock,
where this afternoon's business had produced many
conjectures, especially when the Smeaton got under
weigh, instead of proceeding to land her cargo. The
bell on the beacon being rung, the artificers were
assembled on the bridge, when the affair was explained
to them. He, at the same time, congratulated them
upon the first appearance of mutiny being happily set
at rest by the dismissal of its two principal abettors.

At the rock the landing of the materials and the Sunday,
building operations of the light-room store went on 24th inp>
successfully, and in a way similar to those of the
provision store. To-day it blew fresh breezes ; but
the seamen nevertheless landed twenty-eight stones,
and the artificers built the fifty-eighth and fifty-ninth
courses. The works were visited by Mr. Murdoch,
junior, from Messrs. Boulton and Watt's works of
Soho. He landed just as the bell rung for prayers,
after which the writer enjoyed much pleasure from

208 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 his very intelligent conversation; and, having been
almost the only stranger he had seen for some weeks,
he parted with him, after a short interview, with much
regret.

Thursday, Last night the wind had shifted to north-east, and,
blowing fresh, was accompanied with a heavy surf
upon the rock. Towards high-water it had a very
grand and wonderful appearance. Waves of consider-
able magnitude rose as high as the solid or level of the
entrance-door, which, being open to the south-west,
was fortunately to the leeward ; but on the windward
side the sprays flew like lightning up the sloping
sides of the building ; and although the walls were
now elevated sixty-four feet above the rock, and about
fifty-two feet from high-water mark, yet the artificers
were nevertheless wetted, and occasionally interrupted,
in their operations on the top of the walls. These
appearances were, in a great measure, new at the Bell
Rock, there having till of late been no building to
conduct the seas, or object to compare with them.
Although, from the description of the Eddystone
Lighthouse, the mind was prepared for such effects,
yet they were not expected to the present extent in
the summer season ; the sea being most awful to-day,
whether observed from the beacon or the building.
To windward, the sprays fell from the height above
noticed in the most wonderful cascades, and streamed
down the walls of the building in froth as white as
snow. To leeward of the lighthouse the collision or
meeting of the waves produced a pure white kind of
drift ; it rose about thirty feet in height, like a fine
downy mist, which, in its fall, fell upon the face and
hands more like a dry powder than a liquid substance.
The effect of these seas, as they raged among the
beams and dashed upon the higher parts of the

THE BELL ROCK 209

beacon, produced a temporary tremulous motion 1810
throughout the whole fabric, which to a stranger
must have been frightful.

The writer had now been at the Bell Rock since Sunday,
the latter end of May, or about six weeks, during four ist ^u y*
of which he had been a constant inhabitant of the
beacon without having been once off the rock. After
witnessing the laying of the sixty-seventh or second
course of the bedroom apartment, he left the rock
with the tender and went ashore, as some arrange-
ments were to be made for the future conduct of
the works at Arbroath, which were soon to be brought
to a close ; the landing-master's crew having, in the
meantime, shifted on board of the Patriot. In leaving
the rock, the writer kept his eyes fixed upon the
lighthouse, which had recently got into the form of
a house, having several tiers or stories of windows.
Nor was he unmindful of his habitation in the beacon
— now far overtopped by the masonry, — where he had
spent several weeks in a kind of active retirement,
making practical experiment of the fewness of the
positive wants of man. His cabin measured not more
than four feet three inches in breadth on the floor ;
and though, from the oblique direction of the beams
of the beacon, it widened towards the top, yet it did
not admit of the full extension of his arms when he
stood on the floor ; while its length was little more
than sufficient for suspending a cot-bed during the
night, calculated for being triced up to the roof
through the day, which left free room for the
admission of occasional visitants. His folding table
was attached with hinges, immediately under the
small window of the apartment, and his books,
barometer, thermometer, portmanteau, and two or
three camp-stools, formed the bulk of his movables.

o

210 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 His diet being plain, the paraphernalia of the table
were proportionally simple; though everything had
the appearance of comfort, and even of neatness, the
walls being covered with green cloth formed into
panels with red tape, and his bed festooned with
curtains of yellow cotton-stuff. If, in speculating
upon the abstract wants of man in such a state of
exclusion, one were reduced to a single book, the
Sacred Volume — whether considered for the striking
diversity of its story, the morality of its doctrine,, or
the important truths of its gospel — would have proved
by far the greatest treasure.

