252 



ENGINEERING. 



EUROPE. 



ered with cine homogeneous iron wires alter- 

 nating with as many nianila strands, each wire 

 being- separately taped, and the whole cable 

 sheathed in two of the patent compound tapes ; 

 the other portions are of four kinds, differing 

 in the size and in the number of wires used in 

 the sheathing, according to the depth. They 

 all have their cores protected with the patent 

 covering to keep out insects, and are wrapped 

 in outside tapes. The ends of the different 

 cables are connected with insulated wires laid 

 in pipes filled with water. At Banjoewangie 

 there is a length of 11 miles of these pipes, 

 and at Hong-Kong the pipes are carried over 

 a hill 444 feet high. Some insulator for the 

 core which will stand dry heat better than 

 gutta-percha is greatly desiderated. The most 

 promising substitute is the ozokerit core invent- 

 ed by Henley. The length of the cable is 529 

 nautical miles, the length of the deep-sea sec- 

 tion 327 miles. 



These cables were laid by the Telegraph 

 Construction Company, of England, which has 

 also laid for the Anglo-American Company an 

 Atlantic cable, 2,073 miles in length, between 

 Valentia, Ireland, and Heart's Content, New- 

 foundland, utilizing for 170 miles from Heart's 

 Content, and 94 miles from Valentia, the shore- 

 ends and a portion of the intermediate section 

 of the 1866 cable. The new cable has a core 

 with 300 pounds of copper and 300 pounds 

 of gutta-percha per mile. The deep-sea por- 

 tion has ten No. 13 homogeneous wires, each 

 one covered with Clifford's compound, a new 

 protective, and separately taped, alternating 

 with hemp yarn, the whole being incased in 

 tape. About 190 miles of the cable made for 

 the Brest-St. Pierre line were used in the deep- 

 sea portion ; this has 400 pounds each of cop- 

 per and gutta-percha per nautical mile in its 

 core. At the shore-ends the cable was made 

 with steel wire for short distances, so that it 

 may be grappled and raised without breaking in 

 case it may have to be taken up for repairs. The 

 cable was laid in the month of August, by the 

 steamships Scotia and Seine. This cable is the 

 restoration of that laid in 1866, of which the 

 two shore-ends were utilized. It is called the 

 cable of 1880. The 1866 cable was broken 

 January 13, 1877, and finally abandoned July 

 27. 1878. Its renew.-il has cost about $1.100,- 

 000. The 1865 cable was broken March 11, 

 1873, and abandoned finally February 1, 1878. 

 The third cable laid by this company, in 1873, 

 was broken April 2, 1879, but is still in oper- 

 ation, as well as that laid in 1874, in which no 

 break has occurred. The Anglo-American 

 Company has, consequently, three cables of its 

 own in operation between Ireland and New- 

 foundland, with extensions to Sydney, 300 

 miles. 



The Erlanger cable, which was purchased by 

 the Anglo-American Company from the first 

 French company, was broken in May, 1870, 

 the year after it was first laid, and has been 

 broken and repaired several times since. The 



last time it was repaired was in August, 1879, 

 the break having occurred on the 22d of the 

 preceding February. It was worked until De- 

 cember, 1880, when it broke again. The com- 

 pany then declared their intention of abandon- 

 ing the cable, as it was too rotten to warrant any 

 further attempts to keep it in order. The cable 

 of the Direct United States Company, which 

 was laid in 1874, has twice broken, once near the 

 Torbay end of the main cable, January 4, 1879, 

 and once in the section between Torbay and 

 Rye Beach, in February of the same year. 

 The cable was repaired, and is supposed to be 

 in good condition. The working of the Muir- 

 head system of duplex telegraphy in the Direct 

 United States line has fully doubled the capa- 

 city of the cable. Brown and Allen's relay 

 enables this line to send messages direct from 

 Torbay to New York without transmitting at 

 Rye Beach. 



There are six cables, between 15,000 and 

 16,000 miles in aggregate length, now working 

 between Europe and America. Their total 

 cost has been about $55,000,000. The three 

 cables of the Anglo-American Company have 

 an aggregate length of about 6,450 miles ; the 

 old French cable is 3,329 miles long ; the 

 Direct United States .cable from Ireland to 

 Torbay and Rye Beach is 2,360 miles long; 

 and the new French cables have a total length 

 of 3,461 miles. A project has been mooted 

 of a double cable line, to be built with Ameri- 

 can capital, and used in connection with the 

 United States lines, remaining under the con- 

 trol of one of the American telegraph compa- 

 nies. The projected cable was to extend from 

 Cape Cod to Cape Breton. 



The danger of overhead telegraph-wires in 

 cities, and the occasional stoppages of electric 

 communication by breakage of the wires caused 

 by storms or incrustations of ice, have im- 

 pressed both the public and the directories of the 

 companies with the necessity of soon adopting 

 some method of underground insulation, espe- 

 cially in inhabited places. In England gutta- 

 percha has been used for several years, not with 

 entire success. In Germany there are long lines 

 of subterranean telegraph similar to ocean-ca- 

 bles, arid these have been worked satisfactorily 

 for periods long enough to prove them, though 

 the insulation is less perfect than in overhead 

 wires. The Western Union Company has a 

 cable of 60 wires running under the North 

 River, and one of 80 wires under the streets 

 of New York City, the wires being inclosed in 

 iron pipes of 2| inches aperture. Brooks's 

 underground system has been tried with suc- 

 cess in a section across the St. Louis suspen- 

 sion-bridge, and is also employed for telephone- 

 wires. This cable is made by drawing copper 

 wires, wrapped in cotton or jute, through iron 

 pipes filled with liquid paraffine, every particle 

 of moisture being carefully excluded from the 

 materials, and no air suffered to enter. 



EUROPE. The area of Europe was esti- 

 mated in 1880 at 9,710,340 square kilometres, 





