the bright eyes, supple figures, and innocent faces of the peasant lasses, and the earnestly hopeful expression of all-made up a picture not easily described. On the thirteenth of July, the fleet was ready to sail on its great errand, and lay the cable in the heart of the wide and deep ocean. Previously to the departure, however, a devotional meeting was held, participated in by the company, the officers and hands, at which the enterprise was solemnly commended to the favor of God. In a short time after leaving the shores of Ireland, the Medway reached the buoy to which the shore-end was attached, and immediately the operation of splicing that end with the main coil on board the Great Eastern was performed. At about three o'clock, P. M., the telegraph fleet was on its way to Newfoundland, in the following order: The Terrible ahead of the Great Eastern on the starboard bow, the Medway on the port, and the Albany on the starboard quarter. The weather was thick and foggy, with heavy rains. Signals were sent through the cable on board of the Great Eastern and to the telegraph house at Valentia, and the two thousand four hundred and forty nautical miles were found perfect in condition, and only waiting their final destination in the vast womb of the ocean. All went well until noon of July 18th, when the first real shock was given to the success that had hitherto attended them, and caused considerable alarm. A foul flake took place in the after-tank. The engine was immediately turned astern, and the paying of the cable stopped. All hands were soon on the decks, and there learned, to their dismay, that the running and paying out of the coil had caught three turns of the flake immediately under it, carried them into the eye of the coil, fouling the toy-out and hauling up onehalf turns from the outside, and five turns of the eye of the under flakes. This was stopped, fortunately, before entering the paying-out machines; stoppers of hemp with chains were also put on near the wheel astern, and orders were given by Mr. Canning, to stand by to let go the buoy. This was not very cheering to hear; but, though the calm and collected man inspired those around him with confidence that his skill and experience would extricate the cable from the danger in which it was placed, no fishing line was ever entangled more than the rope when thrust up in apparently hopeless danger from the eye of the cable to the deck. There were at least five thousand feet of rope lying in this state, and in the midst of thick rain and increasing wind, the cable crew set to work to disentangle it. The Dolphin was there, too, patiently following the lights as they showed themselves, the crew now passing them forward and now aft, until at last the character of the tangle was seen, and soon it became apparent that ere long the cable would be saved and uninjured down to the tank. Captain Anderson was at the taffrail, anxiously watching the strain on the rope (they could scarcely make it out, the night. was so dark), endeavoring to keep it up and down, going on raising with paddle and screw. In view of the rise of the great ship, and the enormous mass she presented to the wind, the difficulty of keeping her stern, under the circumstances, over the cable, can be appreciated. The port paddle-wheel was disconnected, but afterward there was a shift of wind, and the vessel came-to the wrong way. Welcome voices were now heard passing the word aft from the tank, that the bights were cleared, and to pay out. Then the huge stoppers were quietly opened, and at 2:05 A. M., to the joy of all, the cable was once more being discharged. They veered it away in the tank to clear the screw, and the paddle-engines were slowed so as to reduce the speed of the ship to four and a half knots. During all this critical time, there was entire absence of noise and confusion. Everything was silently done, and the cable men and crew worked with hearty good will. On the morning of Friday, at eight o'clock, July 27th, the ship arrived at congratulates the President on the successful completion of an undertaking which she hopes may serve as an additional bond of union between the United States and England." To this, the president responded by saying: "The President of the United States acknowledges with profound gratification the receipt of Her Majesty's dispatch, and cordially reciprocates the hope that the cable which now unites the eastern and western hemispheres may serve to strengthen and to perpetuate peace and amity between the Government of England and the Republic of the United States." Heart's Content, the American terminus, the distance run being one thousand six hundred and sixty-nine miles, and the length of cable paid out, one thousand eight hundred and four miles. The average speed of the ship from the time the splice was made until they came in sight of