46 Original Articles. { Jan. 
59, and 14. Since these results have been made known, the wire is 
always contracted for of a certain specified conducting value per mile. 
Much has been said about the deterioration of gutta-percha when 
exposed to the air, and the great difficulty of avoiding flaws in laying 
it on the wire; these evils are however greatly magnified. The rot- 
ting will not proceed under water, and even in air it may be prevented 
by a coat of Stockholm tar, whilst the small and unavoidable flaws are 
perfectly guarded against by applying several successive coatings to 
the wire. Other complaints brought against gutta-percha, are that 
it does not insulate very perfectly when warm, and also that it 
is liable to soften. These are reasons against unnecessary exposure 
of the cable to heat before its submergence, but are of no consequence 
when once it is laid. At the bottom of the ocean everything is in 
favour of its permanence. The surrounding sheath of tar tightly held 
in iron wires, the low temperature of the water, the preservative pro- 
perties of the sea, the absence of light and air, and the enormous 
pressure to which it is subjected, are all elements tending to improve 
the lasting and insulating properties of gutta-percha. 
Many of the most important facts above referred to have been 
ascertained since the Atlantic Cable was manufactured, but they 
ought to have preceded instead of succeeded so important an under- 
taking. This could have been done easily by an expenditure, 
trifling when compared with the amount at stake, and it would have 
supplied the Company with knowledge which has been purchased at 
three quarters of a million sterling. There was far too much haste in 
the preliminary stages of the undertaking. It was looked upon 
merely as a commercial speculation, and in order to raise the requisite 
funds, promises to the shareholders were most rashly made. Whilst 
the Company was only formed in 1856, the line was undertaken to be 
laid in 1857, and in order to keep faith with the public, the prelimi- 
nary experiments and investigations, which ought to have occupied 
the highest available talent for some years, were hurried over in the 
most reckless manner, or were left to be completed by chance. In- 
deed, the most important piece of machinery in the whole affair, that 
for paying out the cable,—an apparatus which would have to run as 
smoothly as a cotton mill for every minute of the time occupied in 
that operation, the slightest hitch or irregularity snapping the cable, 
—was literally being put together for the first time as the ship was 
sailing to its destination, and was entrusted, untried, with its precious 
charge. The result may be anticipated. A stoppage in the machinery 
occurred, and 835 miles of cable were sacrificed at the shrine of 
official incompetence. 
Another great mistake was to have such a rope made of any but 
the very strongest materials. It was intended at first that the outer 
covering should be of steel wire, but this could not be adopted owing to 
the unfortunate promise made by the directors that it should be laid in 
1857. Had another year been permitted to elapse, and, instead of 
iron coating, had steel been employed, there is every probability that 
the cable would have been at work at the present day. Instead of 
a breaking strain of three tons it would have borne uninjured a pull 
