“Yours truly,
“Geo. Peabody & Co.”
In the life of Longfellow, at page 323, is given this entry from his diary:
“August 6th. Go to town with the boys. Flags flying and bells ringing to celebrate the laying of the telegraph.”
And on the 12th, in writing to Mr. Sumner, he says:
“You have already rejoiced at the success of the Atlantic telegraph—the great news of the hour, the year, the century. The papers call Field ‘Cyrus the Great.’ ”
These words express the feeling that pervaded the whole country: and in order to contrast it with the days and months that had just passed, this article, published in the New York Herald of August 9th, is given:
“SUCCESS OR FAILURE—A CONTRAST
“Many terse and witty things have been said and written in all ages to show the difference with which the same enterprise is viewed when it results in success and when it results in failure. We have never had any better illustration of this than we now have in connection with the great enterprise of the age. After the first and second attempts to lay the Atlantic cable had failed, wiseacres shook their heads in sympathetic disapprobation of Mr. Field, and said, ‘What a fool he was!’ It was evident to them all along that the thing could never succeed, and they could not understand why a sensible, clear-headed man like Field would risk his whole fortune in such a railroad-to-the-moon undertaking. If he had ventured a third of it or a half, there might be some excuse for him, but to have placed it all on the hazard of a die where the chances were a hundred to one against him—worse even than the Wall Street lottery conducted under the name of the Stock Exchange—was an evidence of folly and absurdity which they could not overlook and for which he deserved to suffer.
“Now all that is changed. Midnight has given place to noon. The sun shines brightly in the heavens and the shadows of the night have passed away and are forgotten. Failures have been only the stepping-stones to success the most brilliant. The cable is laid; and now the most honored name in the world is that of Cyrus W. Field, although but yesterday there were
“ ‘None so poor to do him reverence.’