WRECKS AND MI NOT LIGHT. 



475 



a height of nearly twenty-five feet, or to where the twelfth course 

 of masonry was afterwards laid. And now began the real work, 

 — the laying of the courses ; and this, executed in a compar- 

 atively short period of time, proved, as has many another noble 

 superstructure, the value of 

 the long, tedious prepara- 

 tion, a task whose results 

 were destined to remain 

 forever unseen. During 

 the year 1855 work upon 

 the foundation pit could 

 only be performed one 

 hundred and thirty hours ; 

 in 1856, one hundred and 

 fifty-seven ; and in 1857, in 

 excavating and in laying 

 four stones, one hundred 

 and thirty hours and 

 twenty-one minutes, the 

 remainder of these years to 

 be relinquished to the 

 savage sea ! During 1858 



a small gain was made, when the last of the cutting and the laying 

 of six courses of stone was accomplished in two hundred and 



Plan of rock as prepared to receive the foun- 

 dation stones. " O " is 1' 9'' above mean low 

 water ; the other parts are deeper than the 

 central. 



First and second courses, 

 reaching to the height of the 

 natural rock in the center. 



Third course, showing the 

 eight iron columns, and well 

 in the center. 



eight hours. It was important that none but the best of granite 

 should be employed, and samples from many localities were 

 submitted to the severest tests. Of stone taken from Rockport, 