land was a little less than five nautical miles per hour, and the cable was paid out at an average of five and one-half miles per hour. The total slack was less than twelve per cent. The fleet was in constant communication with Valentia since the splice was made, July 13th, and news was daily received from Europe, which was posted up outside of the telegraph office, for the information of all on board of the Great Eastern, and was sig-hitherto unknown, but destined to an ennaled to the other ships. It would be difficult to describe the feelings with which Mr. Field, who, with his associates on board, had watched the progress of the undertaking with intense solicitude, day and night,-penned the following announcement to his friends in New York, and which was received throughout the whole land with unbounded delight :— Strangely and happily enough, too, the first European tidings flashed across the cable to the western hemisphere, was, that a treaty of peace had just been signed between Austria and Prussia, and that the black war cloud which had gathered over all Europe was fast fleeing away ;—a fit celebration of the grandest of human enterprises, the successful establishment of telegraphic communication between the Old world and the New. Congratulatory dispatches were immediately forwarded, by Mr. Field, to the president of the United States, the secretary of state, and to the honorary directors of the Atlantic Telegraph Company. The queen of England sent her salutations to the president, as follows: "The Queen Heart's Content, the American terminus of the cable, is a little fishing hamlet, during reputation hereafter, as one of the most interesting geographical points in the history of the age. The bay on which it is situated is a very safe and capacious one, and on this account was selected. Among the complimentary messages sent to Mr. Field, on the consummation of his great and magnificent scheme, was one which came to hand on Monday, July 30th, from M. de Lesseps, the renowned projector of the Suez Canal. It was dated in Alexandria, Egypt, the same day, at half-past one o'clock, P. M., and reached Newfoundland at half-past ten, A. M. By looking at the globe, one can see over what a space that message flew. Remarking upon the wonderful fact, a New York paper graphically said that it came from the farthest East, from the land of the Pharaohs and Ptolemies; it passed along the shores of Africa, and under the Mediterranean, more than a thousand miles, to Malta; thence it leaped to the continent, and shot across Italy, and over the Alps, and then through France, under the Channel, to London; then across England and Ireland, till from the cliffs of Valentia it struck straight into the Atlantic, darting down the submarine mountain which lies off the coast, and over all the hills and valleys of the watery plain, resting not till it touched the shore of the New World. Thus, in its morning's flight, it had passed ARRIVAL OF THE GREAT EASTERN AT HEART'S CONTENT, WITH THE ATLANTIC CABLE. over one-fourth of the earth's surface, and so far outstripped the sun in his course, that, by the dial, it reached its destination three hours before it was sent ! Curiously enough, too, in this latter connection, it was found, when considering the propriety of not sending messages on Sunday, that, supposing no delay in transmission, Sunday in the United States is Saturday in Calcutta, and thus the adoption of such a rule would be-working eastward and westward-to exclude Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, from telegraph operations. As illustrating the moral uses, too, subserved by land and ocean telegraph lines connecting different countries and continents, the following case, given in a New York journal-by no means an extreme case in this present day of increased telegraphic facilities will be found in point: A knavish Chinaman in California having contracted the barbarian vice of swindling, has been cheating sundry merchants in San Francisco out of eighteen thousand dollars, and, getting on board the Pacific Mail steamship, fled to the Central Flowery Kingdom. In this way he hoped to put between himself and those whom he had robbed, first, some ten thousand miles of ocean. But, a telegram from San Francisco bears the tidings of his crime to New York. New York sends it by cable across the Atlantic to London, London through France and under the Mediterranean to Alexandria, Alexandria by the Red Sea and Persian Gulf to Bombay, Bombay to Ceylon, and Ceylon by the Peninsula and Oriental steamers to China. So that, when Hong-Kee trips lightly down the ship's gangway at Hong Kong or Shanghai, dreaming of much opium and many almond-eyed daughters of the Sun in the Land of Flowers, his placid soul will be disconcerted by the tap of a bamboo on his shoulder, and a voice of doom will murmur an ungentle summons