50 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



globe after dipping it in water, and, as a whole, its gravity so overpowers 

 its coliesion, that if its whole mass was granite it would be as plastic, 

 under the immense forces which act upon it, as air itself, so that the figure 

 it maintain? is an oblate spheroid, with its polar and equatorial diameters 

 differing about thirty miles, to which form its atmosphere and its oceans 

 all maintain as perfectly as its granite, for actual experiment long ago 

 settled the fact that our atmosphere has the same density all over the 

 globe, and the great tidal wave influences the land as well as the oceans 

 to some extent. Such a globe is ours, and a knowledge of that fact must 

 prompt every right soul to obey the first law given to him at the creation 

 of him, to till it, adorn it, "and have dominion over the fish of the sea, 

 and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earths 

 Mark the power here conferred upon the creature whom the Creator made 

 " after his image and after his likeness." 



I love to recall often the duties and powers of man, and the first steps he 

 took here, and his unquestionable destinies. The fact was revealed by 

 Deity — he has thus far led us onward ! and we become day by day more 

 and more deeply indebted for the magnificent privileges he extends to us, and 

 will more and more, if we can conduct ourselves so as to deserve it ! And 

 in one way, we here try, by combining the genius and labor of thousands, 

 to increase all works of utility and beauty — so that ultimately an admired 

 article, so precious that none but the rich can have it, may in the end, be- 

 come common to all. Siich is the aim and end of the American Institute ! 

 and in truth of many modern institutions for the restoration and increase 

 of knowledge, (or as the celebrated Lord Bacon called it,) the instauration 

 of knowledge. 



The ancient fairs, some of which were maintained for several months, 

 and were visited by several millions of people, were places of sale and ex- 

 change as well as view. The managers of this fair have restored that good 

 old practice, so that buyers and sellers can add profit to pleasure in the 

 palace. 



We have learned, and practically, the power of union — for as the united 

 strength of a thousand men lifts vast weights, so that of a thousand minds 

 roll awa}^ the great stones which close the portals of the intellectual world. 

 Some such openings made disclose an apparent miracle ! From what small 

 beginnings we have now witnessed the most wonderful fact which man ever 

 had anything to do with ! We have seen a giant's work in the deep fath- 

 omed line of lightening laid on the bed of the stormy Atlantic ! What a 

 grand line compared with Franklin's first kite line, so timidly let up to a 

 thinider cloud ! And both lines were the results of the working of Ameri- 

 can brains ! Such is the will of God ! to whom be all the glory. 



Early in 1857, the project of-this Ocean telegram was considered by the 

 Mechanics' Club of the American Institute, and for practical purposes it 

 was believed that thousands of cables reqrdred for the use of the world, 

 would be laid in Behring's Straits, latitude 65* to 66'', where Asia and 

 America have bold promontories, only fifty miles apart, with the Diomedes 



