The Sun.
London, England, 1865-08-21 00:00:00

(Hear, hear.) He was not an advocate for sus- toriously an expensive half-year. The cost of one
pense accounts, he disliked them, but he believed item of expense alone had amounted to £13,000 odd.
the one they had just got rid of was absolutely The rise in price of coke and coal for locomotive use
necessary at the time it was created to meet the had caused an increased expenditure of £9,000, and
cost of extra works, and to enable the directors to there was an increased cost of £4,000 for the addi-
pay the shareholders their dividends. They had tional mileage run. The increase in the revenue
continued to reduce its amount, and had now not had arisen notwithstanding an important reduction
only wiped it off, but gave the proprietors the same in first-class fares which was made last year, and
dividend as at the corresponding period of 1864. notwithstanding a very slack trade in the iron dis-
He hoped they would never again require such an trict. The minerals on the whole showed an increase
account, but that they would in each future half- of £11,372. There was a diminution in certain
year be able to pay out of revenue all charges for branches of the mineraltrade, which had been coun-
, the renewal and maintenance of the permanent way. terbalanced by other branches. The receipts of the
Mr. Johnson, their engineer, had not only repaired coal traffic in the half-year would have amounted to
the permanent way, but had likewise relaid a portion £300,000 if it had not been for the falling off in the
of it with 357 tons of steel rails, and 1,833 tons of ironstone traffic and the coal for furnace purposes.
rails of 801 b to the yard, in substitution of rails Many of the leading railway companies had shown
which were only 751 b to the yard, all of which had a diminution of dividend, but this company hadbeen
been charged to revenue. (Hear.) With respect able to show an increase of dividend. At the same
to Mr. Sturrock's department the expenses were time, he would remark that the shareholders must
very heavy, but when they cook into account the not expect a rapid increase of dividend. Thepolicy
great increase in the number of trains run, and the of the company was the safest, and the only policy
extra cost of coke and of various materials, they by which they could calculate on a permanent and
would be convinced that the increase in the expen- steadyimprovement in the valueof their undertaking.
diture could not have been avoided. They had run They had spent large sums of money in self• defence,
308,122 train miles more during the past half-year and so long as the company was prosperous, andthe
than during the same half of 1864, at an additional district progressive, so long would people be anxious
cost of £16,200. They had been obliged to hire en- to get into the district. ' They had made arrange-
gines and waggons to carry on the heavy traffic, merits with some of the leading companies, from
which had involved an expense of £5,741, and like- which they hoped all contests in the future would
wise to incur an additional cost for repairs, in con- be avoided. The whole amount expended on
sequence of having so small a stock of engines. new works since the amalgamation in 1864, was
There had been a diminution in the law and Par- nearly £7,000,000, which involved a serious amount
liamentary expenses, the rates and taxes were about of liability, but the result was highly satisfactory.
the same, but the amount paid for compensation He called their attention to the amount of dividend
was nearly £5,000 less. As to the result of the last paid on £lOO Berwick, York, and Leeds stock, for
session of Parliament, he could not but congratulate the first 5i years of the amalgamation, and the
them with having passed through that ordeal in a amount paid in the second 5i years. On the Ber-
most satisfactory manner. It proved that they wick stock there were paid in the former period £24
did not apply to Parliament for useless and un- 12s. 6d. ; York, £lB 10. ; and Leeds, £6105., mak-
necessary bills ; and that bills promoted by ing a total of £l9 12s. 6d. In the second period
other companies required insertion of clauses the amounts paid were, on the Berwick stock, £2B
to protect the interests of the Great Northern £l3s ; York, £24 12s. 6d. ; Leeds, £l5 11s. 3d.,
Company. He then alluded to the advantages of making a total of £6B 16s. 9d. He would look at
the Leeds, Bradford, and Halifax and the West the matter in another point of view, and that was
Yorkshire amalgamation with the Great Northern the increase of capital. In July, 1854, the gross
Company ; they would in future be worked toge- value of the £lOO stock in each of the above cora-
ther at much less expense than formerly. The ar- panies on the London Stock-Exchange was £l6l,
rangement with respect to the Cheshire lines ad- but in July, 1865, that value was £286, being an
witted the Midland Railway Company to partici- increase of £125. (Applause.) He thought there
pate with the Great Northern and Manchester, were exclusive proofs that though they had been
Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway Companies in laying out a great deal of capital they had not laid
the ownership of those lines, each paying one-third out more than was in proportion to their means.
