'EDD

337

EDD

Z er >teen -!-

uay 8 j. 1 P’eces of stone in the whole, yet I found myself no

^ <=on si(1 ,8hea «ened ; for, in establishing these two courses,

*° be a j ered most difficult and arduous part of the work

“p t 0 , r ® a <ly accomplished, as these two courses brought us

“ad begij 6 8atne level where my predecessor Mr. Eudyerd

"kt d J a y. July the 1st, we were able to land. I observed,Pointin' 10 ® ^ le last tide, the swell had washed some of the°Ut 0 f ° ut of the exterior joints, and also some of the grouting*° cor ne ' e u Ptight joints ; but as a heavy sea seemed likelyt^Pose t° n W ' t * 1 ^' e t ' < ^ e flood, I judged it to be to no^ ther e f ° re P a * r the cement while a! ta, >cbo„ 0re em ployed the company in^ to n l bel ^g’n S to the ‘ ‘

ae as e( j ae in our way, and as the hold we got ot themr orn tt lp , e .°f use, in proportion as we got more fastening

violent swell continued;cutting off the ironformer building, as they nowand as the hold we got of them

JtO]

tK V

e lewis holes of our own work.

J fhi 6 Weattl ev having become more favourable, on SundayMr. j i ®> 3d of July, I went on board, accompanied by'be r , ' Ss °P and his party, to whom, as they had never had

V |P°rtunit, *

y of setting a stone, it behoved me to attend.er > not only met with a repulse this day, but couldand ° n y farther attempt to go out till Tuesday, the

V'° w ev,5tb I ° a be

jj ^Tiq fk . . —r~ — ------

th e l0en 'b‘ e wind, though gentle, being contrary, had

i'tig ap j 0ID Pany on board the buss come with their twoha' tr „ yna *

towed us thither, in all probability the day wouldspent in fruitless attempts. Our difficulty was

e en

jj'Bt, increased by the coming on of so thick a fog,

t a «3. efforts united, we had much ado to regain the

!

tb e g ,.' ar U' Son told me they had had such bad weather,y; j.v 'ue-ladder had again broke its lashings and driven

, lt e tock • i. t le y however, got all the irons cut off close to^ 8ot| tb-^ '^ la t the last tide, though there was only a breezek to Put tl St> H le swe J was 80 great, and came on so suddenly,P ( °f t) le le ® 'n great danger of being washed off from the

Sgt'M two°n ’i befor€ the y could fl uit it '

Piec° C ° C k tfl' 8 day we landed, and Jessop’s company

*"*'* . . “

j Ces stone, and effectually repaired the cement ;'ber 1Va J a Proportionable dispatch was made, though the

Cq Pn ]u* s j °t very mild.

(Luting °° da y> the 11th, I again went out; Course III.

“nd q twenty-five pieces, was closed on the followingof n Tl Vsfi a 1 i r ®® begun.

iti n.° Ur Se jy ’ tlle 14th of July, the company pursued the workP) tngfjj ‘ ■• an d now, both companies being fully instructed°ft a 0 "th ; e Se tting the basement courses, I returned to^ s'ho cf 1 w ' len ce I proposed to visit each company as" P n n y’s tn Uld - Seera expedient, but always once in each■ trary 01 ’ w * nd an <l weather should permit.>1 'terrup7 u '^ S ’ S r °und-swells, and heavy seas for several“'sti S suejj ^ ed the regularity of our proceedings ; however,\ ? °f tw° P ^°rtunities as we could, the Course IV., con-thg '"g’a ti f ] o en ^- three pieces of stone, was closed in theS^^ning^ ?t the 31st of July, (see Plate III.) ; and inV t ,' v ent° 0ri lde five pieces of Course V. were set. OurNn'>ork re S u 'arly for some days together; and, visit-tw P ° n V le dth of August, I found the Course V.y Bo me e . nt y-«ix pieces, closed in, (see Plate III.); butjVL ta ason Ila i? Vertenc y ' n P r °eeeding with the interiorv ?° as to i. ° ad been obliged to set two of the outside

« !,1 ch e „ , e farther out than they should have beenft,) > ea ch. tt

, . t . However "as I found the work was sound■ a. lcm gbt it better to cut off the superfluous stonethan to disturb the work by the violence. " t urm; Ve ? een U8 ed in unsetting the pieces ; I there-to-. to let them stand as they were, till thebecome so hard as to support the edges ot

?s the

4 B

the stone while the faces were working afresh ; and which,from the mortar of our first and second course, we found waslikely to be the case before the close of the season. One ofthe dovetails had also given way in driving a trenail, owingto a flaw in the stone; for the remedying whereof we applieda cramp.

“ The 8th of August, at noon, the weather being exceedingfine, with a low neap tide, I took the opportunity of drawinga meridian line upon the platform of Course VI. the seanever going over the work during the whole tide, which wasthe first time it had not washed over all, since we began tobuild: we therefore took this favourable opportunity of care-fully making good all our pointings and groutings, whereverthe water had washed during the bad weather that hadsucceeded the last departure of the Eddystone boat; andwhich was the case with it, in places where it had not hadtime to set before a rough tide came on ; but I observed, withmuch satisfaction, that whatever, not only of the original work,but of the repaired pointing, had once stood a rough tidewithout giving way, the same place never after failed. I alsoobserved, that as in mending the pointings we had in someplaces made trial of Dutch tarras as well as puzzolana, inter-changeably, the puzzolana, for hard service, was evidentlysuperior to the tarras: and some particular joints had provedso difficult, that I was obliged to try other expedients; thebest of which was to chop oakum very small, and beat it upalong with the mortar. This was our last resource, and itnever failed us.

“ Upon the 11th, I again went out in the vessel that con-tained the remaining pieces of Course VI.: those I saw fixed;and that course, consisting of thirty-two pieces, closed in thesame eveuing. (See Plate III.) This completing our six base-ment courses, brought our work upon the same level towhich we had, the preceding season, reduced the top of therock; and upon this, as a common base, the rest of the struc-ture was to be raised by regular entire courses. The timethis part of the work (consisting of one hundred and twenty-three pieces of stone) had taken up, was from the 12th ofJune to the 11th of August inclusive, being a space of sixty-one days. We now considered our greatest difficulties to besuccessfully surmounted, as every succeeding course hadgiven us more and more time, as well as more and moreroom ; and this will appear from our proceedings; for it hasalready been noticed, that the two first courses, consisting ofnineteen pieces of stone only, had cost us seventeen days.

“ Having now got the work to this desirable situation, Iapprehend it will be agreeable to my reader to be more par-ticularly acquainted with the method in which the stoneswere set and fixed. I have intimated, that when eachseparate piece, of which a course was to consist, was separatelywrought, they were all to be brought to their exact places withrespect to each other, upon the platform in the work-yard, andso marked, that, after being numbered and taken to pieces,they could again be restored to the same relative position.This was done upon the complete circular courses by drawinglines from the centre to the circumference, passing throughthe middle of each set of stones; and likewise concentric cir-cles through the middle of each tier or circle of stones, so asto indicate to the eye their relative position to each other:but to render the marks not easily delible, where those linescrossed the joints, a nick was cut and sunk into the surfaceof the two adjacent stones; for doing which, a piece of thinplate-iron was employed, with sand, upon the principle thatstones are sawn ; so that not only the sight, but feeling, couldbe employed in bringing them, together again exactly; forthe same or a similar plate being applied to the nick, theleast irregularity of its position would be discoverable. In a