Monday, In walking over the workyard at Arbroath this

2nd July. morning^ the writer found that the stones of the
course immediately under the cornice were all in
hand, and that a week's work would now finish the
whole, while the intermediate courses lay ready
numbered and marked for shipping to the rock.
Among other subjects which had occupied his atten-
tion to-day was a visit from some of the relations of
George Dall, a young man who had been impressed
near Dundee in the month of February last ; a dispute
had arisen between the magistrates of that burgh and
the Regulating Officer as to his right of impressing
Dall, who was bond fide one of the protected seamen
in the Bell Rock service. In the meantime, the poor
lad was detained, and ultimately committed to the
prison of Dundee, to remain until the question should
be tried before the Court of Session. His friends
were naturally very desirous to have him relieved
upon bail. But, as this was only to be done by the
judgment of the Court, all that could be said was
that his pay and allowances should be continued in
the same manner as if he had been upon the sick-list.
The circumstances of Dall's case were briefly these : —

THE BELL ROCK

He had gone to see some of his friends in the neigh- 1810
bourhood of Dundee, in winter, while the works were
suspended, having got leave of absence from Mr. Taylor,
who commanded the Bell Rock tender, and had in
his possession one of the Protection Medals. Un-
fortunately, however, for Dall, the Regulating Officer
thought proper to disregard these documents, as,
according to the strict and literal interpretation of
the Admiralty regulations, a seaman does not stand
protected unless he is actually on board of his ship, or
in a boat belonging to her, or has the Admiralty
protection in his possession. This order of the Board,
however, cannot be rigidly followed in practice ; and
therefore, when the matter is satisfactorily stated to
the Regulating Officer, the impressed man is generally
liberated. But in Dall's case this was peremptorily
refused, and he was retained at the instance of the
magistrates. The writer having brought the matter
under the consideration of the Commissioners of the
Northern Lighthouses, they authorised it to be tried
on the part of the Lighthouse Board, as one of extreme
hardship. The Court, upon the first hearing, ordered
Dall to be liberated from prison ; and the proceedings
never went further.

Being now within twelve courses of being ready for Wedncs-
building the cornice, measures were taken for getting
the stones of it and the parapet-wall of the light-room
brought from Edinburgh, where, as before noticed,
they had been prepared and were in readiness for
shipping. The honour of conveying the upper part
of the lighthouse, and of landing the last stone of the
building on the rock, was considered to belong to
Captain Pool of the Smeaion, who had been longer in
the service than the master of the Patriot. The
Sineeton was, therefore, now partly loaded with old

212 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 iron, consisting of broken railways and other lumber
which had been lying about the rock. After landing
these at Arbroath, she took 011 board James Craw,
with his horse and cart, which could now be spared at
the workyard, to be employed in carting the stones
from Edinburgh to Leith. Alexander Davidson and
William Kennedy, two careful masons, were also sent
to take charge of the loading of the stones at Green-
side, and stowing them on board of the vessel at Leith.
The writer also went on board, with a view to call at
the Bell Rock and to take his passage up the Firth
of Forth. The wind, however, coming to blow very
fresh from the eastward, with thick and foggy weather,
it became necessary to reef the mainsail and set the
second jib. When in the act of making a tack towards
the tender, the sailors who worked the head-sheets
were, all of a sudden, alarmed with the sound of the
smith's hammer and anvil on the beacon, and had just
time to put the ship about to save her from running
ashore on the north-western point of the rock, marked
' James Craw's Horse.' On looking towards the
direction from whence the sound came, the building
and beacon-house were seen, with consternation, while
the ship was hailed by those on the rock, who were
no less confounded at seeing the near approach of
the Smeaton ; and, just as the vessel cleared the
danger, the smith and those in the mortar gallery
made signs in token of their happiness at our fortunate
escape. From this occurrence the writer had an
experimental proof of the utility of the large bells
which were in preparation to be rung by the
machinery of the revolving light ; for, had it not
been the sound of the smith's anvil, the Smeaton, in
all probability, would have been wrecked upon the
rock. In case the vessel had struck, those on board

THE BELL ROCK 213

might have been safe, having now the beacon-house 1810
as a place of refuge ; but the vessel, which was going
at a great velocity, must have suffered severely, and
it was more than probable that the horse would have
been drowned, there being no means of getting him
out of the vessel. Of this valuable animal and his
master we shall take an opportunity of saying more in
another place.

