It is strongly fortified, and there are a lighthouse, and lifeboat and pilot stations.
The low and dangerous coasts, off which the seas are generally very shallow, are efficiently served by a series of lifeboat stations.
Neuwerk, containing some marshland protected by dikes, has two lighthouses and a lifeboat station.
In 1885 a serious disaster befell the islanders, a lifeboat which went to take provisions to a ship in the offing was lost with all hands - fifteen men - and only four adult males were left on the island.
Among his most important canvases must be reckoned "The Pilot Cutter" in 1866, "The Salmon Poachers" in 1869, "The Lifeboat" in 1876, "Highland Pastures" in 1878, "The Beached Margent of the Sea" in 1880, "The Newhaven Packet" (bought by the Birmingham Corporation), and "Catspaws off the Land" (bought by the Chantrey Fund trustees); in 1885, "Mount's Bay" (bought by the Manchester Corporation) in 1886, "Nearing the Needles" in 1888, "Machrihanish Bay, Cantyre," in 1892, "Hove-to for a Pilot" in 1893, and "Glen Orchy," a landscape, in 1895.
