Chatterbox, 1906 Part 57

'If you build a long stone pier out from either sh.o.r.e so as to break the force of the waves,' said he, 'you will interfere with the free flow of the currents from the river-mouths, and cause them to drop the sand and soil, which they are ever carrying out to sea, until the harbour-mouth is choked by them. The harbour has been formed into its present shape by the free actions of current and tide, and if these be altered by artificial means, the shape and safety will be destroyed.' Then he went on to explain that the proper thing to do was to build a wall in the Sound itself, without letting it touch the land at either end. The tides, thus only slightly confined between the sh.o.r.es and wall-ends (but allowed to run in their old accustomed channels), would keep their channels free. The Lords of the Admiralty thought it all over, and on the 22nd June, 1811, issued an order for the work to begin.

Then no more time was lost. Down to Plymouth went the engineer and his staff again. They searched for a quarry to dig the stone from, and found it at Oreston, in the north-east corner of the Sound. In March, 1812, crowbar and gunpowder began to be busy there. Meanwhile, on the water of the Sound, two and a half miles south of Plymouth Town, a number of buoys were moored in two parallel lines, extending over a distance of one thousand two hundred yards, east and west. They marked the place where the great barrier was to be built, and their anchors partly lay on a reef of dangerous, submerged rocks, and partly in deep water. By the time they were safely fixed, the first shiploads of stone were ready.

But ten of the ships were not like other ships. All along the deck and all down the middle of the lower part of the vessel, ran lines of rails, and on these were small trucks each carrying one large stone. The stones varied in weight from half a ton to ten tons and more. They were rough-hewn from the quarry, for as Rennie was going to let the sea build the wall, it was better that the stones should be irregular in shape.

Each ship, being loaded, sailed to the line of the buoys, and, safely moored to one of them, proceeded to unload. This was done by wheeling the trucks, one after another, to an opening in the stern, where the truck was tilted on one end and the huge stone toppled into the water.

The process of unloading took each ship about three-quarters of an hour.

There were forty-five other ships, each capable of carrying some fifty tons of small stones and rubble. These latter cargoes were shot into the water in much the manner that ordinary ballast is unloaded.

The first large stone, marking the beginning of Plymouth Breakwater, went gurgling to the bottom of the Sound on August 12th, 1812, amid the flutter of flags and the booming of cannon. It was the Prince Regent's birthday, and Lord Keith, commander of the Channel Fleet, came to witness the beginning of the great task. The stone fell on a spot called the Shovel Rock, near the centre of the lines of buoys, and was very soon covered by rubble from the next ship. Then the procession was kept up with such diligence that by the end of the following March, the top of the pile peeped above the water at low tide--forty-three thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine tons had been dropped! Bit by bit this point of new land grew longer and longer, until it became possible for workmen to disembark upon it, and when a storm broke in March, 1814, a number of ships were glad to seek its shelter, among them being the famous warship, _Queen Charlotte_. So satisfactory was the protection it even then afforded, that the engineers decided to raise it higher than was originally intended, not stopping until two feet above high water was reached; thus rendering the water between it and Plymouth calm enough for small vessels.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plymouth Breakwater.]

When making his survey, Rennie had come to the conclusion that the slope of his great bank of stones, where it faced the open sea, should be at an angle of five feet to one. That is, in climbing from the bed of the sea, it should rise one foot in every length of five. But others did not agree with him, and the slope was made three feet to one, until the waves themselves took up the argument, and proved that John Rennie was right. In 1817, they broke over the bank in such a storm that large quant.i.ties of stone on the seaward side were swept over the top, and littered down the opposite side. When the gale was over, examination proved that the sea-slope was five to one. Yet for seven years more this curious dispute was kept up, and not until 1824, when Rennie had been dead for three years, did the sea at last have its way, and convince those in authority that it (and Rennie) knew what the proper slope should be. On November 23rd, 1824, so fierce was the storm that it hurled several thousands of tons of ponderous stones from one side of the Breakwater to the other. That was the final word, and the Breakwater stands to-day as the sea ordered it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The weight of the two birds had the desired effect."]

When this huge pile of loose stones and rubble more than a mile long, rising from a broad base at the bottom of the sea, had been formed into a close ma.s.s by the action of the waves, a coating of masonry was laid over them. At either end, east and west, the great wall bends slightly for a short distance northward, and is finished in a circular platform of solid masonry. At the west end stands a handsome lighthouse; at the east, a beacon, and between these and the sh.o.r.e are the two entrances to the harbour--one a quarter of a mile wide, and the other three-quarters.

The width of the wall at the top is forty-five feet, but at the bottom it is three hundred and sixty feet, and weighs nearly four million tons.

Surely it would be a boisterous sea that would carry this away. Its total cost was about one million five hundred thousand pounds, and it was finished in 1848.