The weather cleared up in the course of the night, Thursday,
but the wind shifted to the N.E. and blew very fresh. 5th
From the force of the wind, being now the period of
spring-tides, a very heavy swell was experienced at
the rock. At two o'clock on the following morning
the people on the beacon were in a state of great
alarm about their safety, as the sea had broke up
part of the floor of the mortar gallery, which was thus
cleared of the lime-casks and other buoyant articles ;
and, the alarm-bell being rung, all hands were called
to render what assistance was in their power for the
safety of themselves and the materials. At this time
some would willingly have left the beacon and gone
into the building : the sea, however, ran so high that
there was no passage along the bridge of communica-
tion, and, when the interior of the lighthouse came to
be examined in the morning, it appeared that great
quantities of water had come over the walls — now
eighty feet in height — and had run down through
the several apartments and out at the entrance door.

The upper course of the lighthouse at the workyard
of Arbroath was completed on the 6th, and the whole
of the stones were, therefore, now ready for being
shipped to the rock. From the present state of the
works it was impossible that the two squads of arti-
ficers at Arbroath and the Bell Rock could meet
together at this period ; and as in public works of this

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 kind, which had continued for a series of years, it is
not customary to allow the men to separate without
what is termed a " finishing-pint," five guineas were
for this purpose placed at the disposal of Mr. David
Logan, clerk of works. With this sum the stone-
cutters at Arbroath had a merry meeting in their
barrack, collected their sweethearts and friends, and
concluded their labours with a dance. It was remarked,
however, that their happiness on this occasion was
not without alloy. The consideration of parting and
leaving a steady and regular employment, to go in
quest of work and mix with other society, after having
been harmoniously lodged for years together in one
large "guildhall or barrack/' was rather painful.
Friday, While the writer was at Edinburgh he was fortunate

enough to meet with Mrs. Dickson, only daughter of
the late celebrated Mr. Smeaton, whose works at the
Eddystone Lighthouse had been of such essential con-
sequence to the operations at the Bell Rock. Even
her own elegant accomplishments are identified with
her father's work, she having herself made the drawing
of the vignette on the title-page of the Narrative of
the Eddystone Lighthouse. Every admirer of the
works of that singularly eminent man must also feel
an obligation to her for the very comprehensive and
distinct account given of his life, which is attached to
his reports, published, in three volumes quarto, by the
Society of Civil Engineers. Mrs. Dickson, being at
this time returning from a tour to the Hebrides and
Western Highlands of Scotland, had heard of the Bell
Rock works, and from their similarity to those of the
Eddystone was strongly impressed with a desire of
visiting the spot. But on inquiring for the writer at
Edinburgh, and finding from him that the upper part
of the lighthouse, consisting of nine courses, might be

THE BELL ROCK 215

seen in the immediate vicinity, and also that one of 1810
the vessels, which, in compliment to her father's
memory, had been named the Smeaton, might also now
be seen in Leith, she considered herself extremely
fortunate ; and having first visited the works at Green-
side, she afterwards went to Leith to see the Smeaton,
then loading for the Bell Rock. On stepping on board,
Mrs. Dickson seemed to be quite overcome with so
many concurrent circumstances, tending in a peculiar
manner to revive and enliven the memory of her
departed father, and, on leaving the vessel, she would
not be restrained from presenting the crew with a
piece of money. The Smeaton had been named spon-
taneously, from a sense of the obligation which a
public work of the description of the Bell Rock owed
to the labours and abilities of Mr. Smeaton. The
writer certainly never could have anticipated the
satisfaction which he this day felt in witnessing the
pleasure it afforded to the only representative of this
great man's family.

