COKAL REEFS. 369 



within a very short distance of an excellent channel traversing 

 this outer line of reefs ; and the erection of a lofty beacon 

 on Raine's Islet, at the edge of this passage, may be cited as 

 one of the main objects fulfilled by the expedition. The 

 work was begun in June, 1844, and completed in less than 

 four months. Twenty convict masons and quarrymen were 

 brought from Sydney; a quarry was opened in the coral 

 rock ; lime was got by burning sea-shells ; wood for burning 

 was brought from islands near the mainland ; water procured 

 from other islands, 25 miles distant ; and timber for the build- 

 ing obtained from the wreck of the Martha Ridgway. Having 

 no anchorage nearer, the ' Fly ' had to lie 12 miles off, within 

 the reefs of the barrier, the smaller vessels and boats running 

 to and fro with the various provisions and materials needful 

 for the workmen. Under all these difficulties a strong 

 circular stone tower was erected, 40 feet high and 30 feet 

 in diameter at its base, raised 30 feet higher by a frame- 

 work of wood covered at the top with painted canvas. Mr. 

 Jukes describes the little islet which gave foundation to the 

 work a spot not two miles in circumference and scarcely 

 20 feet above high-water mark. Seeing the strangeness of 

 the situation and the peculiarity of the work, we cannot but 

 believe that it might have furnished some amusing incidents 

 to a narrative which is very deficient in these points. The 

 truth seems to be that the time was one of dull inaction to 

 those not engaged in the erection^ and that they looked upon 

 it with weariness and distaste. 



Accordingly we find our author, when the beacon was half 

 completed, star-ting in a vessel for Cape York, the great 

 promontory which abuts on Torres Strait, forming the N.E. 

 point of the Australian continent. We have already mentioned 

 that surveys were effected of this Strait and the channels 

 traversing its isles and reefs, the complexity of which ren- 

 ders it, as we have seen, one of the most dangerous, as it 



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