SUBMARINE CABLES. 



June, 1S54, after being nearly two years submerged. This proved 

 a most arduous undertaking. The depth of the water in this part 

 of the Irish channel is 150 fathoms, or 900 feet, and from this 

 depth the cable was dragged by means of a powerful apparatus 

 worked by a steam engine placed on the deck of a steamer. The 

 operation occupied four days, for from the great force of the tide, 

 which runs at the rate of 6 miles an hour, it was found impossible 

 to work except at the times of high and low water. The cable 

 was also imbedded in sand, so that the strain required to drag it 

 up was occasionally very great. 



The recovery of this cable has so far solved the question of the 

 durability of submarine telegraphs. It was found nearly as sound 

 as when laid down. There was a slight corrosion in certain parts 

 which appeared to have been imbedded in decaying sea weed the 

 parts imbedded in sand were quite sound, and on other parts, 

 which appeared to have rested on a hard bottom, there were a few 

 zoophytes. The cable on being tested was found as perfect in 

 insulation as when laid down. 



84. The next great enterprise of this kind, of which the accom- 

 plishment must render for ever memorable the age we have the 

 good fortune to live in, was the deposition in the bed of the 

 Channel of a like cable connecting the coasts of England and 

 Belgium, measuring SEVENTY MILES ix OXE TXBEOZEX LEXGTH I 

 This colossal rope of metal and gutta-percha was also constructed 

 at the works of Messrs. Xewall and Co. 



The probable extension of these extraordinary media of social, 

 commercial, and political communication between countries 

 separated by arms of the sea, may be conceived, when it is stated 

 that during the winter of 1852-53 Messrs. Xewall and Co. exe- 

 cuted under contracts not less than 450 miles of such cable. 



The cable laid between Dover and Calais includes, as already 

 stated, four conducting wires. That between Dover and Ostend 

 contains six wires insulated by the double covering of gutta- 

 percha, manufactured, under Mr. S. Statham's directions, by the 

 Gutta Percha Company. The gutta-percha laid into a rope is 

 served with prepared spun-yarn, and covered with twelve thick 

 iron wires, of a united strength equal to a strain of 40 to 50 tons 

 more than the proof strain of the chain cable of a first rate 

 man-of-war. 



" A side view and section of this cable in its natural size are 

 given in figs. 31 and 32 (page 158). 



The Belgian cable weighed 7 tons per mile, so that its total 

 weight was about 500 tons. Its cost was 33,000/. It took 100 

 days to make it, and 70 hours to coil it into the vessel from which 

 it was let down into the sea, and 18 hours to submerge it. 



157 



