als, was admitted.

Here he saw the important and delicate core again carefully tested as to
its electrical condition, after which it received a new jacket of tanned
jute yarn to protect it from the iron top coat yet to come. Its jute
jacket on, it was then coiled away in tanks full of water, where it was
constantly kept submerged and continuously tested for insulation. Last
of all the top coat was put on. This consisted of ten wires of
peculiarly fine and strong iron. Each of these ten wires had put on it
a special coat of its own, made of tarred Manilla yarn, to protect it
from rust as well as to lighten its specific gravity. The core being
brought from its tank, and passed round several sheaves, which carried
it below the factory floor, was drawn up through a hole in the centre of
a circular table, around the circumference of which were ten drums of
the Manilla-covered wire. A stout iron rod, fastened to the
circumference of the table, rose from between each drum to the ceiling,
converging in a cone which passed through to the floor above. Our core
rose in the middle of all, and went through the hollow of the cone.
When all was put in noisy and bewildering motion, the core which rose
from the turning-table and whirling drums as a thin jute-clad line, came
out in the floor above a stout iron-clad cable, with a Manilla
top-dressing, possessing strength sufficient to bear eleven miles of its
own length perpendicularly suspended in water--or a margin of strength
more than four and a half times that required,--and with a breaking
strain of seven tons fifteen hundredweight.

When thoroughly charged and primed, Robin went off home to write his
treatise.

Then he received the expected summons to repair on board the Great
Eastern, and bade adieu to his early home.

It was of no use that Robin tried to say good-bye in a facetious way,
and told Madge and his mother not to cry, saying that he was only going
across the Atlantic, a mere fish-pond, and that he would be home again
in a month or two. Ah! these little efforts at deception never avail.
Himself broke down while urging Madge to behave herself, and when his
mother gave him a small Bible, and said she required no promise, for she
_knew_ he would treasure and read it, he was obliged hastily to give her
a last fervent hug, and rush from the house without saying good-bye at
all.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

THE BIG SHIP--FIRST NIGHT ABOARD.

When our hero at last rea