s of a limb, but life itself,
that becomes the question.' The boats proceeded with the eight willing
workmen: four hours were passed upon the rock, and, on returning to
the 'Pharos,' the eighteen men who remained on board seemed quite
ashamed of their cowardice; and on again proceeding to the rock, they
were the first to embark. This was the only instance of refusal to go
to the rock.

Shortly after this occurrence, the whole party on board the Pharos was
exposed to a fearful gale, which kept them from the rock during ten
days and exposed them to imminent danger. The floating-light broke
adrift, but, providentially, no damage was sustained. This
circumstance, however, imparted a character of extreme hazard to life
on board the floating-light, that it was difficult to provide sailors
to man her. On landing upon the rock the effects of the gale were at
once apparent. Six large blocks of granite, which had been landed by
way of experiment, had been removed from their places, and by the
force of the sea thrown over a rising ledge into a hole at the
distance of twelve or fifteen paces; a sufficient evidence of the
violence of the storm and the agitation of the sea on the rock. The
smith's forge was also shifted from its place--the ash-pan of the
hearth with its ponderous cast-iron back had been washed from their
places of supposed security, the chains of attachment broken, and
these weighty articles found at a very considerable distance in a hole
of the rock.

Although the sea often had a most frightful appearance, yet the beacon
divested the Bell Rock of many of its terrors: its beams afforded an
excellent guide to shipping, and old sailors frequently expressed
their admiration at the change of circumstances which led to their
cruising with so much confidence both by day and night in the
immediate vicinity of this dangerous rock. It also had a beneficial
influence on all who were actively engaged about the lighthouse by
inducing a greater confidence of safety, so that at all times when a
boat could be put to sea or approach this sunken reef, there was not
that actual danger in landing which formerly presented itself, because
in the event of the tender going adrift or a boat happening to be
wrecked upon the rock, the beacon could be looked to as a refuge till
assistance arrived.

On the 6th October, 1807, the works were relinquished for the season.
The time which had been spent in the rock amounted only to one hundred
a