tender, to lodge in the beacon, together with
Peter Fortune, a person singularly adapted for a residence of this kind,
both from the urbanity of his manners and the versatility of his
talents. Fortune, in his person, was of small stature, and rather
corpulent. Besides being a good Scots cook, he had acted both as groom
and house-servant; he had been a soldier, a sutler, a writer's clerk,
and an apothecary, from which he possessed the art of writing and
suggesting recipes, and had hence, also, perhaps, acquired a turn for
making collections in natural history. But in his practice in surgery on
the Bell Rock, for which he received an annual fee of three guineas, he
is supposed to have been rather partial to the use of the lancet. In
short, Peter was the _factotum_ of the beacon-house, where he ostensibly
acted in the several capacities of cook, steward, surgeon, and barber,
and kept a statement of the rations or expenditure of the provisions
with the strictest integrity.

In the present important state of the building, when it had just
attained the height of sixteen feet, and the upper courses, and
especially the imperfect one, were in the wash of the heaviest seas, an
express boat arrived at the rock with a letter from Mr. Kennedy, of the
workyard, stating that in consequence of the intended expedition to
Walcheren, an embargo had been laid on shipping at all the ports of
Great Britain: that both the _Smeaton_ and _Patriot_ were detained at
Arbroath, and that but for the proper view which Mr. Ramsey, the port
officer, had taken of his orders, neither the express boat nor one which
had been sent with provisions and necessaries for the floating light
would have been permitted to leave the harbour. The writer set off
without delay for Arbroath, and on landing used every possible means
with the official people, but their orders were deemed so peremptory
that even boats were not permitted to sail from any port upon the coast.
In the meantime, the collector of the Customs at Montrose applied to the
Board at Edinburgh, but could, of himself, grant no relief to the Bell
Rock shipping.

At this critical period Mr. Adam Duff, then Sheriff of Forfarshire, now
of the county of Edinburgh, and _ex officio_ one of the Commissioners of
the Northern Lighthouses, happened to be at Arbroath. Mr. Duff took an
immediate interest in representing the circumstances of the case to the
Board of Customs at Edinburgh. But such were the doubts ent