of the expenditure. in the Acts passed last Session During the next three years important reductions
for amalgamating the Caledonian and Scottish would be made in the fares, and that was a reason
Central, and the North British and Edinburgh and why they should not look for a great increase of
Glasgow Railway Companies they got clauses in- dividend.
serted which would protect the interests of the Great Mr. LEEMAN, M.P„ seconded the motion for the
Northern, and allow them to go northward, as far adoption of the report.
as Perth, by which they expected to secure a fair Some discussion then took place, and Captain
share of the Scotch traffic. The next important Trotter observed that they had reason to be thank-
bill in the last Session, and which considerably ful to the board of directors for the general policy
affected the Great Northern interests, was promoted they had pursued.
jointly by the Great Eastern and Lancashire and The report was adopted, and the dividends re-
Yorkshire Railway Companies for a parallel line to commended by the directors were agreed to.
the Yorkshire coal fields. The Great Northern di- The meeting was then made special, and
rectors used every endeavour to reconcile the Great authority given to subscribe £175,000 towards the
Eastern Board and to induce them to come to a fair construction of the Hawes and Melbcrry Railway,
arrangement before the second reading of the bill, and £lO,OOO towards the construction of the Hex-
but all their efforts were in vain. Finding that to ham and Allendale Railway.
be the case, they determined to oppose the second The meeting then separated.
reading, and were successful in doing so. While
on this point, he must say that he considered both
the public and the press took a very one-sided view
of the matter, and leading articles were written in
which they were spoken of as monopolists ; but the
writer forgot the river and the sea were open to all ;
that the Midland Company went to a coal field;
that the London and North Western Company
went to a coal field ; and that the Great Northern
did the same. They forgot, too, who were the first
parties to open the coal trade of the metropolis.
(Hear.) These circumstances considered, he thought
it was rather hard that they should be called mono-
polists. The Great Northern, however, succeeded in
getting the bill to which he referred thrown out on
the second reading, and that was one of the most
beneficial things which could have happened to in-
duce the Great Eastern directors to come to a fair
arrangement with the Great Northern Company ;
and, accordingly, on leaving the house after the bill
was rejected, he said to some of the Great Eastern
directors whom he met in the lobby that he was as
ready then as he had been 24 hours before they sus-
tained their defeat to enter into an arrangement with
them. (Hear, hear.) He mentioned this to show
that he lost no time in his endeavour to bring about
a peaceful arrangement. He trusted, however, that
they had at last come to an arrangement which was
equitable for all parties, but which could not be kept
unless it was carried out on fair terms. They ontheir
part had consented to open the coal traffic to the
Great Eastern Company, so that he hoped they would
not hear anything more about their being monopo-
lists. The Great Eastern might run their coal
train at the same rates and prices as the Great
Northern, or they might lower them, just as they
pleased. This arrangement was, of course, subject
to the approval of the proprietors.
Colonel DUNCOMBE seconded the motion for the
adoption of the report.
Mr. IluGnEs wished to know if the Great Northern,
like some other companies, had exceeded their bor-
rowing powers, and how much the law expenses had
been reduced.

SOUTH-WESTERN.

The directors of this company are applying Mr.