The gale from the N.E. still continued so strong, Friday,
accompanied with a heavy sea, that the Patriot could a ' y'
not approach her moorings ; and although the tender
still kept her station, no landing was made to-day at
the rock. At high-water it was remarked that the
spray rose to the height of about sixty feet upon the
building. The Smeaton now lay in Leith loaded, but,
the wind and weather being so unfavourable for her
getting down the Firth, she did not sail till this after-
noon. It may be here proper to notice that the
loading of the centre of the light-room floor, or last
principal stone of the building, did not fail, when put
on board, to excite an interest among those connected
with the work. When the stone was laid upon the
cart to be conveyed to Leith, the seamen fixed an '

216

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810

Friday,
27th July

Sunday,
zgth July.

ensign-staff and flag into the circular hole in the centre
of the stone, and decorated their own hats, and that
of James Craw, the Bell Rock carter, with ribbons ;
even his faithful and trusty horse Brassey was orna-
mented with bows and streamers of various colours.
The masons also provided themselves with new aprons,
and in this manner the cart was attended in its progress
to the ship. When the cart came opposite the Trinity
House of Leith, the officer of that corporation made
his appearance dressed in his uniform, with his staff
of office; and when it reached the harbour, the shipping
in the different tiers where the Smeaton lay hoisted
their colours, manifesting by these trifling ceremonies
the interest with which the progress of this work was
regarded by the public, as ultimately tending to afford
safety and protection to the mariner. The wind had
fortunately shifted to the S.W., and about five o'clock
this afternoon the Smeaton reached the Bell Rock.

The artificers had finished the laying of the balcony
course, excepting the centre-stone of the light-room
floor, which, like the centres of the other floors, could
not be laid in its place till after the removal of the
foot and shaft of the balance-crane. During the
dinner-hour, when the men were off work, the writer
generally took some exercise by walking round the
walls when the rock was under water; but to-day
his boundary was greatly enlarged, for, instead of the
narrow wall as a path, he felt no small degree of
pleasure in walking round the balcony and passing out
and in at the space allotted for the light-room door.
In the labours of this day both the artificers and sea-
men felt their work to be extremely easy compared
with what it had been for some days past.

Captain Wilson and his crew had made preparations
for landing the last stone, and, as may well be supposed,

THE BELL ROCK 217

this was a day of great interest at the Bell Rock. 1810
'"[hat it might lose none of its honours,' as he
expressed himself, the Heddernnck praam-boat, with
which the first stone of the building had been landed,
was appointed also to carry the last. At seven o'clock
this evening the seamen hoisted three flags upon the
Hedderwick, when the colours of the Dickie praam-boat,
tender, Smeaton, floating light, beacon-house, and light-
house were also displayed; and, the weather being
remarkably fine, the whole presented a very gay
appearance, and, in connection with the associations
excited, the effect was very pleasing. The praam
which carried the stone was towed by the seamen in
gallant style to the rock, and, on its arrival, cheers
were given as a finale to the landing department.

The ninetieth or last course of the building having Monday,
been laid to-day, which brought the masonry to the 3°th July
height of one hundred and two feet six inches, the
lintel of the light-room door, being the finishing-stone
of the exterior walls, was laid with due formality by
the writer, who, at the same time, pronounced the
following benediction : " May the Great Architect of
the Universe, under whose blessing this perilous work
has prospered, preserve it as a guide to the mariner."

At three p.m., the necessary preparations having Friday,
been made, the artificers commenced the completing 3rd Aug>
of the floors of the several apartments, and at seven
o'clock the centre-stone of the light-room floor was
laid, which may be held as finishing the masonry of
this important national edifice. After going through
the usual ceremonies observed by the brotherhood on
occasions of this kind, the writer, addressing himself
to the artificers and seamen who were present, briefly
alluded to the utility of the undertaking as a monu-
ment of the wealth of British commerce, erected

