102 THE SEA. 



off the wheels, an accident due to the insufficient width and depth of the sheaves and to 

 the fact that they were filled with tar, which hardened in the air. This defect was 

 remedied in later expeditions. Still it worked well, and as long as the terrible brakes 

 withheld their iron grasp might work through to the end. On the following day 

 Sunday, the course o affairs was not less smooth ; and on Monday the expedition was 

 upwards of 200 miles from land. The shallow water of the coast had been safely 

 traversed. The ships had passed over the submarine declivity which has been already 

 described, and had reached the deeper waters of the Atlantic, where the cable sank to 

 a depth of not less than 2,000 fathoms. Still the iron cord buried itself in the 

 profound silence, and every instant the flash of light in the telegraph room recorded the 

 continuous passage of the mysterious electric current. About four o'clock on Tuesday 

 morning, however, a sudden interruption occurred. It seems from the published narrative 

 that the cable was running cut fully at the rate of six miles an hour, while the ship was 

 making only four. To check this waste, the engineer applied the brakes very firmly, 

 with the effect of stopping the machine. Hence a heavy strain told on the submerged 

 portion of the cable. The stern of the ship was down in the trough of the sea, and 

 as it rose upward on the swell the pressure became too great, and the cable parted. 

 Instantly a cry of grief and dismay ran through the ship. She was checked in her onward 

 career, and in five minutes all gathered on deck with feelings which can be better imagined than 

 described. One who was present wrote : e< The unbidden tear started to many a manly eye. 

 The interest taken in the enterprise by all every one, officers and men exceeded anything 

 I ever saw, and there is no wonder that there should have been so much emotion at 

 our failure." Captain Hudson says : " It made all hands of us through the day like 

 a household or family which had lost their dearest friend, for officers and men had 

 been deeply interested in the success of the enterprise/' The cable broke in 2,000 

 fathoms water, when about 330 nautical miles were laid, at a distance of 280 miles 

 from Valentia. This was the first of a series of disappointments, ending, however, in 

 /eventual triumph. 



The same vessels sailed again in June of the next year, and as arranged before starting, 

 reached a point of junction in mid-stream, where the ends of the two cables were 

 spliced, and the ships parted, the Agamemnon steering for Valentia, and the Niagara 

 for Trinity Bay, Newfoundland. Both vessels arrived at their ports of destination on 

 August 5th, and the fact of the completion of the enterprise was for the first time "cabled" 

 under the wide Atlantic two days later, to the great rejoicing, it may fairly be said, of 

 two worlds. Congratulatory messages were flashed from either end, and success seemed 

 secured. Alas ! less than a month later all communication ceased ; the electric current 

 would not pass through the great wire-rope; there was a leakage somewhere. But it 

 had been shown conclusively that messages could be transmitted under the given conditions. 

 'This was something. 



Passing over all the financial arrangements connected with a new attempt, which 

 was not made till 1365, we find Brunei's prediction fulfilled. The largest ship in the 

 world was chartered to lay another cable. 



The work of stowing away "the cable on board the Great Eastern, where it was coiled up 