W. 11. Preece's system of electric signals to the car-
riages generally on their lines, the working for seve-
ral months of experimental trains having given
highly satisfactory results. The following is a copy
of printed instructions which have just been issued
by the company :—" This train is fitted up with an
electric communication between passengers and
guards. In the event of something of a serious
nature occurring, which urgently requires the stop-
page of the train, the passenger may break the
glass,' and ring' by moving the bell-handle in the
direction denoted by the arrow. Thereby a bell
will ring in each guard's van in the train, and also
on the engine. When the guards and engineman
hear the bell ring they will at once look carefully
along each side of the train, and in case any violent
oscillation be seen, or a carriage be on fire, or other
occurrence of a serious character be observed, the
train will he stopped as speedily as possible, and,
when stopped, must be protected by signals as pre-
scribed by the rule book. Should, however, the
guards and engineman fail to observe anything
which really necessitates an immediate stoppage of
the train, their duty will be to stop the train at the
next station or junction, so as to protect the train,
when stopped, by the fixed signals. When the train
is stopped the passenger who broke the glass and
rang the bell will communicate with the guard, but
should he fail to do so, the guard will detect the
compartment from which the passenger gave the
alarm by looking for the broken glass, and in case
the alarm has been mischievously and wantonly
given, or from insufficient cause, the names and
addresses of all the passengers in that compartment
will be taken, in order that the law may be enforced.
Passengers are earnestly requested themselves to
protect the communication from improper and mis-
chievous use, as it is very important that it should
not be used without real and urgent necessity."

Mr. GIESLER thought it would be difficult for them
to maintain their present dividend if they went on
increasing their capital at the present rate.
The CHAIRMAN, in reply to questions, stated that
the company had never exceeded their borrowing
powers, but, on the contrary, had constantly kept
within their borrowing powers. In fact, the direc-
tors would rather go their own bankers and borrow
money, if they wanted it, than deceive the public
by issuing a debenture for a single sixpence be-
yond the company's borrowing powers. (Hear.)
No doubt Mr. Hughes forgot the borrowing pow ers
of the East Lincolnshire which they had assumed.
The reduction in the law and Parliamentary charges
was £B,OOO as compared with the corresponding
half of last year. The whole amount of them was
£15,417. The Great Eastern would be at liberty
to carry coal at whatever price they wished, but the
price must be uniform, so much per mile over the
whole distance from the collieries to London.

TAFF VALE.
The report of the directors states that after placing
the usual sum of £750 to the credit of the deprecia-
tion fund, the directors were enabled to declare a
dividend at the rate of 10 per cent, per annum upon
the ordinary stock and the " C" shares, payable on
the 6th September, leaving a balance of £767. As
the new works occasioned the outlay of additional
capital, the directors considered that the time had
arrived for reissuing the £120,000 preferential stock
paid off in January, 1864. They proposed that it
should be issued as a perpetual preference stock,
bearing interest at 4 per cent. per annum, payable
half-yearly, on the Bth of January and Bth of July.
The Penarth dock was opened on the 10th of June
last. The two leases—one of the railway and har-
bour, and the other of the dock, had been settled
by counsel. The Cowbridge Railway was opened
for goods traffic in February last. The capital ac-
count showed that £1,590,819 had been expended.
The revenue account for the half-year showed that
£145,578 had been received, and £70,702 expended,
leaving a balance of £74,876.

The report was then unanimously adopted, and
the usual preference dividends of various denomina-
tions were declared, and also dividends on the ori-
ginal undivided stock at the rate of £2lss. per cent.
for the half-year ; on the B stock at the rate of £3
per cent. for the half-year, towards 6 per cent. for
the year; on the A stock at the rate of £2 10s. per
cent. for the half-year, and at the rate of 51 per
cent. per annum on the proportion of new ordinary
stock entitled to dividend.
The proceedings terminated with a vote of thanks
to the chairman and directors.

DUBLIN AND BELFAST JUNCTION.