218 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

through the spirited measures of the Commissioners
of the Northern Lighthouses by means of the jHtle
assistance of those who now surrounded him. He
then took an opportunity of stating that toward those
connected with this arduous work he would ever retain
the most heartfelt regard in all their interests.
Saturday, When the bell was rung as usual on the beacon this
ug* morning, every one seemed as if he were at a loss what
to make of himself. At this period the artificers at
the rock consisted of eighteen masons, two joiners, one
millwright, one smith, and one mortar-maker, besides
Messrs. Peter Logan and Francis Watt, foremen,
counting in all twenty-five; and matters were arranged
for proceeding to Arbroath this afternoon with all
hands. The Sir Joseph Banks tender had by this time
been afloat, with little intermission, for six months,
during greater part of which the artificers had been
almost constantly off at the rock, and were now much
in want of necessaries of almost every description.
Not a few had lost different articles of clothing, which
had dropped into the sea from the beacon and build-
ing. Some wanted jackets; others, from want of hats,
wore nightcaps ; each was, in fact, more or less cur-
tailed in his wardrobe, and it must be confessed that
at best the party were but in a very tattered condition.
This morning was occupied in removing the artificers
and their bedding on board of the tender ; and al-
though their personal luggage was easily shifted, the
boats had, nevertheless, many articles to remove from
the beacon-house, and were consequently employed in
this service till eleven a.m. All hands being collected
and just ready to embark, as the water had nearly
overflowed the rock, the writer, in taking leave, after
alluding to the harmony which had ever marked the con-
duct of those employed on the Bell Rock, took occasion

THE BELL ROCK 219

to compliment the great zeal, attention, and abilities 1810
of Mr. Peter Logan and Mr. Francis Watt, foremen ;
Captain James Wilson, landing-master; and Captain
David Taylor, commander of the tender, who, in their
several departments, had so faithfully discharged the
duties assigned to them, often under circumstances
the most difficult and trying. The health of these
gentlemen was drunk with much warmth of feeling by
the artificers and seamen, who severally expressed the
satisfaction they had experienced in acting under
them ; after which the whole party left the rock.

In sailing past the floating light mutual compliments
were made by a display of flags between that vessel
and the tender; and at five p.m. the latter vessel
entered the harbour of Arbroath, where the party
were heartily welcomed by a numerous company of
spectators, who had collected to see the artificers arrive
after so long an absence from the port. In the evening
the writer invited the foremen and captains of the
service, together with Mr. David Logan, clerk of works
at Arbroath, and Mr. Lachlan Kennedy, engineer's
clerk and bookkeeper, and some of their friends, to
the principal inn, where the evening was spent very
happily; and after ' His Majesty's Health' and 'The
Commissioners of the Northern Lighthouses' had been
given, 'Stability to the Bell Rock Lighthouse' was
hailed as a standing toast in the Lighthouse service.

The author has formerly noticed the uniformly Sunday,
decent and orderly deportment of the artificers who 5th AuS-
were employed at the Bell Rock Lighthouse, and
to-day, it is believed, they very generally attended
church, no doubt with grateful hearts for the narrow
escapes from personal danger which all of them had
more or less experienced during their residence at the
rock.

220 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1 8 10 The Smcaton sailed to-day at one p.m., having on

Tuesday, board sixteen artificers, with Mr. Peter Logan, to-
i4thAug. i . *

gether with a supply or provisions and necessaries,

who left the harbour pleased and happy to find
themselves once more afloat in the Bell Rock service.
At seven o'clock the tender was made fast to her
moorings, when the artificers landed on the rock and
took possession of their old quarters in the beacon-
house, with feelings very different from those of 1 807,
when the works commenced.

The barometer for some days past had been falling
from 29'90, and to-day it was 29*50, with the wind at
N.E., which, in the course of this day, increased to a
strong gale accompanied with a sea which broke with
great violence upon the rock. At twelve noon the
tender rode very heavily at her moorings, when her
chain broke at about ten fathoms from the ship's bows.
The kedge-anchor was immediately let go, to hold
her till the floating buoy and broken chain should be
got on board. But while this was in operation the
hawser of the kedge was chafed through on the rocky
bottom and parted, when the vessel was again adrift.
Most fortunately, however, she cast off with her head
from the rock, and narrowly cleared it, when she sailed
up the Firth of Forth to wait the return of better
weather. The artificers were thus left upon the rock
with so heavy a sea running that it was ascertained to
have risen to a height of eighty feet on the building.
Under such perilous circumstances it would be difficult
to describe the feelings of those who, at this time,
were cooped up in the beacon in so forlorn a situation,
with the sea not only raging under them, but
occasionally falling from a great height upon the
roof of their temporary lodging, without even the
attending vessel in view to afford the least gleam of

THE BELL ROCK

hope in the event of any accident. It is true that 1810
they now had the masonry of the lighthouse to resort
to, which, no doubt, lessened the actual danger of
their situation; but the building was still without
a roof, and the deadlights, or storm-shutters, not being
yet fitted, the windows of the lower story were stove
in and broken, and at high-water the sea ran in
considerable quantities out at the entrance door.

