d Jeff, who was of a more amiable spirit than Stumps,
"here's more o' the same sort." He took another piece of cheese from a
shelf as he spoke, and gave it to Robin.

"Now, my young toolip," said Slagg, "havin' finished your feed, p'r'aps
you'd like to see over the big ship."

With great delight Robin said that he should like nothing better, and,
being led forth, was soon lost a second time in wonderment.

Of what use was it that Slagg told him the Great Eastern was 692 feet
long by 83 feet broad, and 70 feet deep? If he had said yards instead
of feet it would have been equally instructive to Robin in his then
mentally lost condition. Neither was it of the slightest use to be told
that the weight of the big ship's cargo, including cable, tanks, and
coals, was 21,000 tons.

But reason began to glimmer again when Slagg told him that the two
largest vessels afloat could not contain, in a convenient position for
passing out, the 2700 miles then coiled in the three tanks of the Great
Eastern.

"This is the main tank," said Slagg, leading his friend to a small
platform that hung over a black and apparently unfathomable gulf.

"I see nothing at all," said Robin, stretching his head cautiously
forward and gazing down into darkness profound, while he held on tight
to a rail. "How curious!--when I look down everything in this wonderful
ship seems to have no bottom, and when I look up, nothing appears to
have any top, while, if I look backward or forward things seem to have
no end! Ah! I see something now. Coming in from the light prevented
me at first. Why, it's like a huge circus!"

"Yes, it on'y wants hosses an' clowns to make it all complete," said
Slagg. "Now, that tank is 58 feet 6 inches in diameter, and 20 feet 6
inches deep, an' holds close upon 900 miles of cable. There are two
other tanks not much smaller, all choke-full. An' the queer thing is,
that they can telegraph through all its length _now_, at this moment as
it lies there,--an' they are doing so continually to make sure that
all's right."

"Oh! I understand _that_," said Robin quickly; "I have read all about
the laying of the first cable in 1858. It is the _appearance_ of things
in this great ship that confounds me."

"Come along then, and I'll confound you a little more," said Slagg.

He accordingly led his friend from one part of the ship to another,
explaining and commenting as he went, and certainly Robin's wonder did
not decrease.