Early in the month of May the preparation of the wooden barrack for the Rock had been completed, and the whole had been set up in the workyard at Greenock; and when I visited it for the last time about the 5th of that month, I found it all ready for shipment, excepting some additional iron ties, which I ordered for securing the turret to the top of the pyramid, which were to be applied at the level of the floor of the upper or barrack-room storey. I also found that the moorings, including the mushroom anchors and chains, and the workyard materials, consisting of several cranes, trucks, a janker for the transport of timber, and a Woolwich sling-cart for carrying stones to the various sheds, were in the course of preparation. A large assortment of masons’ and quarriers’ tools was at the same time ready for shipment at Aberdeen. Early in June, a vessel called the Duke of Montrose was chartered to carry coals to Tyree, both for household purposes and for the work; and two small portable smiths’ forges were prepared for use on the Rock. ~Embark for Skerryvore.~ In providing the means of efficiently carrying on so many complicated operations in a situation so difficult and remote, it is impossible, even with the greatest foresight, to avoid omissions; while delay of a most injurious kind may result from very trivial wants. Even the omission of a handful of sand, or a piece of clay, might effectually stop for a season the progress of plans, in the maturing of which hundreds of pounds had been expended. Accordingly, although I had bestowed all the forethought which I could give to the various details of the preparation for the season (of which I found it absolutely indispensable to be personally aware, even to the extent of the cooking dishes), new wants were continually springing up, and new delays occasioned, so that it was not until the evening of the 23d of June that I could embark at Tobermory in the _Pharos_ Lighthouse Tender, commanded by Mr Thomas Macurich, with all the requisites on board for commencing the season’s operations. Next morning we moored off Hynish Point about three o’clock, and, from the roughness of the passage, were not unwilling to land at that early hour. Here I found that Mr Scott, the foreman of the workyard, had, notwithstanding the unworkable nature of the Rock, more particularly afterwards noticed, procured about sixty fine blocks of gneiss, as the produce of the Tyree quarries, which had been wrought for upwards of 15 months; and had at the same time completed the masonry of a range of buildings for stores and barracks, capable of containing upwards of 100 men, and had built about 100 feet in length of a landing-pier, reaching nearly to low-water mark. A magazine for gunpowder, of which a considerable stock was required for quarrying purposes, had also been built; and a piece of garden ground had been inclosed and stocked for the use of the people to be employed at the works.