Page:Ballantyne--The Battery and the Boiler.djvu/53

 and it was not until 1857 that a regular attempt was made to lay an Atlantic cable. It failed, because the cable broke and was lost. A second attempt was made in 1858, and was successful. In that year, my boy, Ireland and Newfoundland were married, and on the 5th of August the first electric message passed between the Old World and the New, through a small wire, over a distance of above 2000 miles. But the triumph of Field and his friends was short-lived, for, soon after, something went wrong with the cable, and on the 6th September it ceased to work."

"What a pity!" exclaimed Bob; "so it all went off in smoke."

"Not quite that, Bob. Before the cable struck work about 400 messages had been sent, which proved its value in a financial point of view, and one of these messages—sent from London in the morning and reaching Halifax the same day—directed that 'the 62d Regiment was not to return to England,' and it is said that this timely warning saved the country an expenditure of £50,000. But the failure, instead of damping, has evidently stimulated the energies of Mr. Field, who has been going about between America and England ever since, stirring people up far and near to raise the funds necessary for another attempt. He gives himself no rest; has embarked his own