The report of the directors states that the traffic
receipts during the past half-year produced £34,674,
against £33,330 for the corresponding half of 1864,
showing an increase of £1,344. The total income of
the company for the half -year amounted to £35,931,
the working expenses to £14,105, and the total ex-
penditure, including interest on loans and rent, to
£21,213, leaving as profit £14,718, being £2,468
more than for the corresponding half of 1864. The
disposable balance was £17,185, out of which the
directors recommended a dividend at the rate of 3i
per cent. per annum, lessincome tax, leaving £i.899.
During the half-year the directors concluded an
agreement with the Postmaster- General, under which
the company would receive £6,000 per annum for
mail services over the line during a period of five
years from the Ist of June last. The day mails were
now conveyed between Dublin and Belfast in four
hours. The expenditure on capital account was
£1,119,154.

NORTH-EASTERN.
The half-yearly meeting of this company was
held at York on Friday, Mr. H. S. Thompson, the
chairman, presided.
The report was taken as read.
The CHAIRMAN said it had frequently been his
duty to move the adoption of half-yearly reports of
this company, but he never did so with greater
satisfaction than on the present occasion. The
great success of their Parliamentary measures had
been such as to call for some special remarks on his
part. The most important of the measures promoted
by this company was the West Hartlepool amalga-
mation. Ile had before pointed out to them several
strong reasons which made it a most important
measure in giving them the control of the commu-
nication with all the north-eastern ports, so as to en-
able them to follow out that policy they had always
advocated and pursued—viz., to put all the ports
on an equal footing, and they had prevented that
port from being the nucleus
b yh
anotherted
t reaomzsaannyd.
supported
This amalgamation was

merchants iu the district almost unanimously. This
company, during the late session of Parliament, had
almost unexampled success in opposing measures
promoted by other companies which would have af-
fected the interests of the North-Eastern. In 1864
the revenue of the company had increased by more
than £300,000 over that of 1863. They had seen in
the past half-year an increase of £65,000 upon the
very extraordinary increase they had in 1864. This
had been realised in a half-year which had been no-

zation does tend to make man only a little lower
than the angels, and to doubt whether the good in-
tentions of humanitarians, in relaxing the severity
of all punishments, are mistaken in their kindness.
In this case of the officer—Major de Vere—shot, but
happily not killed, we have to notice a crime which,
strange to say, is by no means so uncommon in the
army as would be imagined. This instance is the
third within the last four years of officers shot by
their own men in barracks, and there are many
others that would be found if we were to search the
records of the service for them. The soldier, it must
be remembered, lies under the temptation to use the
weapon in his hand if he meets with provocation,
and he is but too often, according to our system of
recruiting, a man chosen from the ranks of crime, or
at least from that class of society whose moral per-
ceptions are not very clear. We do not, of course,
think of excusing a man for so dastardly an act,
as this at Chatham ; the point is, that we take
men for soldiers from the scum of society, arm
them, and insist upon their keeping their arms
in effective use by having so many rounds of
powder and ball in their pouch, and then expect
them to submit like lambs to a discipline of the
sev:rest kind, which often requires to be enforced
by the most galling and depressing punishments. Is
there no means of obviating a state of things that
evidently conduces so much to these outrages ? It
is notorious that our army is constantly weakened
by the large number of men under punishment.
