The Story of the Atlantic Telegraph

The reshipping of the cable at Plymouth occupied the whole month of April and part of May. Some changes were made in the mode adopted, it being coiled around large cones. The work was done as before, by a hundred and sixty men detailed for the purpose, of whom one fourth were the workmen of the Company, and the rest sailors who had volunteered for the duty. These were divided into gangs of forty, that relieved each other, by which the work went on day and night. In this way they coiled about thirty miles in the twenty-four hours. Owing to the increased length of cable, and the greater care in coiling, it took a longer time than the year before. The whole was completed about the middle of May. There was then in all, on board the two ships, a little over three thousand statute miles. This included, besides seven hundred miles of new cable, thirty-nine miles of that lost the year before, which had been recovered by the Company, and a few miles of condemned cable from Greenwich, which was put on board for experiments. The shipment being thus complete, and the paying-out machines in position, the ships were ready to make a trial trip, preparatory to their final departure. For this purpose the telegraphic squadron sailed from Plymouth on Saturday, the twenty-ninth of May, and bore southward two or three hundred miles, till the green color of the sea changing to a deep blue, showed that they had reached the great depths of the ocean. They were now in the waters of the Bay of Biscay, where the soundings were over twenty-five hundred fathoms. Here the Niagara and the Agamemnon were connected by a hawser, being about a quarter of a mile apart. The cable was then passed from one to the other, and a series of experiments begun, designed to test both the strength of the cable and the working of the machinery. Two miles of the cable were paid out, when it parted. This would have seemed a bad sign, had it been any other part of the cable than that which was known to be imperfect and had long since been condemned. The next day three miles were paid out. This, too, was broken, but only when they tried to haul it in, and under a pressure of several tons.