The Commissioners entertained a high sense of Stevenson’s services at the Bell Rock Lighthouse; and, as many of them took a deep interest in the execution of that remarkable work, and paid occasional visits to it during its progress, they were well able to appreciate the ability and zeal with which he devoted himself to this arduous task, and they resolved, at a meeting held in the lighthouse itself--“That a bust of Mr. Robert Stevenson be obtained, and placed in the library of the Bell Rock Lighthouse, in testimony of the sense entertained by the Commissioners of his distinguished talent and indefatigable zeal in the erection of that lighthouse.” A beautiful bust in marble, by Samuel Joseph, from which the frontispiece has been engraved, was accordingly placed in what is called the library, being the upper apartment of the tower.
Mr. Stevenson’s interest in the Eddystone did not cease on the completion of his own work. We know that he paid at least two visits to the Eddystone after the completion of the Bell Rock. One of those visits was made in September 1813, when, by the courtesy of the Trinity House, he was accommodated with the use of the ‘Eddystone’ tender, and, though the weather was not very favourable, succeeded in landing on the rock and making a hasty inspection of the far-famed lighthouse.
Mr. Stevenson’s last visit was made in 1818, on a voyage in the Northern Lighthouse tender, on which occasion he was favoured with a smooth sea and a low tide, and enabled to make a thorough inspection of the rock. It is important and interesting to record that this examination strongly impressed him with the _ultimate_ insecurity of the structure, as appears from the following almost prophetic extract from his Journal:--
“The house seems to be in a very good state of repair, and does not appear to have sustained any injury by the lapse of time. The joints are full of cement, and the stone exhibits little appearance of decay, being granite or syenite. The rock itself upon a narrow inspection seems to be gneiss. The rock is shaken all through, and dips at a very considerable angle, perhaps one in three, towards the south-west; and being undermined on the north-east side for several feet, it must be confessed that it has rather an alarming appearance. I am not, however, of opinion that it has altered its state perhaps since the date of the erection of the tower. Since my last visit in 1813 I am not sensible of any change upon it. On the north-east side, however, at what is called the ‘Gut’ landing-place, where the men sheltered themselves from the fire of Rudyerd’s Lighthouse, but especially at low-water mark of spring-tides, there is a hollowing of the rock which penetrates at least to the circumference of the base of the lighthouse. I therefore conclude that when the sea runs high there is danger of this house being _upset_, after a lapse of time, when the sea and shingle have wrought away the rock to a greater extent. Nothing preserves this highly important building but the hardness of the rock and the dip of the strata, but for how long a period this may remain no one can pretend to say.”