ength of the line. Therefore, the wires must be
encased or insulated in some material that will not admit water and is
not itself a conductor. Gutta-percha meets these needs, and the hemp
and galvanized wire are added for the strength and protection they
afford to the whole.

It was an American who first thought of laying such an electric cable
as this under the turbulent Atlantic. Some foolish people laughed at
the idea and declared it to be impracticable. How could a slender cord,
two thousand miles long, be lowered from an unsteady vessel to the
bottom of the ocean without break? It would part under the strain put
upon it, and it would be attacked by marine monsters, twisted and
broken by the currents. At one point the bed of the sea suddenly sinks
from a depth of two hundred and ten fathoms to a depth of two thousand
and fifty fathoms. Here the strain on the cable as it passed over the
ship's stern would be so great that it certainly must break. More than
this, the slightest flaw--a hole smaller than a pin's head--in the
gutta-percha insulator would spoil the entire work, and no remedy would
be possible. A great many people spoke in this way when the Atlantic
cable was first thought of, as others, years before, had spoken of Watt
and Stephenson. But Watt invented the steam-engine, Stephenson invented
the locomotive, and Cyrus Field bound Great Britain to the United
States by telegraph.

Early in 1854, Mr. Field's attention was drawn to the scheme for a
telegraph between Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, in connection with a
line of fast steamships from Ireland to call at St. John's,
Newfoundland. The idea struck him that if a line were laid to Ireland,
lasting benefit would result to the world. So he called together some
of his intimate friends, including Peter Cooper, Moses Taylor, Chandler
White, and Marshall O. Roberts, and they joined him in organizing the
"New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company," which was the
pioneer in the movement to connect the two continents by a telegraph
cable, and without whose aid its consummation would have been
indefinitely delayed.

The work was costly and difficult. The first part consisted in
surveying the bottom of the sea for a route. This was done by taking
"soundings" and "dredgings." As some of you are aware, "sounding" is
an operation for ascertaining the depth of the sea, while "dredging"
reveals what plants and living creatures are at the bottom. After much
p