1849."| 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



This Ibero-Pelasgic race is undoubtedly earlier in Western Asia 

 and Europe than the Indo-European — earlier, therefore, than the 

 Celtic or Slavonian families of the latter. Mr. Fergusson con- 

 siders that their monuments are dispersed over the greater part of 

 Asia and Europe. Mr. Clarke, too, sug-gests that the so-called 

 Druidic monuments. Round Towers, and Nurhags likewise belong 

 to them. Mr. Fergusson calls them a tumulus-raising people ; for 

 wherever they were they raised round barrows over the bodies of 

 their dead, whether in the steppes of Scythia, in these islands, or 

 outside the walls of the towns in Italy or Greece. 



Mr. Fergusson doubts whether the history of this race will ever 

 be grasped with the same clearness and distinctness as that of 

 Egypt ; but we see no grounds for this, and in truth, it has already 

 made great way. We must not look in a great race such as this, 

 any more than in the Indo-European, to find all tlie families in 

 the same degree of advancement; we must look out for the proto- 

 types of the Englishman and the Celt ; we may find them in the 

 Etruscans and Scrito-Fenni. 



Our writer says truly, that the study of the antiquities of 

 Western Asia — he might have said of this race — is more need- 

 ful to enable us to understand the ancient history of Greece 

 and Rome than that of Egypt can be ; for thougli Egypt may be 

 called the teacher of Greece, she was nut her only teacher: hers 

 was, indeed, the great storehouse to which olden Europe traded 

 for knowledge, but Asia was the motber from whom her people 

 sprang — in whose lap they were nursed ; and it was ever after the 

 home towards which her redundant population returned when 

 pressed for room in their new land ; and though much of her 

 learning and of her manners were no doubt brought from Egypt, 

 all her affections were centred in the East. 



Mr. Fergusson suggests that the Pelasgians left Asia Minor in 

 consequence of the retirement of the Egyptians and advance of 

 the Indo-Europeans ; and that this was about the year 8700 of the 

 Decimal Era, or 1,300 years before Christ, nearly at the same time 

 that the Jews, under Moses, left Egypt. This led to a great influx 

 of Pelasgians into Greece, whence they were again driven by the 

 Hellenic Indo-Europeans. Our writer thinks that the Pelasgians 

 prevailed in Greece from the settlement of Argos, in the year 

 7200, D. E., until the return of the Heraclidi*. in 8900 n. E. 



The details of these speculations we shall review under the 

 several sections in which they are treated. We shall now go on 

 where Mr. Fergusson has left off, and that is as to the Iberians. It 

 has been established by Humboldt that they held the greater part of 

 Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica ; and this gives a reason why a 

 new settlement should be made from Lydia, and accounts for the 

 Lydians going so far. Most branches of this race nere fond of ship- 

 ping, — an ethnological peculiarity deserving of notice. 



The Iberians kept their ground longest in Spain and the South 

 of Gaul ; and here we have their offspring in the Euskaldunes, 

 Basques, or Biscayans, who speak the Euskardian, a living Iberian 

 language. 



The names of rivers throughout Europe and Western Asia show 

 a common origin, and tliis in Europe has been shown to be often 

 Celtic — and therefore it is assumed that all the names are Celtic ; 

 but Humboldt has identified some as Euskardian ; and Mr. 

 Clarke suggests that this will be found the case more extensively 

 if a further examination is made 



As to Britain, it has always appeared unaccountable that the 

 Phenicians should find out the tin there, and that a direct trade 

 with the East should spring up ; but if Britain had been long set- 

 tled by the Iberians, a seafaring, enterprising, and more cultivated 

 people than the Celts, it was natural that tin should be found out, 

 carried to Spain, and thence, by Iberian traders, to Carthage — per- 

 haps to Lydia or Phenicia. 



Mr. Clarke's theory is, that the Iberians came into Britain and 

 Ireland from the south, and the Fins from the north, and that 

 these two branches of the same race were overcome by the Celts, 

 as they were in North Gaul and South Spain. In the time of 

 Tacitus, the Silures in South Wales were still to he recognised as 

 Iberians, in name and look, if not in speech ; and the traditions of 

 the Welsh and Irish point to Spanish immigrations, which on every 



f round we may believe to be Iberian, and not Celtic. It is this 

 beriau element which will account for many of the peculiarities 

 of the population of the south of Ireland. It seems likely that 

 the Iberians of the North-West lingered last in Armorica, Corn- 

 wall, South Wales, and South and West Ireland, from which there 

 was good access by sea to Spain and Gascony. 



(To be continued.J 



BELL ROCK LIGHTHOUSE. 



