three o'clock
Here the cliffs are , I should say , seventy feet high , broken by frequent slips in the upper stratum of clay , and , as I proceeded , climbing always , I encountered some rather formidable gullies in the chalk , down and then up which I had to scramble , till I came to a great mound or barrier , stretching right across the great promontory , and backed by a natural ravine , this , no doubt , having been raised as a rampart by some of those old invading pirate-peoples , who had their hot life-scuffle , and are done now , like the rest . Going on , I came to a bay in the cliff , with a great number of boats lodged on the slopes , some quite high , though the declivities are steep ; toward the inner slopes is a lime-kiln which I explored , but found no one there . When I came out on the other side , I saw the village , with an old tower at one end , on a bare stretch of land ; and thence , after an hour 's rest in the kitchen of a little inn , went out to the coast-guard station , and the lighthouse . Looking across the sea eastward , the light-keepers here must have seen that thick cloud of convolving browns and purples , perhaps mixed with small tongues of fire , slowly walking the water , its roof in the clouds , upon them : for this headland is in precisely the same longitude as London ; and , reckoning from the hour when , as recorded in the _ Times _ , the cloud was seen from Dover over Calais , London and Flambro ' must have been overtaken soon after three o'clock on the Sunday afternoon , the 25th July . At sight in open daylight of a doom so gloomy -- prophesied , but perhaps hoped against to the last , and now come -- the light-keepers must have fled howling , supposing them to have so long remained faithful to duty : for here was no one , and in the village very few . In this lighthouse , which is a circular white tower , eighty feet high , on the edge of the cliff , is a book for visitors to sign their names : and I will write something down here in black and white : for the secret is between God only , and me : After reading a few of the names , I took my pencil , and I wrote my name there . * * * * * The reef before the Head stretches out a quarter of a mile , looking bold in the dead low-water that then was , and showing to what extent the sea has pushed back this coast , three wrecks impaled on them , and a big steamer quite near , waiting for the first movements of the already strewn sea to perish .