Engineering Wonders of the World
Volume I

EARLY ATLANTIC CABLES. 371 Fig. 15.—THE “ GREAT EASTERN ” COMPLETING THE SECOND ATLANTIC CABLE. Albany, and Medway to drag simultaneously, but at points some miles apart, for the cable more or less near its end. As soon as the line had been raised to a certain height, it was to be cut by the Medway, stationed to the westward of the Great Eastern, so as to enable the latter vessel to lift the Valencia end on board.* Without following the sequence of events too closely, it may be remarked that for thirteen days, in all sorts of weather, the cable was alternately hooked and lost. Twice it actually reached the surface, only to slip away, like However, the thirteenth drag Repeated Failures. a great eel. * This was, of course, before the introduction of combined cutting and holding grapnels, which nowadays enable a single ship to effect such repairs with the aid of buoys—even where it is impossible to recover the cable in. a single bight. Otherwise, the routine to-day is much the same as above described. brought better luck, and the cable was picked up by the Great Eastern in a perfect calm. The monster ship did her work admirably throughout. To quote the words of Dr. (afterwards Sir William Howard) Russell, the Times correspondent on board : “ So delicately did she answer her helm, and coil in the film of thread-like cable, that she put one in mind of an elephant taking up a straw in its pro- boscis.” When the bight was some nine hundred fathoms from the surface the grappling rope was buoyed. The big ship then proceeded to grapple three miles west of the buoy, and the Medway another three miles further west. The cable was soon once more hooked by both ships ; and when the Medway had raised her bight to within three hundred fathoms of the surface she was ordered to break it.