Surely,instead of seeking for recruits in the slums
and alleys of the large towns, and taking all that
come, it would be better to make some selection
upon the test of character. By this means, although
the number of recruits would be lessened, the num-
ber of men in prison would be decreased also, and
the improved status of the army would be a source
of incalculable advantages. But we leave this rather
large question to speak of the more direct Aource of
these crimes, m the regulation of the service which
orders every man to retain the ball-cartridges he
takes with him when on guard. The military autho-
rities have always resisted all efforts to interfere with
the soldiers' arms. It took many years to convince
them that the bayonet was a highly dangerous orna-
ment for a soldier to wear, and many lives were sac-
rificed to this absurd military prejudice. We are
afraid to say how long it will take to convince the
Horse Guards that the soldiers forming the guard
might, with perfect ease and regularity, take their
ammunition from the magazine, and leave it there on
coming off guard. If this plan were adopted, it
would be difficult for any ammunition to find its
way into the barrack-room, as an officer would be
held responsible for every man's ammunition being
returned. But the real opposition to this very evi-
dent remedy, we believe, comes from the officers
themselves, who positively prefer the chance of be-
ing shot by some ruffian who owes them a grudge
to making themselves safe from such cowardly at-
tacks. It seems to be a point of military feeling,
which the authorities—themselves soldiers—are not
disposed to touch. But we must say that it is for the
Minister of the War Department to deal with this
as a matter of common sense. Considering, how-
ever, the facilities for these crimes which exist, it is
especially incumbent upon all who are in the posi-
tion of officers, and hold the power of punishment
in their hands, to have a full and fair regard for the
men under them. Not that any sort of flinching
from the strictest rules of discipline should be main-
tained with temper and firmness without exceeding
the just limits of reproof and punishment. In this
case the man Currie appears to hare had no greater
grievance than being ordered to continue at his drill
longer than others, because of his incompetence.
The hard and malicious way in which he continues
to speak of his crime without the least sign of regret
is a feature that may perhaps receive some explana-
tion at the trial; in the meantime, the circumstances,
as at present known, seem to offer very little in the
shape of provocation to so base and murderous an
attack. The most important evidence in the case
will come from Major De Vere himself, whose re-
covery is now, we are happy to see, predicted with
some confidence.

life and duty which his inferior predecessors in the
art and science of slaughter only showed us in im-
perfect glimpses and single aspects. Stephen Forward
would be called by the penny papers a psychological
curiosity, and we shall be told, or perhaps have been
told, that his views of duty exhibit " a tangled and
intricate problem in:morals." What we have to say
about him is this—that in one, and that a very seri-
ous, sense his horrid crimes may become a great
benefit to society. There is not the least occasion
for us to summarise or epitomise his disgusting life
and character. It may suffice to say that he is
clearly a person of very considerable powers ; and
that he has made such use of his education that,
had he turned his mind to sensational fiction, he
might have earned a very much better living than
by wasting his talents on billiard-marking and beg-
ging letters. Even now he writes quite as well as
many of the guides of public opinion, and offers as
good a vindication for himself as some of our daily
instructors have offered for his predecessors in
crime. This is the real moral of Forward's cha-
racter. If, as Dr. Forbes Winslow assured us,
Townley was mad, not because he could not dis-
tinguish between right and wrong, but because
his whole moral nature was inverted, so that he
made wrong right and right wrong, this is
precisely Forward's case. Forward only brings
out, enlarges, insists upon, and with scientific
breadth and precision expounds, the philosophy of
his new moral world, and he often argues logically
enough upon it. He admits that he and society are
at issue upon first principles ; but he is right, and
society is wrong. This is intelligible. He is only
a blackleg, and an adulterer, and an extortioner,
and a thief, and a murderer ; but this is his
morality. Evil is, as it was to Milton's Satan, his
good. He has a high and noble soul, a sublime
vocation ; he worships duty, and recognises its
claims ; he is governed by high principles and aims.
His quarrel with society is, that it is not disposed to
give its confidence unreservedly to a man who
deserts his wife and child, and endeavours to extort
money by threats and menacing letters. So, to
show society that it is wrong, and that its whole
moral system is disjointed, he murders his wife and
child and three other children—probably also his
own—almost at a single blow. In " his desperate
extremity"—that is, after he had violated almost
every law, human and divine—he feels himself to
be justified in teaching us all a great moral lesson.
