es,
and hurled into a hole at some distance; and the heavy hearth of the
smith's forge, with the ponderous anvil, had been washed from their
places of supposed security.

From the time of the setting up of the beacon a new era in the work
began. Some of the men were now enabled to remain on the rock all
day, working at the lighthouse when the tide was low, and betaking
themselves to the beacon when it rose, and leaving it at night; for
there was much to do before this beacon could be made the habitable
abode which it finally became; but it required the strictest
attention to the state of the weather, in case of their being
overtaken with a gale, which might prevent the possibility of their
being taken off the rock.

At last the beacon was so far advanced and secured that it was deemed
capable of withstanding any gale that might blow. As yet it was a
great ungainly pile of logs, iron stanchions, and bracing-chains,
without anything that could afford shelter to man from winds or
waves, but with a platform laid from its cross-beams at a
considerable height above high-water mark.

The works on the rock were in this state, when two memorable
circumstances occurred in the Bell Rock annals, to which we shall
devote a separate chapter.

CHAPTER XV

RUBY HAS A RISE IN LIFE, AND A FALL

James Dove, the blacksmith, had, for some time past, been watching
the advancing of the beacon-works with some interest, and a good deal
of impatience. He was tired of working so constantly up to the knees
in water, and aspired to a drier and more elevated workshop.

One morning he was told by the foreman that orders had been given for
him to remove his forge to the beacon, and this removal, this
"flitting", as he called it, was the first of the memorable events
referred to in the last chapter.

"Hallo! Ruby, my boy," cried the elated son of Vulcan, as he
descended the companion ladder, "we're goin' to flit, lad. We're
about to rise in the world, so get up your bellows. It's the last
time we shall have to be bothered with them in the boat, I hope."

"That's well," said Ruby, shouldering the unwieldy bellows; "they
have worn my shoulders threadbare, and tried my patience almost
beyond endurance."

"Well, it's all over now, lad," rejoined the smith. "In future you
shall have to blow up in the beacon yonder; so come along."

"Come, Ruby, that ought to comfort the cockles o' yer heart," said
O'Connor, who passed up the ladder as he