The Story of the Atlantic Telegraph

As the island of Newfoundland is to stand in the foreground of our story, we observe on the map its salient geographical position. It holds the same relation to America that Ireland does to Europe. Stretching far out into the Atlantic, it is the vanguard of the western continent, or rather the signal-tower from which the New World may speak to the Old. And yet, though large as England, and so near our coast, few Americans ever see it, as it lies out of the track of European commerce. Our ships, though they skirt the Banks of Newfoundland, pass to the south, and get but occasional glimpses of the headlands. Even what is seen gives the country rather an ill reputation. It has a rockbound coast, around which hang perpetual fogs and mists, through which great icebergs drift slowly down, like huge phantoms of the deep, gliding away to be dissolved by the warm breath of the Gulf Stream: dangers that warn the voyager away from such a sea and shore. Sailing west from Cape Race, and making the circuit of the island as far as the Straits of Belle Isle, one is often reminded of the most northern peninsula of Europe. The rocky shores are indented with numerous bays, reaching far up into the land, like the fiords along the coast of Norway; while the large herds of Caribou deer, that are seen feeding on the hills, might easily be mistaken for the flocks of reindeer that browse on the pastures and drink of the mountain torrents of ancient Scandinavia.