He " obeyed the dictates of his conscience in sharing
his destiny" with another victim of our social laws
—that is, he committed adultery upon the highest
principle and from the purest motives ; and now,
consistently enough, he perpetrates a whole crop of
murders under the inspiration of a high and para-
mount sense of duty to himself and others. " The
imperfect letter of what is right, as represented by
social laws," he has learned to live above. Being
in the spirit, he can dispense with the lettter of such
cold and pedantic formulas as " Thou shalt not
steal," " Thou shalt not commit adultery," " Thou
shalt do no murder ;" and his emancipated nature
revolts against the artificial and cramping restraints
of the barbarous criminal law of England. Now
what we have reason to be grateful for to Forward
is that he is a living fact. We have heard a good
deal of this sort of talk before. Shelley, in his
worst days, had the same kind of quarrel with the
world and social laws. So had Rousseau. So had
the whole crowd of Byron heroes. So have the con-
ventional heroes and heroines of romance, French
and English, of the sensational school. In Forward,
however, we have the advantage of seeing the thing
at work. He is, as the modern phrase has it, the
outcome of these fine fictional theories. What this
person's studies may have been we do not know, but
when we find him observing that " it is not external
circumstances which measure human consciousness
of pain, but individual sensitiveness thereto," we
almost recognise the fine Italian hand of George
Sand, or M. Sue, or the daily preacher who informed
us that Constance Kent was a psychological pheno-
menon. Not only is Mr. Forward not a worse apostle
of a new moral world than some of his literary con-
temporaries, but he is rather better. Anyhow he is
more practical. He applies his philosophy—and it
is really not much worse metaphysics than one meets
with in the Daily Telegraph—to practice. Very
ugly practice it is, to be sure. He murders his wife
and child, who were not only no incumbrance to
him, but were simply respectable, decent, and in-
offensive ; and he does this, so far as we can see,
only because they were respectable, decent, and in-
offensive. And he murders the three other children,
who were neither trouble, expense, nor discredit to
him, but whom he " claimed as his by the strongest
ties"--such strong ties giving the right to murder
them. Townley, too, avowed the same right to do
what he pleased with his own. It is perhaps just as
well that it should at last come to this. Forward,
with his five murders at once, will perhaps bring people
to their senses, for after all, an excellent case might,
on certain familiar grounds of argument, be made
out for this precious villain. There is, in the first
place, that perfect and complete absence of intelli-
gible motive in all his murders which, as we all
know, divests crime of its criminality, and converts
every form of wickedness into mere cerebral malady.
There is, again, what has been laid down to be the
great scientific test of irresponsibility—the wicked
and blasphemous substitution of wrong for right,
which the experts held to be conclusive of Townley's
insanity. There is, in short, an irresistible homi-
cidal mania in its strongest form. Five innocent
persons murdered, and without the slightest reason
for it. If 'Townley was mad, if the Queen's nurse
was mad, if Constance Kent was morally insane, if
Celestina Sumner was not be hung because nobody
could assign a sufficient cause for her crime, how
can anybody pretend that Forward is not mad ?
