The Sun.
London, England, 1866-07-17 00:00:00

ATLANTIC TELEGRAPH EXPEDITION.

(From the Times Special Correspondent)

VALENTIA, Friday Night, July 13.
This day, just before noon, the Great Eastern
picked up the shore end off this island, and in less
than three hours made a perfect splice with the main
cable, and amid the hearty good wishes of all, went
steaming across the Atlantic to America, paying out
the wire as she went. This evening she was about
80 miles from laud submerging the rope at the rate
of about six knots an hour, and conversing by sig-
nals with the shore through the whole length of
2,370 miles of wire, all the signals coming with a
force and distinctness such as have never yet been
found with any submarine wire. So clear and rapid
are all the messages that, even despite the paying
out work going on, it is perfectly easy now to hold
the most gossipy sort of conversation on all kinds of
subjects with any of the engineers on board the
Great Eastern. This has never been done before,
and probably could not easily be done now but for
the improved instruments invented by Professor
Thomson, Mr. Varley, and Mr. Willoughby Smith.
These, however, are all acting with the most uner-
ring precision, and every one is sanguine of a suc-
cessful result to this last great attempt. Beyond
actually recording the fact there is not a great deal
to say about the splice-making. Everything went
so smoothly and gas such a perfect matter of busi-
ness routine that there was an utter lack of incident.
It was meant, if possible, to make the splice the day
before this, for there was a half-concealed repug-
nance among many about commencing the work on
Friday. It need scarcely be said, however, that
there was no feeling of this kind among the en-
gineers and electricians, most of whom had been
engaged in former efforts, and all of whom remem-
bered that when the cable was successfully laid
in 1858 it was on Friday that the work of sinking
in mid-ocean was begun. The Great Eastern left
Berehaven on the evening of Thursday, the 12th.
A small fleet of ships had previously assembled there.
In addition to six fine colliers there were her Ma-
jesty's ship Terrible, with the Albany, Medway, and
William Corry, and to these on the morning of
Thursday was added her Majesty's ship Racoon,
which, through the kind hospitality of Capt. Armi-
tage and his officers, took out a large party of visi-
tors to see the squadron start, and be present at the
making of the splice. Under these special circum-
stances, therefore, Berehaven wore a most festive
aspect, and with the constant visiting of boats from
ship to ship the harbour teemed with life and activity
from morn till dark. The general sailing of the
squadron, however, did not come off as was expected.
For many reasons it was deemed advisable that all
the vessels should not leave together, so the Terrible,
the Medway, and the Albany were started early
yesterday morning, and aftersome hours unpleasant
groping through a dense fog, during which all the
ships came perilously near the rocks off the Skelligs,
they at last found their way to the entrance of
Valentia harbour last evening, and taking their bear-
ings, stood out again, to remain at the buoy at the
shore eud till morning. Tne Great Eastern, with
the Racoon, quitted Berehaven just before dusk,
leaving the magnificent bay destitute of a single
ship out of the squadron which had so lately
filled its waters with life and animation. Im-
mediately outside the haven both ships were
at once enveloped in one of those dense, white
Atlantic fogs which make navigation on the coast of
Ireland almost as difficult and dangerous in summer
as in winter. Not a thing could be seen ahead.
Even the Great Eastern herself, to which the Racoon
kept close, gradually became dimmer and dimmer in
the watery haze, like the shadow of a vessel as
vague and unsubstantial looking as the Flying
Dutchman. Soon even this faint visionary outline
was lost as a great sweep of fogbank poured over
her and enveloped also the Racoon so closely that
even from her own deck her spars were lost to view.
It was not by any means a pleasant situation on
such a coast and such a cruise, especially with a
gigantic neighbour close at hand like the Great
Eastern ; the slightest touch from each would at
once have put her Majesty's ship Racoon under
some 50 fathoms water. The speed of both ships,
therefore, was slowed to as low a rate of motion as
would keep steerage way upon them through the
swell which came lumbering sluggishly along in tire-

some monotony. Fog horns were also set going
from both ships, and their dismal clamour made the
night seem doubly long. It was alsolutely neces-
sary, however, to keep them going, for at all risks
an accidental encounter with the great ship was to
be avoided, even if the Racoon had to heave to and
remain where she was till daylight. Fortunately, the
fog-signals from the Great Eastern were so distinct

