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PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE SEA. 



could live. This terrible reef, so fatal to many a gallant bark, 

 rendered the erection of a lighthouse most desirable, yet such 

 was the difficulty of the case that although so long ago as 1814 

 an Act was obtained for a light on Skerryvore, it was not before 

 1837 than Mr. Alan Stevenson, son of the famous architect of 

 the Bell Rock sea-tower, was authorised to commence the work. 

 That difficulty was not confined to the position and character 



Bell Eock Lighthouse. 



of the reef itself, as the neighbouring island of Tyree afforded 

 no resource, and all the materials for the building, even the stone 

 itself, had to be transported from distant quarters. At length 

 all preliminary arrangements being settled, the engineer reached 

 the rock and commenced his work, in June 1838, by erecting a 

 barrack-house upon stilts-a sort of dovecot perched on poles- 

 high out of the water on the reef, close to the proposed site of 

 the hghthouse. The erection of this barrack fully occupied the 