The gale continues with unabated violence to-day, Thursday,
and the sprays rise to a still greater height, having
been carried over the masonry of the building, or
about ninety feet above the level of the sea. At
four o'clock this morning it was breaking into the
cook's berth, when he rang the alarm-bell, and all
hands turned out to attend to their personal safety.
The floor of the smith's, or mortar gallery, was now
completely burst up by the force of the sea, when the
whole of the deals and the remaining articles upon
the floor were swept away, such as the cast-iron
mortar-tubs, the iron hearth of the forge, the smith's
bellows, and even his anvil were thrown down upon
the rock. Before the tide rose to its full height to-
day some of the artificers passed along the bridge into
the lighthouse, to observe the effects of the sea upon
it, and they reported that they had felt a slight tremu-
lous motion in the building when great seas struck it
in a certain direction, about high-water mark. On
this occasion the sprays were again observed to wet
the balcony, and even to come over the parapet wall
into the interior of the light-room.

The wind being at W.S.W., and the weather more Thursday,
moderate, both the tender and the Smealon got to 23rdAuR-
their moorings on the 23rd, when all hands were
employed in transporting the sash-frames from on
board of the Smeaton to the rock. In the act of

222

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810

Monday,
27th Aug.

Sunday,
and Sept.

setting up one of these frames upon the bridge, it
was unguardedly suffered to lose its balance, and in
saving it from damage Captain Wilson met with
a severe bruise in the groin,, on the seat of a gun-
shot wound received in the early part of his life.
This accident laid him aside for several days.

The sash-frames of the light-room, eight in number,
and weighing each 254- pounds, having been got
safely up to the top of the building, were ranged on
the balcony in the order in which they were num-
bered for their places on the top of the parapet-wall ;
and the balance-crane, that useful machine having
now lifted all the heavier articles, was unscrewed
and lowered, to use the landing-master's phrase, ' in
mournful silence.'

The steps of the stair being landed, and all the
weightier articles of the light-room got up to the
balcony, the wooden bridge was now to be removed,
as it had a very powerful effect upon the beacon when
a heavy sea struck it, and could not possibly have
withstood the storms of a winter. Everything having
been cleared from the bridge, and nothing left but
the two principal beams with their horizontal braces,
James Glen, at high -water, proceeded with a saw to
cut through the beams at the end next the beacon,
which likewise disengaged their opposite extremity,
inserted a few inches into the building. The frame
was then gently lowered into the water, and floated
off to the Smeaion to be towed to Arbroath, to be
applied as part of the materials in the erection of
the lightkeepers' houses. After the removal of the
bridge, the aspect of things at the rock was much
altered. The beacon-house and building had both
a naked look to those accustomed to their former
appearance ; a curious optical deception was also

THE BELL ROCK

remarked, by which the lighthouse seemed to incline 1810
from the perpendicular towards the beacon. The
horizontal rope-ladder before noticed was again
stretched to preserve the communication, and the
artificers were once more obliged to practise the
awkward and straddling manner of their passage
between them during 1809.

At twelve noon the bell rung for prayers, after
which the artificers went to dinner, when the writer
passed along the rope-ladder to the lighthouse, and
went through the several apartments, which were
now cleared of lumber. In the afternoon all hands
were summoned to the interior of the house, when
he had the satisfaction of laying the upper step of
the stair, or last stone of the building. This ceremony
concluded with three cheers, the sound of which had
a very loud and strange effect within the walls of the
lighthouse. At six o'clock Mr. Peter Logan and
eleven of the artificers embarked with the writer
for Arbroath, leaving Mr. James Glen with the
special charge of the beacon and railways, Mr.
Robert Selkirk with the building, with a few
artificers to fit the temporary windows to render
the house habitable.

On returning from his voyage to the Northern Sunday,
Lighthouses, the writer landed at the Bell Rock on
Sunday, the 14th of October, and had the pleasure
to find, from the very favourable state of the weather,
that the artificers had been enabled to make great
progress with the fitting-up of the light-room.