that there was no necessity for this, and at slow
speed the Racoon was able to keep her place about
half a mile astern of her huge consort. A very wide
berth was given to the shore, and of course a very
wide one indeed to the Skelligs. The ships were off
the latter soon after daylight, and before 6 a.m. the
Terrible, Medway, and Albany were sighted, keep-
ing their dreary vigil through the mist and rain
round where they thought the buoy at the shore end
was. This, as we have said, was about 30 miles to
sea, and was quite out of sight of land. There were
two buoys—one a very large one, equal to a weight
of seven tons. It was moored by what is called a
mushroom grapnel, which was attached to the buoy
itself by 120 fathoms of stout chain. This was
only placed a little cast, or nearer land than that
which upheld the end of the cable itself, for if
the buoy holding the actual end of the wire
pitched about much in rough weather the cable
is very certain to fray through its fastenings or
break off, and in either case, it, of course, sinks im-
mediately, and, no particular bearings being taken,
is often difficult to find. For this reason a mooring
buoy is always placed inside the supporting buoy
and exactly over the cable, so that if the ropebreaks
loose its place is known at a glance, and can be
raised in such shallow water in 10 or 20 minutes.
The second and outer buoy which held the wire was
of nearly the same size as the mooring one, and to
this, by powerful slip ropes, the cable was securely
held with about a quarter of a mile of its end length
hanging down in water. To landsmen it may ap-
pear a very simple task to find these conspicuous
beacons floating at a given place in the sea. Yet, in
reality, the work is one of no ordinary difficulty and
delay. The swell so frequently conceals them that',
a ship may actually be within half a mile of them
without making them out ; and, with no bearings
to guide them, a continued succession of short tacks
across the place where they are supposed to be is
often necessary for hours and hours before they are
discovered. This was actually the case with the
buoys of the cable picked up this morning. As soon
as the first gleam of daylight shone, the Terrible,
Albany, and Medway all went in search of them,
in the confident expectation of an immediate find ;
yet, after two hours close search, they got no trace
of them, and even when the Great Eastern hove in
sight were obliged to sbi(,nal" Buoys not yet found."
_ _ -

Within ten minutes after this they lighted upon
both of them, and the great ship was at once sig-
nalled to come up. As she did so, all the accom-
panying vessels of the squadron gave her a wide
berth, for as on her lay the duty of grappling for
and lifting the table buoy, her movements were
likely to be both quick and uncertain. This, in fact,
proved to be the case. Several times she steamed
down with her grappling iron and ropes astern just
over the line of the buoy, and it seemed impossible
to Those not on board of her that she could have
missed it. Miss it, however, she did so repeatedly
that it was after 10 o'clock before a great strain was
seen to come upon her grappling ropes, and the buoy
itself began to follow slowly, dodging and dipping
about in the foain of her track. Directly this was
noticed her paddh7s were reversed, and the great
ship was brought to a standstill, and after a deal of
shouting and directions the end of the wire was safely
noosed and brought on board the vessel, and so on
through the hauling in machine. When this was
perfectly secure, and a tight grip had of it, the fas-

tenings to the buoy were cut away, and the huge,
red monster rose more than half its length above
the waves, and went tossing about at random. No-
body, however, troubled himself about this, for
buoys, though costly, are as nothing when compared
with submarine cables, and it was wished to make
the splice at once. This was rather a long operation,
and though done with every speed consistent with
safety occupied nearly four hours before it was com-
pleted. Before it was begun the shore end was put
in connection with the batteries on board, and a
message at once despatched to Mr. Glass at the tele-
graph house. At the latter place Mr. Glass, with
Mr. Varley and all the staff, had been waiting since
dawn for the first signal that the shore end was found.
The marine galvanometer had been watched with
impatient eyes for the long-expected signals; but it
was mute and gave. no sign till at about '2O minutes
past 11, when its stationary light began to move in
strong, rapid signals of dash and dot from right to
left, which were read as they came with ease, and the
message was, " Got the shore end—going to make
the splice—everything is right." To this Mr. Glass
replied with a few words of congratulation, and for
a little time a rapid conversation was kept up be-
tween the house and the ship at sea, and then sud-
denly the light stood still and mute, for the work of
making the splice had begun. This, with a cable of
such length and importance as the Atlantic Tele-
graph, is a labour which involves the utmost scien-

