peculiar smile.

“Never!” said Mrs Potter, emphatically; and then she gave it forth as one of her settled convictions, that, “Kings wasn’t such fools as to go makin’ presents like that to poor working men.”

However, John Potter, who had only just then presented himself before the eyes of his astonished spouse, stoutly asserted that it was true; and said that if she would set about getting something to eat, for he was uncommonly hungry, and if Tommy would leave off opening his mouth and eyes to such an unnecessary extent, he would tell them all about it. So Mrs Potter was convinced, and, for once, had her “settled convictions” unsettled; and the men returned to their work on the Eddystone; and a man-of-war was sent to cruise in the neighbourhood to guard them from misfortune in the future; and, finally, the Rudyerd lighthouse was completed.

Its total height, from the lowest side to the top of the ball on the lantern, was ninety-two feet, and its greatest diameter twenty-three feet four inches. It took about three years to build, having been commenced in 1706, the first light was put up in 1708, and the whole was completed in 1709.

Teddy Maroon was one of the first keepers, but he soon left to take charge of a lighthouse on the Irish coast. Thereupon John Potter made application for the post. He was successful over many competitors, and at last obtained the darling wish of his heart: he became principal keeper; his surly comrade, Isaac Dorkin, strange to say, obtaining the post of second keeper. Mrs Potter didn’t like the change at first, as a matter of course.

“But you’ll come to like it, Martha,” John would say when they referred to the subject, “‘Absence,’ you know, ‘makes the heart grow fonder.’ We’ll think all the more of each other when we meet during my spells ashore, at the end of every two months.”

Tommy also objected very much at first, but he could not alter his father’s intentions; so John Potter went off to the Eddystone rock, and for a long time took charge of the light that cast its friendly beams over the sea every night thereafter, through storm and calm, for upwards of six-and-forty years.

That John’s life in the lighthouse was not all that he had hoped for will become apparent in the next chapter.