Whatever arguments could be used—and they have
been successfully used—in favour of each one of
these notorious and atrocious criminals, why are
they not produced in behalf of this poor irrespon-
sible victim of a disordered intelligence and a dis-
torted ethical system--the lunatic Stephen For-
ward ? Why not ? Only because the penny news-
papers and the public opinion of the Peckham
omnibus begin to suspect that this is going rather
too far. But we must hint to the penny newspapers
and to the Peckham omnibus that they must either
make up their minds to give Forward a good word,
and to accept what we have no doubt will be offered
in his defence on the homicidal mania dodge, or else
they must swallow a good deal of the fine talk that
has been talked about that interesting young mur-
deress Constance Kent. We could, upon scientific
grounds, construct an apology for Forward immea-
surably stronger than that which succeeded
in Townley's case. For if Townley was mad be-
cause he was outrageously wicked, and avowed his
wickedness with shameless audacity, then Forward
is ten times more mad, because he is ten times more
wicked, and ten times more outspoken in his impu-
dent assertion of wickedness on principle. Only, as
the Peckham omnibus will probably think this
is really rather too much of a good thing, Forward
is just a trifle too conclusive, too argumentative,
too consistent, and too practical. And so, possibly,
the Peckham omnibus may agree with us that, if
we cannot refute Forward and his superfine talk, it
is perhaps as well that we can hang him ; and per-
haps the Peckham omnibus will go a step further
with us, and will begin to have its doubts whether,
if we had hung some of our recent heroes and
heroines, our Celestinas and Constanccs and Victors,
we might not have been spared our Stephen For-
ward. It comes to this at the last. Severity in
the first instance is mercy in the long run. Peck-
ham cannot sleep in security if homicidal mania is
to talk with impunity as loudly and as long as
Stephen Forward talks, and, which is even more
important, to act as well as talk. The last, and
perhaps the only conclusive, argument with mur-
derers of high religious and moral sentiments is
the latter. It is, we admit, vulgar, barbarous,
coarse, and altogether a painful specimen of what
Mr. Forward so indignantly denounces as " our
present iniquitously defective social justice." The
gallows does not make a discriminating allowance
for those fine natures which, touched by fine issues,
elevate adultery into a duty, robbery into a virtue,
and murder into an act of piety. The Swedish
clergyman and Air. Forward have a view that,
generally speaking, people are better off dead than
alive. It is a theory which has, perhaps, some-
thing to say for itself. At any rate, the Peckham
omnibus does not quite know how to answer it.
But when this theory is worked out by a revolver,
and a little nicotine, and a poisoned Eucharist, the
matter begins to be serious. It may be all very
well to say that the dead are better off than the
living, and that it was our duty to help them on
their journey to the better land, but we somehow
feel that this won't do. We must draw the line
somewhere. Stephen Forward has rather overdone
the thing—has put too fine a point upon it. We
are almost afraid—and it is a serious consideration
for the future interests of the homicidal maniacs
—that he will hardly get' even the boldest of ex-
perts to argue that he is so excessively wicked
that he must be mad, and therefore that we have no
right to hang him.

TIIE " READER" ON TIIE ATLANTIC TELEGRAPH.
The Great Eastern has returned for a rope. But this
is not all ; she has brought with her the most san-
guine hopes of our ultimate success in girdling the
earth, and a record of facts which demolish we know
not how many adverse opinions expressed during
her absence. From the telegraphic report received
while we are going to press, we learn that the Great
Eastern had arrived in lat. 57 deg. 25 min., long.
39 deg. 6 min., on the 3d July, and had paid out
1,212 miles when the cable parted in 3,900 yards
soundings. It will be recollected that when the tele-
graphic communication ceased, the electricians at
Valentia fixed the position of the fault at about 1,230
miles from land. IVe learn, therefore, that the
difference between the calculated and the real
length paid out is only some 20 miles, so exact has
modern science become in its practical details. Even
this difference would have disappeared, and elec-
tricians on land could have foretold within a mile
the position of the fault, had the copper conducting-
wire been equally resisting throughout; but here,
as elsewhere, nature refuses to furnish us with a
perfectly homogeneous. body ; such a wire is, there-
fore, well-nigh an impossibility. The account goes
on to say that " a partial loss of insulation having
been discovered, the Great Eastern was stopped to
recover that portion of the cable in which the fault
lay, electrical tests placing it probably within six
miles. The cable was passed from the stern to the
bow of the ship for this purpose, and after getting
in two miles of cable, the fault being still overboard,
the cable broke about ten yards in board of the
wheel at the bow, having been injured by chafing
on the stern of the ship. Two previous faults had
been discovered—the first in soundings of about
1,000 yards, and the second in about 4,100 yards,
and had been successfully recovered and made good
—in the first case ten miles, and in the second two
and a half miles, of cable were hauled in. After the
cable parted, a grapnel with two and a half nautical
miles of rope was lowered, the ship being placed so
as to drift over the line of cable. The cable was
hooked on the 3d, and when 2,200 yards of the rope
had been hauled in, a swivel in the latter gave
way, and 2,800 yards of rope were lost, the cable
having been lifted 1,200 yards from the bottom.