tific and mechanical skill, for a faulty joint might
delay the working of the wire for weeks. How it
was made on board the Great Eastern may, how-
ever, be very simply told. The end of the cable,
stowed in the aftermost tank, was brought out, and
about six fathoms' length of its wire and hemp cover-
ing untwisted, and while this was being done the
same operation was going on and to the same ex-
tent with the shore end which was picked up from
the buoy. In this manner the gutta-percha insu-
lator was quite laid bare, and the gutta-percha itself
was cut away for a considerable length of both por-
tions. The strand of copper conductors was next
unwound from each end, and the two joined together
by close plaiting. Every copper wire plaited toge-
ther was of a different length to that to which it
was bound, so that at no one place were any two
joints near each other. Every junction, too, was
firmly bound round with fine wire, and further se-
cured by strong soldering. When the conductors
had been thus, as it were, welded together to the
perfect satisfaction of the electricians, another class
of workmen came upon the scene--the men who in-
sulate with gutta-percha. This is the most important
work of all, and every step in its long process is
watched with the most careful scrutiny. With fine
bands of softened gutta-percha, about as broad and
not thicker than an ordinary tape, they envelope the
conductor in fold after fold, each laid transversely'
to the other, and each as it is wound round having
its edges melted firmly together by the flame of a
small spirit-lamp. As the operation progresses the
insulating compound is laid on in thicker bands till
the whole core is covered with a perfectly homoge-
neous mass as impervious to water as granite itself.
When this was effected this morning the splice was
lowered over into the sea, and the huge coils in all the
tanks having been previously joined together, the
whole was tested through to ascertain the perfectness
of the splice by a series of messages to and from the
telegraph-house. An ordinary conversation was
carried on with very rapid signalling, and the result
was that in a short time the joint with the shore-
end was pronounced absolutely faultless. The light
signals were as strong and as distinct to follow as
those which would be made by a common Morse-
needle, and even those least versed in telegraphy
would be able to read them easily after a day's in-
struction.
Here it may not be out of place to mention that
the system of signalling employed is entirely through
Professor Thomson's marine galvanometer. The
principle of this is merely that, instead of a needle
oscillating on a dial to right and left, a small, but
exquisitely burnished, mirror on which a light is
thrown is made to move. This fine reflected ray of
light is thrown upon a graduated scale, about 3 feet
distant from it, so that with its movement its sig-
nals range over an area of nearly 2 feet each way.
Thus a rapid passage of the ray of light to the right
or left means, as they pass over the divisions of the
scales in front, different letters, and these are called
dashes, while a pause upon any particular degree
for a second or so means dots, and so by dots and
dashes of this flashing ray the signals are read, the
work being much facilitated according as the light
passes to the right or left to the centre of the scale.
By means of this beautiful apparatus the slightest
battery power would be sufficient to signal through
an insulated wire of 5,000 miles in length, even
though some serious faults might exist in the cable.
As soon as these bright, dancing little tokens had
given their last answers this morning the submerged
splice was raised out of the sea and its iron covering
plaited on and round it till the whole work was
finished. When this, like other parts of the splice,
had been supervised and reported upon by the
mechanical engineers, a
message was sent through
to Mr. Glass, saying, " Splice all, 0. K. ; we are
going off." The answer was, " God speed you,"
and on the receipt of this the fastenings of the
joint were cut adrift and it went down in the
waves under the Great Eastern's stern. As it sank
the first movement of the paying-out machine could
be observed, and in another minute the Great
Eastern and her consorts steamed slowly out into
the fog and mist and rain which covered the Atlan-
tic, and, with a parting salute of one gun, the Ra-
coon turned her head inland, and brought her
visitors ashore this evening. Since then the
signals between shore and ship have been incessant.
If possible they improve in character and clearness
every hour, but this is always the case as cables
become immersed in the perfectly equable tempera-
ture of a deep sea. The weather since the ship
started has been very squally, with storms of heavy
rain. When last heard from, at about 9 o'clock this
evening, the ship
was nearly 80 miles from shore,
steaming a little over five knots an hour, the cable
running out smoothly at about six. Everything
was going on perfectly, the wind and sea rather
abeam, the ship rolling, or we should rather say
moving slightly, and reported as altogether astonish-
ingly steady. During every hour of the day and
night these signals will be kept up, stating weather,
depth of water, position of the ship, distance run,
and amount of cable paid out. Until fairly out of
deep water, however, nothing can be safely said as
to the result of the enterprise, and it will be a week
at least before the cable can be said to be entirely
beyond risk of loss. By that time the Great East-
ern will be in little more than 1,000 fathoms of
water, when a fracture of the cable might be re-
garded with comparative indifference.

