BainLiE.—Early Reclamations and Harbour-works of Wellington. 705 
Beacon Hill became what was known as a learners’ station, with a Morse 
telegraph-set connection with the Wellington Telegraph Office, a cadet 
being stationed there. Still later, a telephone was installed between the 
w 
pilot-station and Beacon Hill, one of the first telephone circuits in Ne 
Zealand. 
The first pilot appointed by the Government, in 1842, was D. McCarthy. 
James Hebberley had been appointed by the New Zealand Company in 
1840. McCarthy was succeeded by R. Calder, who retired in 1848. 
He was succeeded by James Ames (father of the present City Valuer), who 
filled the position temporarily. In 1849 Captain Daniel Dougherty, an 
American whaling captain, was appointed, and he held the position until 
the young chiefs of Port Nicholson, had, with a boat’s crew of Natives, gone 
off to the “ Olympus," immigrant ship, in the strait during a gale, and 
piloted her with safety into the harbour, and to an anchorage, for which 
service the company awarded him £5. 
Time-signals were given daily from H.M. Surveying Ship “ Acheron,” 
Captain J. L. Stokes, while in port towards the end of 1849. On the 9th 
March, 1864, a time-ball service was instituted. A mast was raised above 
the Customhouse, on which a large black ball was raised daily, half-mast 
at ten minutes to 12, mast-head at five minutes to 12, and dropped at noon, 
Wellington mean time. e cóst of the astronomical clock ordered in 
connection with the time-ball, with the other necessary apparatus and 
fittings, amounted to £941 12s. 7d. The first observer was the Rev. Arthur 
Stock, of St. Peter's Church. 
LiGHTHOUSES. 
The first mention of a proposed light was the offer of the New Zealand 
Company, on the 5th November, 1841, to erect a lighthouse on Pencarrow 
Head, at a cost of £1,500, provided that such sum should be a charge against 
future dues (2, p. 31). The Colonial Office referred the matter to the New 
Zealand officials. Whatever the reply may have been, there was no light- 
house erected by the company. Perhaps the following extract from Wake- 
field’s Adventure (9) should have been the first paragraph of this section 
although the lights referred to were hardly what is known as a lighthouse : 
" The frigate sailed away on her return to the Bay of Islands the same 
evening, beating out in the dark against a fresh breeze with her boats holding 
lights on the extremities of the reefs.” The frigate was H.M.S. “ Herald,” 
Captain Nias, which had called at Port Nicholson on the 20th July, 1840, 
on her return from a mission to declare British sovereignty over the South 
Island, and also to secure signatures to the Treaty of Waitangi. When 
the beacon was erected in 1844, the question of a lighthouse was left in 
23—Trans. 
