In 1763 we first hear of an endeavour to increase the intensity of the light shown by means of a reflector. It was then successfully tried by William Hutchinson, a master mariner of the port of Liverpool, in connection with a rudely constructed flat-wick oil lamp; M. Argand, a citizen of Geneva, about the year 1780, improved on this system by his cylindrical-wick lamps in conjunction with a silvered reflector. This is probably the form of light which _The Gentleman’s Magazine_ tells us was, in 1783, displayed from a hill near Norwood, and nightly viewed by an astonished crowd on Blackfriars Bridge. On Argand’s system Augustine Fresnel afterwards improved, by his large concentric-wick lamp and lenses. Gas was suggested by Aldini of Milan in 1823; but for many years was used only for lighthouses on piers and harbours, or in places adjacent to gas works; and it was not till 1865 that we find gas construction taking place at out-of-the-way lighthouse stations for the purpose of supplying the light. The year 1853 saw the first attempt at the use of electricity as a lighthouse luminant; a series of experiments with it were then carried out under Faraday’s supervision at the South Foreland. Nine years later Drummond tried the lime-light at the same lighthouse. But there is yet one feature in the system of coast lighting which deserves attention. The difficulty felt by mariners in _identifying_ a particular light when seen, was evidently experienced as early as the opening years of the last century, when lighthouses had begun to materially increase in number. It was not, however, till 1730 that we find any plan of distinction put forward. In that year Robert Hamblin, a barber at Lynn, patented his invention ‘for distinguishing of lights for the guidance of shipping,’ which was, that at each lighthouse station the lights should be placed ‘in such various forms, elevations, numbers, and positions that one of them should not resemble another,’ and he undertook—as soon as the distinguishing features were agreed upon—to prepare and publish a chart of the coasts of England and Wales, in which such lights should be distinctly expressed. It is probable that in a measure Hamblin’s plan was acted upon, as lights erected after this date were mostly arranged in groups.