In 1838, Charles de Massas presented a project (the first in order of date), which consisted in constructing upon the Eclat reef a semi-lunate dike, and a breakwater at Cape Heve.  Moreover, upon the emergent parts of the Eclat reef and heights of the roadstead he proposed to erect two forts.

[Illustration:  FIG. 2.—­LEWIS’ FLOATING BREAKWATER.]

The defense of the port of Havre is a very important question, and one that appears to be completely abandoned.  Since Engineer Degaulle in 1808 advised the erection of a fort upon the Eclat, and requests have periodically been made and projects drawn.  The requests are forgotten, but the drawings are in the Ministers’ portfolios, and if France should to-morrow have a war with a maritime power our great northern port might be destroyed and burned by the smallest squadron.

Some years after Massas’ project, two officers, Deloffre and Bleve, and an engineer named Renaud, received a commission to search for a means of closing a portion of Seine Bay.  These gentlemen advised the erection of two dikes, one on the Eclat shoal in the very axis of this reef, and the other at Heve.  Between these two masonry dikes was to be placed a floating breakwater.  This project, which was submitted to Admiral de Hell in 1845, had a favorable reception, and the Admiral especially applauded the trial of breakwaters, “which were much talked of in England, although the effects that they might produce were not well known.”  Deloffre, Bleve, and Renauds’ project comprised two forts—­one to the north and the other to the south of the roadstead.  For a long time nothing more was said about it, and it is only during recent years, when the peril has become imminent for Havre (threatened as it is of being abandoned even by the French transatlantics), that the question has again became the order of the day.

[Illustration:  FIG. 3.—­FROIDEVILLE’S FLOATING BREAKWATER.—­END VIEW.]

Mr. Bert, a merchant, would protect the Little Roadstead by means of two jetties, 1,000 and 1,600 meters in length, built, one of them upon the Eclat and the other upon the eminences of the roadstead.  These would be constructed by forming a foundation of loose rocks, and using earth and brick above the level of the water.  Mr. Vial has likewise proposed a rockwork of 2,000 meters in length, to form a dike 10 meters in height and width, whose platform would be on a level with the highest tides.

Next comes the more recent project of Mr. Coulon.  Seeing that it is the deposits of the ocean and not those of the Seine that accumulate upon the estuary, Mr. Coulon advises the construction of a dike about 2,000 meters in length, starting from the Havre jetty, and ending at the southwest extremity of the shoals at the roadstead heights, and a second one returning toward the northwest, of from 500 to 1,000 meters.  A third and very long one of not less than 8 kilometers would be built from Honfleur to the Ratier shoals.