Known chiefly as the site of one of our chief convict prisons and of almost world-famous stone quarries, Portland, or the “Isle of Slingers,” forms a unique seamark, and is a place of considerable interest. This strange tongue of rocky land, which has been called “the Gibraltar of England,” is connected with the mainland by the wonderful Chesil Beach, which is an immense ridge or bank of pebbles some fifteen miles in length, varying in height and ranging from 170 to upwards of 200 yards in width. The beach is separated from the mainland as far as Abbotsbury by the Fleet. The word “Chesil” is Anglo-Saxon for pebble. The stones vary greatly in size, being largest at the Portland end and gradually decreasing until they become quite small at Bridport, where the beach meets the cliffs. So regular, indeed, is this decrease that fishermen landing on the shore at night can easily tell their approximate whereabouts upon taking some of the pebbles in their hands. The stones differ greatly in material and colour, being drawn by the current from all portions of the south-western coasts. There is a tradition among the Portlanders that anyone finding two pebbles alike will be paid a reward of £50, and many fruitless searches have from time to time in former years been made. That this truly marvellous agglomeration is due chiefly to the action of south-westerly gales and the obstruction presented by the Isle of Portland to their dispersion eastward is generally agreed. There have been many wrecks upon this famous beach since the days when the Roman galleys swept along the coast filled with Cæsar’s legions down to modern times; and rescue is rendered very difficult, and sometimes impossible by the huge rollers which break upon the shingle during southerly and south-westerly gales, creating a terrible under-tow which has over and over again been fatal even to strong swimmers, who attempt to reach the shore from wrecked vessels. Indeed, such a terrible number of disasters have taken place at the Portland end of the beach, that the little creek or bay lying in the curve where the island joins it has come to be known as Dead Man’s Bay. A little more than a century ago a fleet of transports was wrecked there, with a loss of over a thousand lives, and many miles of the coast was for weeks afterwards strewn with wreckage. During the terrible storm of November, 1824, the _Ebenezer_, a sloop of nearly a hundred tons, laden with heavy stores and war material was swept from the sea right over the beach and safely deposited in the Fleet.