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Updated: June 20, 2025
Beyond the sea-marshes a curious archipelago lies. If you travel by steamer to the sea-islands to-day, you are tolerably certain to enter the Gulf by Grande Pass skirting Grande Terre, the most familiar island of all, not so much because of its proximity as because of its great crumbling fort and its graceful pharos: the stationary White-Light of Barataria.
There was no longer a contest between poverty and pride, between the maintenance or destruction of his ancient house, between his old engagement and his present passion; that was past. Henrietta Temple was the light in the pharos amid all his stormy fortunes; thither he directed all the energies of his being; and to gain that port, or sink, was his unflinching resolution.
The other towns are Cittavecchia, Verbosca, and Gelsa. The first is the new Pharos, founded at the end of the third century B.C., and flourishing during the Roman period. It lies at the bottom of an inlet six miles long, and is a nourishing modern town with little antiquity visible.
The island of Pharos lies just off the coast of Egypt. There I remained until the daughter of the Ancient Sea King, seeing my distress, came to my rescue. "My men and I had wandered over the island in search of food until we were nearly starved, when she discovered us, and told us that our efforts would be useless unless we consulted with her father.
Among the structures raised by him were the lighthouse of vast height on the island of Pharos, which was connected with the shore by a mole, or causeway, a mile in length; the Soma, or mausoleum, containing the body of Alexander; the Temple of Serapis, completed by his son; and the Hippodrome. In this last province he did a greater work than his father. He greatly enlarged the library.
Following a path that leads along the ancient mole one reaches a quadrangular tower of Roman masonry with a stone conical roof, which goes by the name of the Lantern of Augustus, and is supposed to have served as lighthouse at the entrance of the harbour, but the height is too insignificant for this purpose, it is not over thirty-five feet, and there is no indication of any contrivance whereby it could have been utilised for the purpose of a pharos.
Behind the Acropolis the Mappalian road, which was lined with tombs, extended through red lands in a straight line from the shore to the catacombs; then spacious dwellings occurred at intervals in the gardens, and this third quarter, Megara, which was the new town, reached as far as the edge of the cliff, where rose a giant pharos that blazed forth every night.
The next boat, called the Mason, was generally steered by the writer; while the floating light's boat, Pharos, was under the management of the boatswain of that ship. Having now so considerable a party of workmen and sailors on the rock, it may be proper here to notice how their labours were directed.
And when he had measured and staked out the ground with the advice of the best architects, he chanced one night in his sleep to see a wonderful vision; a gray-headed old man, of a venerable aspect, appeared to stand by him, and pronounce these verses: An island lies, where loud the billows roar, Pharos they call it, on the Egyptian shore.
From such shadowy accounts as I have collected, the edifice would seem to have consisted but of a single tower or donjon-keep very strong and thick, and defying the lashings of the waves, almost as though it were some Pharos or other guide to mariners. It was surrounded by a low stone wall of prodigious weight of masonry, and was approached from the mainland by a drawbridge and barbican.
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