ign in that inhospitable
island, and full of childish vanity, he determined at length, as
Suetonius humorously observes, "to make war in earnest; he drew up his
army on the shore of the ocean, with his ballistse and other engines of
war, and, while no one could imagine what he intended to do, on a
sudden commanded them to gather up sea shells and fill their helmets
and the folds of their dresses with them, calling them 'the spoils of
the ocean due to the Capitol and the Palatium.' As a monument of his
success, he raised a lofty tower, upon which, as at Pharos, he ordered
lights to be burnt in the night time for the guidance of ships at sea"
("Lives of the Twelve Caesars," Caligula, p. 283).

"It seems generally agreed," writes Forester, the translator of
Suetonius' Lives, "that the point of the coast which was signalised by
this ridiculous bravado of Caligula, somewhat redeemed by the erection
of a high house, was Itium, afterwards called Gessoriacum and Bononia
(Boulogne), a town belonging to the Gaulish tribe of the Morini" (note,
p. 283).

For many centuries this tower called Turris Ordens, Turris Ardens, or
Turris Ordinis by the Romans, and Neamthur by the Gauls, spread its
light over land and sea on the north-eastern cliffs of Boulogne.

A description of the tower is given in the "Memoirs of the Academy of
Inscription," quoted by Bertrand in his "History of Boulogne," as
follows: "The form of this monument, one of the most striking erected
by the Romans, was octagon. It was entirely abolished about a hundred
years ago, but, fortunately, a drawing of it, made when the lighthouse
was still perfect, is still in existence, and has been exhibited to the
Academy by the learned Father Lequien, a Dominican monk, native of
Boulogne. Each of its sides, according to Bucherius, measured 24 to 25
feet, so that its circumference was about 200, and its diameter 66
feet. It contained twelve entablatures, or species of galleries, on the
outside, including that on the ground floor. Each gallery projected a
foot and a half further than the one above it, and consequently their
size diminished with each succeeding gallery. On the top fires were
lighted to serve as a beacon to vessels at sea. A solid foundation was
formed, not only under the lighthouse, but for some distance beyond the
external walls. It was constructed of stones and bricks in the
following manner: first were seen three layers of stones, found on the
coast, of iron g