Not long since many an anxious eye was turned Channelwards from Plymouth Hoe towards that group of rocks, on one of which the famous Eddystone Light stood—and happily, still stands—for the light that should have illumined the stormy waters was apparently quenched. Not till morning dawn had nearly come was a re-assuring glimmer noted in the lantern of that famed Pharos of our coasts. And there was good reason for anxiety, although the immediate occasion was a mere temporary derangement of the lighting apparatus: for the report had spread that Smeaton’s greatest architectural triumph had collapsed before the power of the sea. One trembles to think what that might have meant, not merely to its few inhabitants, but to scores of sailors and owners. “Happily,” said one of our leading journals, “the Eddystone is still safe, despite the terrible effects of winds and waves, and the serious weakness of its own foundations, which was discovered a few years ago. For the tower which lights the way of the sailor into Plymouth Sound is, after all, not so secure a structure as could be desired. Built of solid masonry and with immense skill, by the clever architect from Hull who designed and carried out the work, it had yet to trust for its foundation to the rock upon which it stood. Should that give way the stone-work of the edifice might be strong enough, and yet some day fall into hopeless ruin. Strange to say, this very weakness has been self-revealed. The rock upon which the lighthouse stands, and which, of the twenty-three that comprise the group, is most exposed to the action of the sea, has been so violently attacked by what Ovid calls the ‘insane waters’ as to have become very seriously undermined. Gradually the waves have cut away the foundations of the stone, rising now and then against the lighthouse, and pressing against the structure with such force as to make the building itself serve the turn of a crowbar, and so, little by little, creating fissures in the foundations, and gradually preparing the way to the end.” Many attempts have been made to obviate these evils by the removal of rock which it was supposed acted as a lever to the water, and by other means: but in vain. At length the Board of Trinity House finding their efforts futile, determined to erect another lighthouse. Meantime, a light-ship has been provided, which, in case of accident to Smeaton’s tower, will be moored in the neighbourhood. A larger building is now in course of erection on an adjacent rock, which affords a more durable foundation and is less exposed to the merciless waves. It will be nearly double the height of the older structure, which was seventy-two feet high, and is being built on a principle of dovetailing, which, it is hoped and believed, will secure it against the worst fury of the sea. Think what that fury is sometimes, gentle reader! At the Skerryvore Rock they have an apparatus for registering the power of the waves per square foot surface; once recently