Arizona republican., 1899-03-10

from Australia to New Zealand, a dis
 tance of over LOCO miles, and another
 extending from Australia to the
 French colony of New Caledonia, 500
 miles seaward.
 The chief obstacle in the past to the
 construction of grand trans-Pacific
 cable was found in the fact that mid
 ocean resting places could not be sat
 isfactoriIy obtained or arranged for, no
 single government controlling a suffi-
 cient number of suitable landing places
 to make this seem practicable, in view
 of the belief that the distances from
 which messages could be sent and ca
 bles controlled were limited. With
 landing places at Hawaii, Wake Island.
 Guam and the Philippines, however,
 no section of a cable stretching from 1 the United States to Asia and touching
 at these points would have a length
 equal to that now in daily operation between France and the United States. The length of the French cable from Brest, France, to Cape Cod, Mass, is i 3,250 miles while the greatest dis tance from land to iand on the prOpos-
 cd Pacific route would be that from
 San Francisco to Hawaii, 2,089 miles,
 that from Hawaii to Wake Island be-
 ing 2.O40 miles, from Wake Island to Guam 1, ,290 miles, from Guam to Man fla 1,520 miles, and from Manila to the Asiatic coast 630 miles. While the depth of the Pacific is somewhat greater than that at which any cable has been laid, the difference between its depth and the greatest reached by cables in the Atlantic would be very slight, the cable recently laid from Haiti to the the Windward Islands be- ing in 1S,000 feet of water, while the greatest depth between San Fran cisco and Hawaii is 1S,300 feet, and the greatest depth between Hawaii and Manila is estimated at 19,6OO feet, though this estimate is yet to be veri- fed by detailed sOundings. Otto KrUmneI, who was the first to discuss the bathymetric data and calculate the area and volume of the various oceanic basins, puts the mean depth of the Pacific at 2,160 fathOms, against 2,O4O for the Atlantic, in which cables have already been so successfully laid, and later researches and actual sCundings while they have developed extreme depths at certain points in the Pacific, have not in the opinion of experts. been such as to warrant the belief that the depths along the proposed line would be considerably greater than those in which cables have been all ready laid and operated.
 The developments in construction, laying and operating of submarine cables and in their availability for general public use have kept pace with their extension throughout the civi- Iized world. From a mere gutta- conductor of electricity has developed in half century into q great cable having a central copper core surround ed by numerous layers Of nonconduct- ing material and protected by a steel wire wound spiraliy about it, and in turn further protected by waterproof and insect-prOOf wrappings. From open barge, the facili- ties for laying have developed to a fleet Of nearly 50 steam vessels, with every facility for laying, picking up, l splicing and repairing the cable lines. l From speed rate Of three words per minute which was made on the first cables, the speed of transmission has been accelerated to 50 words per minute, and even more |