On the 4th, a buoy, with a flag and ball, was
moored with 500 yards of rope to mark the place.
It is in lat.: 51 deg. 35 min., long. 38 deg. 42
min. 30 sec. From the 4th, fogs and adverse
winds prevented a further attempt until the 7th,
which was then made nearer the end of the cable,
and was unsuccessful from the same cause, when the
cable had been lifted about 1,000 yards. Another
buoy was here placed lat. 51 deg. 28 min. 30 sec.,
long. 38 deg. 56 sec. 9 min. A third attempt was
made on the 10th, which failed on account of the
grapnel chain having fouled the flukes of the grap-
nel. The grapnel and last 800 yards of rope came
lup covered with ooze. A fourth attempt was made
on the 11th at 3 p.m., which also failed throughthe
breaking of the grapnel rope when the cable had been
raised 600 yards from the bottom. The stock of
rope having now become exhausted, it became ab-
solutely necessary to proceed to England for more
and stronger tackle." Thus the biggest ship in the
world has come back to us for a bit of rope. That
the attempt to raise the end of the sunken cable will
prove successful, seeing what has already-been done,
is almost certain ; still the task will be a most diffi-
cult one, even should the cable itself be easily found.
If the main object of the expedition this time prove
a failure, invaluable lessons have yet been learnt,
both as regards the cable itself and the means of
paying it out. The way to the grandest discoveries
has often been paved by the bitterest failures, until
determination and energy, guided by accumulated
experience, have at last brought success. The Great
Eastern has been proved to be fit for her work, her
size gives her a steadiness which no other ship can
emulate. The paying-out machinery is thoroughly
reliable, and the insulation of the gutta percha has
been found to be admirable, greatly improving, in-
deed, when submerged. The fault of the first At-
lantic cable was its bad insulation, but this has proved
itself to be " the best insulated cable ever manufac-
tured." The primary cause of the failure of the cable is
an apparently insignificant oversight, which was re-
vealed beforemany miles had been paid out. The fault
then discovered, and now so disastrous, was caused
by one of the cuttings of the iron wire covering
sticking in the cable and perforating the gutta
percha through to the copper conductor. The cable
was thus tapped, and through the way opened the
current flowed back to Valentia. This serious fault
must be guarded against in the future laying of the
cable,

THE " EXAMINER" ON A NUT FOR FUTURE
ANTIQUARIANS. —ln the year 2500 a question
may arise amongst our posterity travelling ex-
press a hundred miles an hour whether their
remote ancestors had not some modes of loco-
motion by sea and land attaining to an in-
comparably higher rate of speed, in support of which
theory antiquarians may produce fragments of the
Times newspaper, in which these advertisements
have appeared :
" THEATRE ROYAL, MELBOIIHNE.—Under the Manage-
ment of Mr. Barry Sullivan.—Every Evening, ARRAII-NA-
POGUE ; or, the Wicklow Wedding. The scenery painted
after models and sketches by Mr. W. Telbin. The drama
produced under the written directions of the author."
" PRINCE'S THEATRE, MANCHESTER.—Sixth Week of
ARRAII-NA-Poaux. Full every night. This beautiful
drama has been produced regardless of expense in every
department. The scenery by Mr. Grieve and assistants
and Mr. Holding has been allowed to equal in perfection
the cqlebrated miss en scene at the Princess's Theatre,
London.-0. Calvert."
"NIBLO'S GARDEN, NEW YORK.—Fifth Week and un-
precedented success of the great Irish drama, ARRAH-NA-
POGuE ; or, the Wicklow Wedding. Tho whole of the
Scenery has been painted after coloured sketches and *to-
dels by W. Telbin, and the miss en scene is rendered an