THE SIMPLE IDEA OF AN ATLANTIC CABLE 31 
ers stopped the funds and he was arrested and prosecuted for 
the company’s debts. 
Discouraged, Gisborne came to New York to raise more 
funds in January, 1854, and stopped at the opulent Astor 
House despite his shortage of cash. Matthew Field, who had 
employed Cyrus in the paper business and who knew Gis- 
borne, asked his capitalist brother to have a talk with the in- 
genious Englishman. There were several conferences about 
the project and its possibilities. Matthew, as an engineer, had 
built railroads and bridges in the West and South; he was a 
practical man. 
After one of these evening conferences, Cyrus, who at first 
had been indifferent and skeptical, was studying the large 
globe in his library. The thought occurred to him that if a 
short ocean cable was feasible, why could not a long one be 
laid between Newfoundland and Ireland. Next morning he 
wrote about this to Professor Samuel F. B. Morse at Pough- 
keepsie and to Matthew F. Maury, head of the National Ob- 
servatory at Washington. He also consulted with his brother 
David and another neighbor, Peter Cooper, the venerable 
philanthropist. 
Morse, then in his sixties, had suggested an Atlantic cable 
several years before. He now called on Field, the two became 
good friends, and Morse assisted the enterprise as electrician. 
The reply of Lieutenant Maury was still more to the point. 
Strangely enough, he had just written a long letter on the 
identical subject to the Secretary of the Navy, and he en- 
closed a copy of this, dated February 22, 1854, in his reply 
to Field. 
This interesting letter reported that a United States brig 
had taken soundings during the previous summer between 
‘Newfoundland and Ireland. Fortunately the ocean bed had 
been found to be of moderate depth and comparatively 
smooth. This insured quiet water necessary for a telegraph 
cable. The specimens of the sea bottom brought up by the 