The light-room work had proceeded, as usual, to-day Friday,
under the direction of Mr. Dove, assisted in the *9 '
plumber-work by Mr. John Gibson, and in the brazier-
work by Mr. Joseph Fraser ; while Mr. James Slight,
with the joiners, were fitting up the storm-shutters

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 of the Windows. In these several departments the
artificers were at work till seven o'clock p.m., and it
being then dark, Mr. Dove gave orders to drop work
in the light-room ; and all hands proceeded from
thence to the beacon-house, when Charles Henderson,
smith, arid Henry Dickson, brazier, left the work
together. Being both young men, who had been
for several weeks upon the rock, they had become
familiar, and even playful, on the most difficult parts
about the beacon and building. This evening they
were trying to outrun each other in descending from
the light-room, when Henderson led the way ; but
they were in conversation with each other till they
came to the rope-ladder distended between the
entrance-door of the lighthouse and the beacon.
Dickson, on reaching the cook-room, was surprised
at not seeing his companion, and inquired hastily
for Henderson. Upon which the cook replied, ' Was
he before you upon the rope-ladder ? ' Dickson
answered, ' Yes ; and I thought I heard something
fall.' Upon this the alarm was given, and links
were immediately lighted, with which the artificers
descended on the legs of the beacon, as near the
surface of the water as possible, it being then about
full tide, and the sea breaking to a considerable height
upon the building, with the wind at S.S.E. But, after
watching till low-water, and searching in every direc-
tion upon the rock, it appeared that poor Henderson
must have unfortunately fallen through the rope-
ladder, and been washed into the deep water.

The deceased had passed along this rope-ladder
many hundred times, both by day and night, and
the operations in which he was employed being
nearly finished, he was about to leave the rock
when this melancholy catastrophe took place. The

THE BELL ROCK

unfortunate loss of Henderson cast a deep gloom 1810
upon the minds of all who were at the rock, and it
required some management on the part of those who
had charge to induce the people to remain patiently
at their work ; as the weather now became more
boisterous, and the nights long, they found their
habitation extremely cheerless, while the winds were
howling about their ears, and the waves lashing with
fury against the beams of their insulated habitation.

The wind had shifted in the night to N.W., and Tuesday,
blew a fresh gale, while the sea broke with violence 23rd Octt
upon the rock. It was found impossible to land,
but the writer, from the boat, hailed Mr. Dove, and
directed the ball to be immediately fixed. The
necessary preparations were accordingly made, while
the vessel made short tacks on the southern side of
the rock, in comparatively smooth water. At noon
Mr. Dove, assisted by Mr. James Slight, Mr. Robert
Selkirk, Mr. James Glen, and Mr. John Gibson,
plumber, with considerable difficulty, from the
boisterous state of the weather, got the gilded ball
screwed on, measuring two feet in diameter, and form-
ing the principal ventilator at the upper extremity of
the cupola of the light-room. At Mr. Hamilton's
desire, a salute of seven guns was fired on this
occasion, and, all hands being called to the quarter-
deck, ' Stability to the Bell Rock Lighthouse ' was
not forgotten.

On reaching the rock it was found that a very Tuesday,
heavy sea still ran upon it ; but the writer having been 3°th Oct'
disappointed on two former occasions, and, as the
erection of the house might now be considered
complete, there being nothing wanted externally,
excepting some of the storm-shutters for the defence
of the windows, he was the more anxious at this time

A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 to inspect it. Two well-manned boats were therefore
ordered to be in attendance ; and, after some diffi-
culty, the wind being at N.N.E., they got safely into
the western creek, though not without encountering
plentiful sprays. It would have been impossible to
have attempted a landing to-day, under any other
circumstances than with boats perfectly adapted to the
purpose, and with seamen who knew every ledge of
the rock, and even the length of the sea- weeds at each
particular spot, so as to dip their oars into the water
accordingly, and thereby prevent them from getting
entangled. But what was of no less consequence to
the safety of the party, Captain Wilson, who always
steered the boat, had a perfect knowledge of the set
of the different waves, while the crew never shifted
their eyes from observing his motions, and the
strictest silence was preserved by every individual
except himself.

