locks,
which, when laid and fastened in one solid stratum, weighed 120 tons.
They were not laid in cement; but each block was fastened to its fellow
by joints and similar to the first. The whole of this fabric was built
round a strong central mast or pole, which rose from the rock. The two
timber courses above described terminated the "solid" part of the
lighthouse. It rose to the height of about fourteen feet from the rock,
at the centre of the building.

At this point in the structure; namely, at the top of the "solid," the
door was begun on the east side; and a central "well-hole" was left,
where the stair leading to the rooms above was ultimately built. The
door itself was reached by a strong iron stair of open work, outside,
through which the sea could easily wash.

After the solid was completed, other five courses of moor-stone were
laid, which weighed about eighty-six tons. It was in these that the
door-way and well-hole were made. Two more courses of wood followed,
covering the door-head; and on these, four more courses of stone,
weighing sixty-seven tons; then several courses of timber, with a floor
of oak plank, three inches thick, over all, forming the floor of the
first apartment, which was the store-room. This first floor was
thirty-three feet above the rock.

The upper part of the column, containing its four rooms, was by no means
so strong as the lower part, being composed chiefly of the timber
uprights in which the building was encased from top to bottom. These
uprights, numbering seventy-one, were massive beams; about a foot broad
and nine inches thick at the bottom, and diminishing towards the top.
Their seams were caulked like those of a ship, and they gave to the
lighthouse when finished the appearance of an elegant fluted column.
The top of the column, on which rested the lantern, rose, when finished,
to about sixty-three feet above the highest part of the rock.

We have thought proper to give these details in this place, but at the
time of which we write, none of the outside timbers had been set up, and
the edifice had only reached that point immediately above the "solid,"
where the doorway and the "well-hole" began. Here a large crane had
been fixed, and two of the men were up there working the windlass, by
which the heavy blocks of moor-stone were raised to their places.

The signal had been given to hoist one of these, when Isaac Dorkin, who
stood beside the stone, suddenly uttered