52 ON A PIECE OF CHALK 



For it became a matter of immense importance to 

 know, not only the depth of the sea over the whole 

 line along which the cable was to be laid, but the exact 

 nature of the bottom, so as to guard against chances of 

 cutting or fraying the strands of that costly rope. The 

 Admiralty consequently ordered Captain Dayman, 

 an old friend and shipmate of mine, to ascertain the 

 depth over the whole line of the cable, and to bring 

 back specimens of the bottom. In former days, such 

 a command as this might have sounded very much like 

 one of the impossible things which the young prince 

 in the Fairy Tales is ordered to do before he can ob- 

 tain the hand of the Princess. However, in the months 

 of June and July, 1857, my friend performed the task 

 assigned to him with great expedition and precision 

 without, so far as I know, having met with any reward 

 of that kind. The specimens of Atlantic mud which 

 he procured were sent to me to be examined and re- 

 ported upon. 1 



The result of all these operations is, that we know 

 the contours and the nature of the surface-soil covered 

 by the North Atlantic, for a distance of seventeen hun- 

 dred miles from east to west, as well as we know that of 

 any part of the dry land. 



It is a prodigious plain one of the widest and most 

 even plains in the world. If the sea were drained off, 

 you might drive a wagon all the way from Valentia, on 

 the west coast of Ireland, to Trinity Bay, in Newfound- 

 land. And, except upon one sharp incline about two 



1 See Appendix to Captain Dayman's " Deep-sea Soundings in the 

 North Atlantic Ocean, between Ireland and Newfoundland, made in 

 H.M.S. Cyclops. Published by order of the Lords Commissioners of 

 the Admiralty, 1858." They have since formed the subject of an 

 elaborate Memoir by Messrs. Parker and Jones, published in the 

 Philosophical Transactions for 1865. 



