OUT OF SIGHT OF LAND Ixxxv 



speed to us. If the paying-out only works well ! I have just 

 thought of a great improvement in it ; I can't apply it this time 

 however. The sea is of an oily calm, and a perfect fleet of 

 brigs and ships surrounds us, their sails hardly filling in the 

 lazy breeze. The sun sets behind the dim coast of the Isola 

 San Pietro, the coast of Sardinia high and rugged becomes 

 softer and softer in the distance, while to the westward still the 

 isolated rock of Toro springs from the horizon. It would 

 amuse you to see how cool (in head) and jolly everybody is. A 

 testy word now and then shows the wires are strained a little, 

 but everyone laughs and makes his little jokes as if it were all 

 in fun : yet we are all as much in earnest as the most earnest 

 of the earnest bastard German school or demonstrative of 

 Frenchmen. I enjoy it very much. 



'June 12. 



1 5.30 A.M. Out of sight of land : about thirty nautical miles 

 in the hold ; the wind rising a little ; experiments being made 

 for a fault, while the engine slowly revolves to keep us hang- 

 ing at the same spot : depth supposed about a mile. The 

 machinery has behaved admirably. Oh ! that the paying-out 

 were over ! The new machinery there is but rough, meant for 

 an experiment in shallow water, and here we are in a mile of 

 water. 



c 6.30. I have made my calculations and find the new paying- 

 out gear cannot possibly answer at this depth, some portion 

 would give way. Luckily, I have brought the old things with 

 me and am getting them rigged up as fast as may be. Bad 

 news from the cable. Number four has given in some portion 

 of the last ten miles : the fault in number three is still at the 

 bottom of the sea : number two is now the only good wire ; and the 

 hold is getting in such a mess, through keeping bad bits out and 

 cutting for splicing and testing, that there will be great risk in 

 paying out. The cable is somewhat strained in its ascent from 

 one mile below us ; what it will be when we get to two miles is 

 a problem we may have to determine. 



1 9 P.M. A most provoking unsatisfactory day, We have 



