The _Commission des Phares_ has raised, however, in the place of the Tour d’Ordre, a worthy substitute. In 1835 it established at Boulogne a red light, fixed, and two other fixed lights, the first of which shed its radiance for four, and the second and third for nine miles; ample illumination this for a portion of the French coast which is already lighted, at Cape Grisnez, by a powerful apparatus, whose lustre extends as far as twenty-two miles, and at Pointe d’Alpreck, by a lighthouse visible for twelve miles. [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER IV. THE TOWER AT DOVER. The summit of the lofty down at Dover, now crowned by the famous castle, with its Norman keep and towers, was used as a military post from a very remote antiquity. There can be little doubt that the Britons here kept watch and ward: that it was the site of a Roman stronghold, we know from indisputable evidence. A circular entrenchment of Roman work is still extant, and so too are the remains of the Roman lighthouse, whose steady blaze lighted the imperial galleys as they hovered about the port, or guided the British oyster-boats returning from their market at Boulogne. With the history of the stronghold, however, we have nothing to do. It is the pharos which attracts our steps, and induces us to ascend the steep acclivity. A recent antiquary is of opinion that there were _two_ lights; one on the eastern, and the other on the western edge of the hill. The ruins of the latter are so shapeless and indistinct that no description of them could interest the reader, or enable him to picture to his “mind’s eye” the form and structure of the ancient edifice. Of the former enough remains to assist our imagination very materially. [Illustration: THE TOWER AT DOVER.] It is still, says Mr. Puckle,[11] a massive shell: the inner face of its walls vertical and squared, the outside with a tendency to a conical form, which was probably at one time much more distinct, allowing for the quantities of external masonry and facing which by degrees must have fallen or been hewn away. The basement only is of Roman work; the octagon chamber above having been added in the reign of Henry VIII. The dimensions are about fourteen feet square. [11] Rev. J. Puckle, “Church and Fortress of Dover Castle” (ed. 1864). The following description we borrow from Mr. Puckle’s learned monogram:— Except fragments here and there, he says, such as might have been picked up along the shore, the materials used in the pharos are few and uniform throughout; each having its own peculiar character, quite distinct from any supposed similar materials of subsequent date.