“The story of this great undertaking” has been told, and as far as possible in his own words, in these chapters; but there are two or three further extracts from his speech that it seems expedient to give, for they explain the pages just read; they refer to the voyage, grappling, and manner of working the cable.
“Yet this was not a ‘lucky hit’—a fine run across the ocean in calm weather. It was the worst weather I ever knew at that season of the year. In the despatch which appeared in the New York papers you may have read, ‘The weather has been most pleasant.’ I wrote it ‘unpleasant.’ We had fogs and storms almost the whole way. Our success was the result of the highest science combined with practical experience. Everything was perfectly organized to the minutest detail. We had on board an admirable staff of officers, such men as Halpin and Beckwith; and engineers long used to this business, such as Canning and Clifford and Temple, the first of whom has been knighted for his part in this great achievement; and electricians, such as Professor Thomson, of Glasgow, and Willoughby Smith, and Laws; while Mr. C. F. Varley, our companion of the year before, who stands among the first in knowledge and practical skill, remained with Sir Richard Glass at Valentia, to keep watch at that end of the line, and Mr. Latimer Clark, who was to test the cable when done. We had four ships, and on board of them some of the best seamen in England, men who knew the ocean as a hunter knows every trail in the forest. Captain Moriarty had, with Captain Anderson, taken most exact observations at the spot where the cable broke in 1865, and they were so exact that they could go right to the spot. After finding it they marked the line of the cable by a row of buoys, for fogs would come down and shut out sun and stars, so that no man could take an observation. These buoys were anchored a few miles apart. They were numbered, and each had a flag-staff on it, so that it could be seen by day, and a lantern by night. Thus having taken our bearings, we stood off three or four miles, so as to come broadside on, and then casting over the grapnel, drifted slowly down upon it, dragging the bottom of the ocean as we went. At first it was a little awkward to fish in such deep water, but our men got used to it, and soon could cast a grapnel almost as straight as an old whaler throws a harpoon. Our fishing-line was of formidable size. It was made of rope, twisted with wires of steel, so as to bear a strain of thirty tons. It took about two hours for the grapnel to reach bottom, but we could tell when it struck. I often went to the bow and sat on the rope, and could feel by the quiver that the grapnel was dragging on the bottom two miles under us. But it was a very slow business. We had storms and calms and fogs and squalls. Still we worked on day after day. Once, on the 17th of August, we got the cable up, and had it in full sight for five minutes—a long slimy monster, fresh from the ooze of the ocean’s bed—but our men began to cheer so wildly that it seemed to be frightened, and suddenly broke away and went down into the sea.
“This accident kept us at work two weeks longer; but finally, on the last night of August, we caught it. We had cast the grapnel thirty times. It was a little before midnight on Friday night that we hooked the cable, and it was a little after midnight Sunday morning that we got it on board. What was the anxiety of those twenty-six hours? The strain on every man’s life was like the strain on the cable itself. When finally it appeared it was midnight; the lights of the ship, and in the boats around our bows, as they flashed in the faces of the men, showed them eagerly watching for the cable to appear on the water. At length it was brought to the surface. All who were allowed to approach crowded forward to see it; yet not a word was spoken; only the voices of the officers in command were heard giving orders. All felt as if life and death hung on the issue. It was only when it was brought over the bow and on to the deck that men dared to breathe. Even then they hardly believed their eyes. Some crept towards it to feel of it—to be sure it was there. Then we carried it along to the electrician’s room to see if our long-sought treasure was alive or dead. A few minutes of suspense and a flash told of the lightning current again set free. Then did the feeling, long pent up, burst forth. Some turned away their heads and wept. Others broke into cheers, and the cry ran from man to man and was heard down in the engine-rooms, deck below deck, and from the boats on the water and the other ships, while rockets lighted up the darkness of the sea. Then with thankful hearts we turned our faces again to the west. But soon the wind arose, and for thirty-six hours we were exposed to all the dangers of a storm on the Atlantic. Yet in the very height and fury of the gale, as I sat in the electrician’s room, a flash of light came up from the deep which, having crossed to Ireland, came back to me in mid-ocean telling that those so dear to me were well.
“When the first cable was laid in 1858 electricians thought that to send a current two thousand miles it must be almost like a stroke of lightning. But God was not in the earthquake, but in the still, small voice. The other day Mr. Latimer 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 compliments to Dr. 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!’ ”
These were among the toasts given on the same evening:
“Captain Anderson and the officers of the Great Eastern and the other ships engaged in the late expedition: they deserve the thanks not only of their own country, but of the civilized world.”
“The capitalists of England and America who use their wealth to achieve great enterprises, and leave behind them enduring monuments of their wise munificence.”
“While expressing our grateful appreciation of the energy and sagacity that practically achieved the spanning of the Atlantic by the electric current, let us not fail to do honor to those whose genius and patient investigation of the laws of nature furnished the scientific knowledge requisite to success.”
A reception was given to Mr. Field by the Century Club on Saturday evening, November 17th.