86 THE OCEAN 



usual method is to install a beacon or a light- 

 buoy. These are towers of stone or iron, or 

 floating iron buoys, securely anchored and 

 bearing bright lights which operate automat- 

 ically. Such beacons and gas-buoys may have 

 either steady or flashing lights and as they re- 

 quire attention only at long intervals a great 

 many of them are in use along our coasts. 

 While lighthouses, beacons, etc., are all of 

 the utmost importance for warning mariners 

 of dangerous spots and for enabling them 

 to learn their ship's location and bearings, yet 

 sailors would find it a most difficult matter, by 

 such helps alone, to pick their way into har- 

 bours and other localities with which they are 

 unfamiliar. Buoys are used to enable sailors 

 to find their way among reefs, shoals and other 

 obstructions, and to those familiar with the 

 meanings of buoys, they serve to guide the 

 course of a ship just as plainly as sign-posts at 

 cross-roads guide travellers by land. The 

 landsman finds it truly marvellous to watch 

 a sailor steam or sail up some winding, tortu- 

 ous channel ; turning first to right and then to 

 left; doubling and swinging about, with noth- 