Sir — Mr. Alan Stevenson having printed and circulated a letter 

 addressed by himself to me, dated the 26th of December last, com- 

 plaining of a paragraph in my work upon the "Breakwater in 

 Plymouth Sound," wherein I claim the merit of the design and 

 construction of the Bell Rock Lighthouse foi the late Mr. Rennie, 

 and asserting that the Bell Rock Lighthouse was not designed and 

 built by the late Mr. Rennie, but by his (Mr. Stevenson's) father; 

 in justice, therefore, to the late Mr. Rennie, I feel bound to adhere 

 to the statement above ccmjilained of, — which is confirmed by the 

 following facts, taken from Mr. Robert Stevenson's work on the 

 Bell Rock Lighthouse (1824), and other documents in my posses- 

 sion. I shall, therefore, feel nnich obliged by your inserting this 

 letter in your valuable Journal. 



On January 7, 1793 (see Mr. Stevenson's book, p. 85), the late 

 Sir Alexander Cochrane, then commander-in-chief on the Leith 

 station, wrote a letter to the Commissioners of Northern Light- 

 houses, proposing that a lighthouse should be erected on the Cape 

 or Bell Rock, situated on the east coast of Scotland, about eleven 

 miles from the shore, opposite to Arbroath, and which had been 

 the cause of numerous disastrous shipwrecks, whereby many valu- 

 able lives and much property had been sacrificed. In 1794 (p. 90), 

 Mr. Stevenson says that he began to consider the subject. 



Nothing further, however, was done towards this desirable pro- 

 ject until the year 1799, wlien another severe storm arose, which 

 lasted three days, and was tlie cause of many melancholy ship- 

 wrecks in this quarter. The subject was then taken up by Captain 

 Joseph Brodie, of the navy, and Mr. Joseph Couper, iron-founder, 

 of Leith, who together made two designs for a cast-iron lighthouse, 

 one supported upon four columns, and another upon a diflerent 

 plan, wliich they proposed to erect at their own expense on the 

 Bell Rock, and to reimburse themselves by a toU on shipping. 

 They also at different times erected three beacons (the last in 

 1803) on the Bell Rock, which were successively carried away. 

 Mr. Robert Stevenson says that he also made a design for a cast- 

 iron lighthouse on columns, in 1799. In the summer of 1800, he 

 says (p. 91) that he landed on the Bell Rock for the first time, in 

 company with Mr. James Haldane, an architect, and on the 23rd of 

 December, 1800 (p. 440), wrote a Report to the Commissioners of 

 Northern Lighthouses, wherein, after describing the locality and 

 characteristics of the rock, he proposed two designs for a light- 

 house, one of cast-iron on pillars and another of stone: the former 

 he estimated at 15,000/., the latter 42,636/. Of these designs he 

 remarks as follows: — 



" In the stone design I have retained nearly the same elevation as that of 

 the Edriystone lighthouse, which presents less resistance, and preserves a 

 greater hase than perhaps any other figure that cuuld have been thought of. 

 In this design I have also followed Mr. Smeaton in the use of oak trenails, 

 to keep the stones in their places while the work is in progress; hut have 

 differed in the mode of diminishing the interior walls as the building rises in 

 height. Instead, also, of Mr. Smeaton's plan of dovetailing the stones and 

 connecting the floors, various other modes are resorted to for effecting this 

 purpose perpendicularly, as well as laterally, with the view of introducing 

 larger materials, and keeping the stones in a more entire state. One of 

 these is by an iron bat, which is inserted into the joints of the lower courses, 

 while the void or upper courses are to be indented or let perpendicularly into 

 one another." 



He says that Mr. Rennie at his request examined the models, 

 and preferred the stone design. 



In 1803, the Northern Lighthouse Commissioners applied to 

 parliament for an Act to enable them to borrow 30,000/. for the 

 purpose of making a lighthouse on the Bell Rock. The bill passed 

 the House of Commons, but was thrown out in the Lords by the 

 opposition of the city of London (p. 94). 



Mr. Telford was applied to for his opinion (p, 92), but after the 

 bill was thrown out he was not consulted again; neither does it 

 appear that he made any design or Report, although no doubt he 

 gave much valuable advice. Considerable doubts still existed in 

 the minds of many (p. 95), as to the practicability of the under- 

 taking. The late Mr. Rennie was applied to by the Commission- 

 ers in the year 1884, and visited the rock on August 15th of the 

 same year, in company with Mr. Robert Stevenson and Mr. Hamil- 

 ton, one of the Commissioners, and on the 30th December follow- 

 ing made a long Report to the Commissioners (p. 447), embracing 

 the whole subject, and after commenting at length upon the vari- 

 ous designs submitted to him, decided upon recommending a stone 

 lighthouse, and observes, that as to the practicability of erecting 

 such a work on the Bell Rock, "I think no doubt can be enter- 

 tained, with such examples before us as the Tours de Cordouanami 

 the Eddystone, before mentioned." 