On entering the house, the writer had the pleasure
to find it in a somewhat habitable condition, the lower
apartments being closed in with temporary windows,
and fitted with proper storm-shutters. The lowest
apartment at the head of the staircase was occupied
with water, fuel, and provisions, put up in a temporary
way until the house could be furnished with proper
utensils. The second, or light-room store, was at
present much encumbered with various tools and
apparatus for the use of the workmen. The kitchen
immediately over this had, as yet, been supplied only
with a common ship's caboose and plate-iron funnel,
while the necessary cooking utensils had been taken
from the beacon. The bedroom was for the present
used as the joiners' workshop, and the strangers' room,
immediately under the light-room, was occupied by
the artificers, the beds being ranged in tiers, as was

THE BELL ROCK

done in the barrack of the beacon. The light-room, 1810
though unprovided with its machinery, being now
covered over with the cupola, glazed and painted, had
a very complete and cleanly appearance. The balcony
was only as yet fitted with a temporary rail, consisting
of a few iron stanchions, connected with ropes ; and-
in this state it was necessary to leave it during the
winter.

Having gone over the whole of the low-water works
on the rock, the beacon, and lighthouse, and being
satisfied that only the most untoward accident in the
landing of the machinery could prevent the exhibition
of the light in the course of the winter, Mr. John Reid,
formerly of the floating light, was now put in charge of
the lighthouse as principal keeper ; Mr. James Slight
had charge of the operations of the artificers, while Mr.
James Dove and the smiths, having finished the frame
of the light-room, left the rock for the present. With
these arrangements the writer bade adieu to the
works for the season. At eleven a.m. the tide was far
advanced ; and there being now little or no shelter for
the boats at the rock, they had to be pulled through
the breach of sea, which came on board in great
quantities, and it was with extreme difficulty that they
could be kept in the proper direction of the landing-
creek. On this occasion he may be permitted to look
back with gratitude on the many escapes made in the
course of this arduous undertaking, now brought so
near to a successful conclusion.

On Monday, the 5th, the yacht again visited the Monday,
rock, when Mr. Slight and the artificers returned with 5th Nov.
her to the workyard, where a number of things were
still to prepare connected with the temporary fitting
up of the accommodation for the lightkeepers. Mr.
John Reid and Peter Fortune were now the only

228 A FAMILY OF ENGINEERS

1810 inmates of the house. This was the smallest number
of persons hitherto left in the lighthouse. As four
lightkeepers were to be the complement, it was
intended that three should always be at the rock. Its
present inmates, however, could hardly have been
better selected for such a situation ; Mr. Reid being a
person possessed of the strictest notions of duty and
habits of regularity from long service on board of a
man-of-war, while Mr. Fortune had one of the most
happy and contented dispositions imaginable.
Tuesday, From Saturday the 10th till Tuesday the 13th, the

i3th Nov. wjn(] had been from N.E. blowing a heavy gale; but
to-day, the weather having greatly moderated, Captain
Taylor, who now commanded the Smeaton, sailed at
two o'clock a.m. for the Bell Rock. At five the
floating light was hailed and found to be all well.
Being a fine moonlight morning, the seamen were
changed from the one ship to the other. At eight,
the Smeaton being off the rock, the boats were manned,
and taking a supply of water, fuel, and other
necessaries, landed at the western side, when Mr.
Reid and Mr. Fortune were found in good health and
spirits.

Mr. Reid stated that during the late gales,
particularly on Friday, the 30th, the wind veering
from S.E. to N.E., both he and Mr. Fortune sensibly
felt the house tremble when particular seas struck,
about the time of high-water; the former observing
that it was a tremor of that sort which rather tended
to convince him that everything about the building
was sound, and reminded him of the effect produced
when a good log of timber is struck sharply with a
mallet ; but, with every confidence in the stability of
the building, he nevertheless confessed that, in so
forlorn a situation, they were not insensible to those

THE BELL ROCK 229

emotions which, he emphatically observed, 'made a 1810
man look back upon his former life.'

The day, long wished for, on which the mariner was 1811
to see a light exhibited on the Bell Rock at length Friday,
arrived. Captain Wilson, as usual, hoisted the float's Ist Feb>
lanterns to the topmast on the evening of the 1st of
February ; but the moment that the light appeared
on the rock, the crew, giving three cheers, lowered
them, and finally extinguished the lights.

Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty
at the Edinburgh University Press

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