160 . THE SEA. 



only be carried on during fine weather, when the sea was comparatively smooth. The 

 first summer was wholly spent in making 1 twelve holes in the rock, and fastening twelve 

 irons in them, by which to hold fast the superstructure. " Even in summer/' Winstanley 

 says, " the weather would at times prove so bad that for ten or fourteen days together 

 the sea would be so raging about these rocks, caused by out-winds and the running of the 

 ground seas coming from the main ocean, that although the weather should seem and be 

 most calm in other places, yet here it would mount and fly more than two hundred feet, 

 as has been so found since there was lodgment on the place, and therefore all our works 

 were constantly buried at those times, and exposed to the mercy of the seas." 



The second summer was spent in making a solid pillar, twelve feet high and fourteen 

 feet in diameter, on which to build the lighthouse. In the third year all the upper work 

 was erected to the vane, which was eighty feet above the foundation. In the midsummer 

 of that year Winstanley ventured to take up his lodging with the workmen in the light- 

 house ; but a storm arose, and eleven days passed before any boats could come near them. 

 During that period the sea washed in upon Winstanley and his companions, wetting all 

 their clothing and provisions, and carrying off many of their materials. By the time the 

 boats could land, the party were reduced almost to their last crust; but, happily, the building 

 stood, apparently firm. Finally, the light was exhibited on the summit of the building, 

 on the 14-th of November, 1098. 



The fourth year was occupied in strengthening the building round the foundations, 

 making all solid nearly to a height of twenty feet, and also in raising the upper part of 

 the lighthouse forty feet, to keep it well out of the wash of the sea. This timber erection, 

 when finished, somewhat resembled a Chinese pagoda, with open galleries and numerous 

 fantastic projections. The main gallery, under the light, was so wide and open that an 

 old gentleman who remembered both Winstanley and his lighthouse, afterwards told 

 Smeaton that it was possible for a six-oared boat to be lifted up on a wave and driven clear 

 through the open gallery into the sea on the other side. In the perspective print of the 

 lighthouse, published by the architect after its erection, he complacently represented himself 

 as fishing out of the kitchen window ! 



When Winstanley had brought his work to completion, he is said to have expressed 

 himself so satisfied as to its strength that he only wished he might be there in the fiercest 

 storm that ever blew. In this wish he was not disappointed, though the result was the 

 reverse entirely of the builder's anticipations. In November, 1703, Winstanley went off 

 to the lighthouse to superintend some repairs which had become necessary, and he was still 

 in the place with the light-keepers, when, on the night of the 26th, a storm of unparalleled 

 fury burst along the coast. As day broke on the morning of the 27th, people on shore 

 anxiously looked in the direction of the rock to see if Winstanley's structure had withstood 

 the fury of the gale, but not a vestige of it remained. The lighthouse and its builder 

 had been swept completely away. 



The building had, in fact, been deficient in every element of stability, and its 

 form was such as to render it peculiarly liable to damage from the violence both of 

 wind and water. " Nevertheless," as Smeaton generously observes, "it was no small 

 degree of heroic merit in Winstanley to undertake a piece of work which had before 



