CHAP. IV. SMEATON'S LIGHTHOUSE ON THE EDDYSTONE. 47 



soundings about the Scilly Isles ; and hence they oftener 

 make the Lizard Lights first, which are visible about 

 twenty miles off. These are two in number, standing 

 on the bold headland forming the most southerly point 

 of the English coast, against which the sea beats with 

 tremendous fury in south-westerly gales. From this 

 point the coast retires, and in the bend lie Falmouth 

 (with a revolving light on St. Anthony's Point), Fowey, 

 the Looes, and Plymouth Sound and Harbour ; the 

 coast-line again trending southward until it juts out 

 into the sea in the bold craggy bluffs of Bolt Head 

 and Start Point, on the last of which is another house 

 with two lights, one revolving, for the Channel, and 

 another, fixed, to direct vessels inshore clear of the 

 Skerries shoal. But between the Lizard and Start 

 Point, which form the two extremities of this bend 

 in the land of Cornwall and Devonshire, there lies the 

 Eddystone Eock and Lighthouse, standing fourteen miles 

 out from the shore, almost directly in front of Plymouth 

 Sound and in the line of coasting vessels steaming or 

 beating up Channel. From this point it gradually con- 

 tracts, and the way becomes lighted on both sides to the 

 Downs. On the south are seen the three Casquet Lights 

 on the Jersey side ; and on the north the two fixed lights 

 on Portland Bill. The next is St. Catherine's, a brilliant 

 fixed light on the extreme south point of the Isle of 

 Wight. Next are the lights exhibited at different 

 heights on the Nab, and then the single fixed light exhi- 

 bited on the Owers vessel. Beachy Head, on the same 

 line, exhibits a powerful revolving light 285 feet above 

 high water, its interval of greatest brilliancy occurring 

 every two minutes. Then comes Dungeness, exhibiting 

 a fixed red light of great power, situated at the extre- 

 mity of the low point of Dungeness Beach. Next are 

 seen Folkestone, and then Dover, harbour lights; whilst 

 011 the south are the flash light, recently stationed on 

 the Varne Bank ; and, further up Channel, on the French 



