“Balmoral, 29th September, 1866.
“Dear Sir Stafford,—As I understand you are to have the honor of taking the chair at the entertainment which is to be given on Monday next in Liverpool to celebrate the double success which has attended the great undertaking of laying the cable of 1866 and recovering that of 1865, by which the two continents of Europe and America are happily connected, I am commanded by the Queen to make known to you, and through you to those over whom you are to preside, the deep interest with which Her Majesty has regarded the progress of this noble work, and to tender Her Majesty’s cordial congratulations to all of those whose energy and perseverance, whose skill and science, have triumphed over all difficulties, and accomplished a success alike honorable to themselves and to their country, and beneficial to the world at large.
“Her Majesty, desirous of testifying her sense of the various merits which have been displayed in this great enterprise, has commanded me to submit to her for special marks of her royal favor the names of those who, having had assigned to them prominent positions, may be considered as representing the different departments whose united labors have contributed to the final result.
“Her Majesty has accordingly been pleased to direct that the honor of knighthood be conferred on Captain Anderson, the able and zealous commander of the Great Eastern; on Professor Thomson, whose distinguished science has been brought to bear with eminent success upon the improvement of submarine telegraphy, and on Messrs. Glass and Canning, the manager and engineer respectively of the Telegraph Maintenance Company, whose skill and experience have mainly contributed to the admirable construction and successful laying of the cable.
“Her Majesty is further pleased to mark her approval of the public spirit and energy of the two companies who have had successively the conduct of the undertaking by offering the dignity of a baronetcy of the United Kingdom to Mr. Lampson, the deputy chairman of the original company, to whose resolute support of the project, in spite of all discouragements, it was in great measure owing that it was not at one time abandoned in despair; and to Mr. Gooch, M.P., the chairman of the company which has finally accomplished the great design.
“If among the names thus submitted to and approved by Her Majesty that of Mr. Cyrus Field does not appear, the omission must not be attributed to any disregard of the eminent services which from the first he has rendered to the cause of transatlantic telegraphy, and the zeal and resolution with which he has adhered to the prosecution of his object, but to an apprehension lest it might appear to encroach on the province of his own government if Her Majesty were advised to offer to a citizen of the United States, for a service rendered alike to both countries, British marks of honor which, following the example of another highly distinguished citizen, he might feel himself unable to accept.
“I will only add, on my own part, how cordially I concur in the object of the meeting over which you are about to preside, and how much I should have been gratified had circumstances permitted me to have attended in person.
“I am, dear Sir Stafford,
“Very sincerely yours,
“Derby.”
The celebration on the western shore of the Atlantic was not less general and cordial. We quote from the report of a New York newspaper:
“A dinner was given in this city on the evening of the 16th instant by the New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company to Cyrus W. Field, who has recently returned to this country, after assisting in the successful laying of the Atlantic telegraph cable, with which movement Mr. Field has been more prominently identified from the beginning than any other of its advocates and supporters. A considerable number of our first citizens were present, including the honorary directors of the Atlantic Telegraph Company.... Mr. Peter Cooper told of the formation of the New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company, and then said: ‘On those eventful evenings we became fully magnetized and infatuated with a most magnificent idea. We pictured to ourselves that in a short time we should plant a line of telegraph across the vast and mighty ocean. We as little dreamed of the difficulties at that time that we were destined to encounter as did the Jews of old dream of the difficulties that they were doomed to meet in their passage to the promised land. We, like the Jews of old, saw the hills green afar off, and, like them, we had but a faint idea of the bare spots, the tangled thickets, and rugged cliffs over and through which we have been compelled to pass in order to gain possession of our land of promise. We have, however, been more fortunate than the Jews of old; we have had a Moses who was able to lead on his associates, and when he found them cast down and discouraged, he did not call manna from heaven nor smite the rock, but just got us to look through his telescope at the pleasant fields that lay so temptingly in the distance before us, and in that way he was able to inspirit his associates with courage to go on until, with the help of the Great Eastern, and the means and influence of the noble band of men that Mr. Field has been able to enlist in the mother country, we have at last accomplished a work that is now the wonder of the world.