This new Lantern has just been manufactured by Mr. W. Wilkins, of 24 and 25, Long Acre, by order of the Honourable Corporation of the Trinity House, for the Eddystone Lighthouse, off the port of Plymouth.
This Lantern is of very large dimensions. The frame is of gun-metal, and, exclusive of the light apparatus, it weighs about 7 tons. The extreme external diameter is 11 feet 4 inches; the height of the glass (nearly three-fourths of an inch thick, best English manufacture) is 8 feet; the height of the roof is 6 feet 6 inches; height of ball and vane, 6 feet; and the total height from the floor to the summit of the vane is 30 feet; it is lighted by a fixed dioptric light apparatus of the second order, on the most improved construction, having refractors and zones of polished glass, illuminating the whole of the horizon, and burning at about 90 feet above the level of the sea.
To explain the improved points of construction in this new Lantern, we add a sectional Illustration:—A is the Lantern; B, the pedestal; C, the cupola; and D, the ventilating ball. E E are upright supports, which, instead of being 6 inches wide, as in the old lantern, are only l ¾ inches wide; thus a larger body of light is gained, for the old supports obstructed the light to the effect of 7 degrees when a ship was at some distance off. The new supports are fixed into the granite pedestal by means of the long iron shafts, F F, and secured to the base by the bolts G G; the supports terminating in a graceful scroll. The roof or cupola is sustained by the rafters, and has external and internal support, by means of which much additional strength is gained. An elegant vane surmounts the cupola, and is an useful as well as ornamental finish.
Another novelty is I I, a gully to carry off the water, which flows into a pipe passing down one side of the Lantern.
What a marvel of construction lies been this famed Eddystone Lighthouse of Smeaton, which has now withstood the storms of three-quarters of a century!.