Never on any occasion have there been so many
visitors at Valentia to witness the starting of the
expedition. Every morning has brought in fresh
groups of tourists, and every evening has as regu-
larly witnessed their departure, for there is absolutely
no accommodation to be had here on any terms.
Col. Bradford, and Lieut. Bentinck, who were among
the late arrivals, have been wise enough to bring a
bell tent with them, and are camped out on the hill,
and other visitors coming from Killarney are, we
have heard, intending to bring similar means of
shelter with them.

Yesterday a large party, conducted by Mr. Bevan
and Mr. Bewlay, came in from Dublin, and held a
very important meeting, at which prayers were
offered up for the succes,,, of the Atlantic Telegraph
expedition. Nearly all the county gentry were pre-
sent at this gathering, which was held in a store-
room belonging to the slate works. It was not en-
tirely a religious service, however, for manyspeeches
were delivered. Yet, even for most of these visitors,
no accommodation could be found in this pretty little
village, or even at the market town of Cahircivee►i
some eight miles distant. The majority, therefore'
had a wild mountain drive into Killarney, througl;
a night of heavy rain and keen cold wind.
None of those interested in the success of the
expedition intend leaving here till the Great Eastern
is in comparatively shoal water, and on her way to
the banks of Newfoundland.

ROWING MATCH FOP. £2O.—A scullers' wager
took placo yesterday morning, the competitors being Bird
and Miles, both plying at Greenwich, to row from the
Halfway House to Greenwich Hospital. It was a very
close match for some time, when Bird took the lead, main-
tained it, and won by a blicrt distance only.

...................._ .........
Supposed Suicide by a Military Ofileer in
a West-end Hot el.

Last evening an inquest was held by Mr. C. St.
Clare Bedford, in the board-room. of St. James's
Workhouse, on the body of Capt. George Gordon
Hope Johnstone, 46 years of age, who was found
dead in bed at " Gregory's Hotel," Rupert-street,
Haymarket, under circumstances thatled to the sup-
position that he had destroyed himself by poison.
The jury having viewed the body in the dead-
house attached to the workhouse,
Mr. Robert Hope Johnstone, residing in St.
James's-street, identified the body as that of his
brother, who was formerly an officer inher Majesty's
79th Highlanders. Witness had also been in her
Majesty's military service. He had not seen the de-
ceased for some time.

Mr. Norman Buchanan, distiller, of Glasgow, but
at present staying at No. 6, Craven-street, Strand,
said he had known the deceased for the last 26
years. On Saturday morning he
,left the deceased_
about a quarter to two, as far as he could remem-
ber, and he never saw him happier. About half-
past 12 deceased had some gin-sling, and witness
had some brandy and soda. Deceased complained
of spasm of the heart, but after taking a cigar and
some gin and water he recovered. An agreement
was made that witness should call at his hotel in the
morning at half-past ten, or deceased was to drive
down to him at a quarter to 11. When witness left
he said he was quite well. He appeared to be per-
fectly able to take cart of himself, and said he was.
going to see a friend. He saw nothing more of him.
By the Coroner—Witness knew that while deceased
was in the Highlands last summer he carried a bottle
of chloridine with him in his portmanteau, and used
occasionally,to take as many as 20 drops at a time.

The brother of deceased said he knew that large
doses of medicine were taken by deceased, and he
had told him he should not take double doses of blue
pills and strong doses of salts. Witness knew no-
thing of the chloridine. From the character of de-
ceased, he did not think he would commit suicide.
Evidence was given that deceased returned to his
hotel at half-past three, and ordered the waiter to
call him at 10 next morning, and to supply him with
some rum-and-milk. The servant-girl took in the
rum-and-milk at the hour named, but as deceased
appeared to be asleep she did not disturb him. A
short time afterwards he was found dead in his bed.
Au empty bottle which had contained chloridine
was found near the bed, and also a tumbler which
had contained chloridine and water, and which still
contained about 20 drops of chloridine. From the
post-mortem examination it appeared that death
was occasioned by an overdose of chloridine while
in a state of intoxication.

The Coroner, after some difficulty in attempting
to arrive at a conclusion, showed the jury that there
were, according to the medical evidence, several
causes for death, and, having descanted upon thew,
left the jury to consider upon their verdict.

After a short deliberation, a verdict simply of
" Disease of the heart" was returned.

COUNTRY MARKETS.

COLCHESTER-JULY 14.

There was a moderate supply of wheat at market to-
day. Trade more active, at the prices of last week. Tb°
weather fine and forcing.
Wheat, white 54s 608 Beans, Mazag-an.,....40s 425
red: 50s 54s Middle and 5ma11..42s 4,4!
Barley ..
Oati grey ...30s 425

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