More remarkable was the accident which happened at the Flannen Islands light-station in 1900; it remains an unsolved mystery to this day. This is one of Scotland’s lonely lights, mounting guard over a group of islets fifteen miles off the Hebrides. On December 26 the relief-tender approached the station on her usual fortnightly visit, but, to the amazement of those on board, no signs of the keepers or the usual signals were to be seen, while the lantern was not dressed in its daylight garb. The crew landed hurriedly, wondering what was amiss. They found the lighthouse absolutely deserted; not a sign of any of the three keepers was to be seen or heard. They examined the log, and found that the light had not been burning for some days, the last entry being made about 4 a.m. nearly a week previously. The rock was searched, but yielded no clue to the mystery of the complete disappearance of the men. The light had not been abandoned; it had simply burned itself out. It was a fortunate circumstance that very little shipping frequents these seas during the winter, or there would have been one or two marine disasters, as the islands are often wrapped in fog. It is surmised that one of the men ventured outside on to a rocky ledge in the early hours of the morning. According to the log, a vicious storm was raging at the time, and probably in the darkness the man was swept off his feet and carried into the sea. The second keeper on duty, marvelling at the non-return of his assistant, evidently had roused his other companion, and the two had instituted a search in the storm, only in turn to be caught by a wave and carried away. In Great Britain, since 1860, men only have been employed by the Trinity House Brethren for the maintenance of the lights, but in the United States women still are engaged in this duty. Some of the British lights have been controlled by one family through two or three generations. It was only a few years ago that a Darling retired from the vigil on the Longstones of Farne Islands, the scene of Grace Darling’s heroism, while for a century and a half one family kept the South Foreland light faithfully. The Casquets light off Alderney, in the Channel Islands, was maintained by one family, some of the children spending the whole of their lives on the rock, son succeeding father at the post of duty.