rocks lying about fourteen miles to
the south-west of Plymouth harbour. The highest part of this reef,
named the Eddystone, is only a few feet above water at high tide, and as
it lies in deep water exposed to the full swell of the ocean, the raging
of the sea over it in stormy weather is terrible beyond conception.

Lying as it does in the track of vessels coasting up and down the
English Channel, it was, as we may easily believe, a source of terror,
as well as of danger, to mariners, until a lighthouse was built upon it.

But a lighthouse was talked of long before any attempt was made to erect
one. Important though this object was to the navies of the world, the
supposed impossibility of the feat, and the danger apprehended in the
mere attempt, deterred any one from undertaking the task until the year
1696, when a country gentleman of Essex, named Henry Winstanley, came
forward, and, having obtained the necessary legal powers, began the
great work of building on the wave-lashed rock.

Winstanley was an eccentric as well as a bold man. He undoubtedly
possessed an ingenious mechanical mind, which displayed itself very much
in practical joking. It is said of him that he made a machine, the
spring of which was attached to an old slipper, which lay (apparently by
chance) on the floor of his bedroom. If a visitor kicked this out of
his way, a phantom instantly arose from the floor! He also constructed
a chair which seized every one who sat down in it with its arms, and
held them fast; and in his garden he had an arbour which went afloat in
a neighbouring canal when any one entered it! As might have been
expected, Winstanley's lighthouse was a curious affair, not well adapted
to withstand the fury of the waves. It was highly ornamented, and
resembled a Chinese pagoda much more than a lighthouse. Nevertheless it
must be said to the credit of this bold man, that after facing and
overcoming, during six years, difficulties and dangers which up to that
time had not been heard of, he finished his lighthouse, proved hereby
the possibility of that which had been previously deemed impossible, and
gave to mankind a noble example of enterprise, daring, and perseverance.

Our friend John Potter had, from the commencement, rendered able
assistance in the dangerous work as a stone cutter, and he could not
help feeling as if he had been deserted by an old friend that night when
the boat went off to the rock without him.

It wa