Page:Heroes of the telegraph (IA cu31924031222494).djvu/102

 leading article in the current Times: 'It is a great work, a glory to our age and nation, and the men who have achieved it deserve to be honoured among the benefactors of their race.' 'Treaty of peace signed between Prussia and Austria.' The shore end was landed during the day by the Medway; and Captain Anderson, with the officers of the telegraph fleet, went in a body to the church to return thanks for the success of the expedition. Congratulations poured in, and friendly telegrams were again exchanged between Her Majesty and the United States. The great work had been finally accomplished, and the two worlds were lastingly united.

On August 9 the Great Eastern put to sea again in order to grapple the lost cable of 1865, and complete it to Newfoundland. Arriving in mid-ocean she proceeded to fish for the submerged line in two thousand fathoms of water, and after repeated failures, involving thirty casts of the grapnel, she hooked and raised it to surface, then spliced it to the fresh cable in her hold, and payed out to Heart's Content, where she arrived on Saturday, September 7. There were now two fibres of intelligence between the two hemispheres.

On his return home, Professor Thomson was among those who received the honour of knighthood for their services in connection with the enterprise. He deserved it. By his theory and apparatus he probably did more than any other man, with the exception of Mr. Field, to further the Atlantic telegraph. We owe it to his admirable inventions, the mirror instrument of 1857 and the siphon recorder of 1869, that messages through long cables are so cheap and fast, and, as a consequence, that ocean telegraphy is now so common. Hence some account of these two instruments will not be out of place.