Before the lighthouse was built, it became necessary to warn vessels of the position of the new sea-wall, and for more than twenty years a lightship burned a signal there. This was the state of affairs when that terrible storm of 1824 swept up the Sound, and among the wrecks it caused was one of an unusual character. A small vessel, laden with cork, was nearing the mouth of the Sound, when she was suddenly struck by a violent gust of wind and turned completely over. The captain, a boy, and two pa.s.sengers were the only ones below at the time, and these, finding the water rushing in, sought refuge in the ship's coal-hole, which, owing to the reversed position of the hull, was now above them instead of below. In total darkness, and lapped by the encroaching water, they floated thus for six hours. In the early morning they struck against the west point of the Breakwater, heeled over it and drifted toward the lightship. Those on board the latter, little thinking that the wreck had life on it, pushed the hull away with poles, and, caught by the tide, it soon drifted from sight. Three hours later it appeared again. The return tide had washed it back, and a little later a larger wave than usual carried it on to the rough stones of the unfinished Breakwater, where it held fast. The water receded, and the four unhappy voyagers crept out on to the rocks, to be rescued half an hour later by a pilot boat. Such was one of the unexpected services rendered by the Breakwater at Plymouth; but its expected benefits, worthily accomplished, have been too numerous to record.

JOHN LEA

UNION IS STRENGTH.

A True Anecdote.

A water-hen, seeing a pheasant feed out of one of those mechanical boxes which open when the bird stands on the rail in front of the box, went and stood in the same place, as soon as the pheasant quitted it. Finding that its weight was not sufficient to raise the lid of the box, it kept jumping upon the rail to try to open it. It could net succeed in lifting the lid sufficiently high, and so the clever bird went away, and returned with another bird of its own species. The weight of the two had the desired effect, and they both enjoyed the reward of their sagacity.

LITTLE WORKERS.

I saw a little flake of snow Fall down towards the land; 'Twas such a tender little thing, It rested on my hand.

But after, when I went abroad, And looked on field and hill, The snow had covered everything, And all the land was still.

I saw a little daisy-bud Peep upwards through the green; It was a tiny little flower, And yet it promised spring.

And when the summer days had come, The little blossoms fair Had made a carpet red and white That covered everywhere.

A child--it is a little thing, How weak its hands! how small!

What tiny footsteps it doth take, How soon 'twill slip and fall!

Yet all the wonders of the world.

The towers and castles fair, Were thought and planned and built by men, Who once small children were.

A NEGLECTED SALUTE.

An anecdote is told of one of the sons of the German Emperor which shows that the faults of youth are common to all ranks, and that princes, no less than ordinary boys, require to be trained in the way they should go.

This little prince was a great favourite, and his winning ways made him very popular. It was always his delight to receive the military salute when he pa.s.sed through the palace gates, and for this reason he looked forward to his daily walk with his tutor.

But in the nursery he was inclined to be unruly, and there was at one time great trouble in making him take his morning bath. One day, to his surprise, when he rebelled he was allowed to go without it, and he thought he had certainly gained the upper hand.

Later in the morning, when he pa.s.sed the sentinel, the usual salute was not given. He stormed and raged, but no notice was taken. At luncheon, the little prince, with tears of wrath, complained of the insult which had been offered him, fully expecting the immediate punishment of the sentinel.

But the Emperor only shook his head. 'What else could you expect' he said. 'Surely you did not imagine that the guard would salute a dirty boy?'

After this there was no more trouble about the morning tubs.

A STORY OF THE UNFORESEEN.

'It's no good, Baker, the thing we must decide is whether Billy or Pottles will give us the most lines; for we shall get them from one or the other, and that's certain.'

'Bosh! there's another two days yet before we must have the books back, and, at any rate, I know where Billy has put them.'

'What's the good of that? We are not allowed in the school buildings except in work-hours, and then, if his study is not locked, it's because Billy himself is inside it. If you could get him out without locking the door, in the lunch-hour, there would be some use in all your ideas.'

'If I could make him put his head out of the window, that would do quite as well,' said Baker, meditatively. 'The books are on the cupboard just inside the door.'

Paynton laughed. 'It would take an awful uproar in the quad to wake Billy, and if we are creating an uproar, how are we to fetch the books out? It is all your fault. Whatever made you say Billy's window was the window of our cla.s.s-room?'

'Well, I thought it was.'

'You shouldn't think, you should be sure. If only we'd thrown in anything but the algebra books it would have been all right; but Pottles promised to teach us a lesson next time we came to cla.s.s without them, and you know what that means.'

'Shut up, Paynton--I've got an idea.'

'I hope it's a better one than throwing books in at wrong windows,' said his friend, and the two boys went along together still arguing busily.

Baker and Paynton were the despair of Mr. Potter, the master of the Lower Fourth, rudely called Pottles behind his back; and even Mr.

Wilson, the somewhat absent-minded Head Master, nicknamed Billy by his irreverent scholars, was beginning to wonder whether it would not be better to suggest to the parents to try whether sending them to a fresh school would have any effect on them. It was useless to cane them, it was useless to give them 'lines.' They took their punishment as the natural part of a day's work that was otherwise devoted to 'scoring off'

the masters and avoiding the pursuit of knowledge. On this occasion Mr.

Wilson had by no means forgotten that he had ordered the two boys to come to his study to claim the books that they had thrown in there by mistake, but he was rather glad that they did not arrive at once, as he wanted to think of some fresh means of impressing them.