“These systems of supports having been completed, the actual operations commenced, and for this another and less permanent system of shoring was requisite. If the main shoring may be compared to the solid masses of an army, those I am now speaking of may be viewed as the _skirmishers_. They consist of needles and props inserted immediately above the part to be operated on, and supporting a portion of the shattered pier while that below it was renewed, and as soon as this was effected, a new needle was inserted above the first one, to make way for the renewal of another batch, each lower needle being in its turn removed, when that above it was secured. Besides this, however, endless extemporised precautions had at every hour to be taken, to provide against contingencies which were ever arising; blocks of timber inserted under stones threatening to fall; struts and shields against masses in danger of bursting; sand-bags, &c., against the rushing out of the avalanches of rubbish; temporarily running together, with liquid cement, of parts which, though eventually to be removed, had not yet been reached, and threatened, if not consolidated, to bury the workmen in their ruins. All these, and many more precautions, had to be taken to meet the exigencies of every day and every hour; and when it is considered that each pier took months to reinstate, that these dangerous operations could not, in many cases, be suspended day or night, and that the Clerk of the Works would never leave the spot while any dangerous work was pending, you may judge of the wearing anxiety which he and others engaged in the work have undergone. “By the process I have thus briefly sketched, the entire piers, excepting a small central portion, have been rebuilt from their foundations to their capitals; the new stone-work having to be inserted a little at a time, has been aided, in all cases, by strong copper cramps, so as to tie its courses together in their circuit round the pier. “All the stones are laid in strong cement, and all that remains within of the old work is run together at each course with liquid cement till it will hold no more. I saw, myself, ten pails full of this material poured into a single hole. “The stone made use of is the purple stone of the neighbouring cliffs, and closely resembles the old stone, though somewhat harder, and is worked in a similar manner. Any old stones which are unshattered (of which I regret to say that but very few were found) have been re-used. “I had hoped that the southern pier, which was the second operated upon, would have proved less dangerous than the northern one, but on a close examination of it, just before the work on it was commenced, I found that it was really as much shattered as the other had been, and, in point of fact, was ready to burst at the middle of its height. The Clerk of the Works, when he reached this point, told me that a cat could walk in and out of the cracks which intersected the pier!