in his ear. Poor Hong-Kee! The bad morals of the Christians have corrupted him, and in the steam-engine of the Christians has he put his trust. But the literal chain-lightning' of those same Christians is after him, to outstrip their steam-engine, and to teach him in sorrow and in shame how much better he might have done. Not less curious, in a scientific point of view, is the following incident, as related by Mr. Field, at the magnificent banquet given in his honor, in New York, on the triumphant completion of what has justly been pronounced the grandest of human enterprises. "The other day," said Mr. Field, in his speech on this occasion, "Mr. Lattimer Clark telegraphed from Ireland, across the ocean and back again, with a battery formed in a lady's thimble! And now Mr. Collett writes me from Heart's Content: "I have just sent my compli ments to Doctor Gould, of Cambridge, who is at Valentia, with a battery composed of a gun cap, with a strip of zinc, excited by a drop of water, the simple bulk of a tear!"" Too great credit can never be awarded to Mr. Field, for his persevering devotion to this enterprise, through ten years of disheartening failure. In the early stages of the enterprise, few encouraged him in his expectations, though all personally wished him well. On preparing, therefore, for one of his trips across the Atlantic, in connection with the business, one of his friends said to him, "When shall we see you again?" "Not until I have laid the cable!" was Mr. Field's reply. So, too, on presenting the subject to Lord Clarendon. The latter showed great interest and made many inquiries, but was rather startled at the magnitude of the proposed scheme, as well as at the confident tone of the projectors, and pleasantly asked the lion-hearted man "But, suppose you don't succeed? Suppose you make the attempt and fail-your cable is lost in the sea-then what will you do?" "Charge it to profit and loss, and go to work to lay another," was Mr. Field's quick and characteristic response to his noble friend. On another occasion, when dining at the residence of Mr. Adams, the American ambassador, in London, he was seen for an instant to nod his head. John Bright, who sat next to him, turned to him with a smile, and said, "I am glad to see you sleep; I didn't know that you ever slept!"-a most pertinent and deserved tribute to the man whose indomitable faith and energy was finally crowned with immortal success. LXXV. COMPLETION OF THE PACIFIC RAILROAD.-1869. Spikes of the Richest Gold and a Hammer of Pure Silver Used in Laying the Last Rail.-The Blows of the Sledge Telegraphed to All the Great Cities.-The Wide Continent Spanned with Iron from the Farthest East to the Golden Gate -Junction of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.-Seven Days from New York to San Francisco.-Greatest Railroad Route on the Face of the Earth.-"Manifest Destiny" of the United States.-A Pacific Highway Agitated for Years-Its National Importance and Necessity. Charters and Government Aid at Last.-The "Union " and "Central" Companies.— Natural Difficulties to be Overcome.-Feats of Engineering Involved.-Triumphs of Science in this Respect.-Mountains Tunneled, Rivers Bridged.-Gulfs Spanned, Depths Fathomed.-Vastness and Progress of the Work-A Force of Twenty-five Thousand Men and Six Thousand Teams-First Train at the Top of the Sierras.-Pushing the Line to Completion.-Approach of the Two Grand Divisions.-Union at Promontory Point, Utah.-Exultation Over the Victory.-Historic Scene in the Heart of America.-Offerings of Gold, Silver, Iron, and Laurel.-Telegram to President Grant.-Celebration in the Principal Cities.-Easy Journey Around the World. "The last rail is laid--the last spike driven-the Pacific Railroad is completed!"-OFFICIAL TELEGRAM FROM PROMONTORY POINT, OCTOBER 10th, 1869 ELIEVERS in the "manifest destiny" of the universal Yankee nation were favored with one of the most conclusive and gratifying confirmations of their cherished theory, when that most stupendous work ever undertaken by man, the Construction of the Pacific Railway, was finally consummated by the laying of the last rail and the memorable ceremony performed by officials of clasping together the iron girdle about the loins of the nation;-in the winding of which mighty coil across the continent, mountains were tunneled which made one's head giddy to gaze upon; rivers were bridged which, since the primeval days of creation, had rolled in majestic solitude; gulfs, frightful and tumultuous, were spanned; frowning heights were climbed and leveled; and abyssmal depths were fathomed. And all this was accomplished in a period of time, and on a scale of magnitude, the recital of which is fairly calculated to stagger credulity. Notwithstanding the necessity of such a line of communication had for years been MOUNTAIN SCENE ON THE PACIFIC RAILROAD. |