The Battery and the Boiler: Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables

“Well, what d’ee think of Ebbysneezer Smith, my electrical toolip?” asked Jim Slagg, whom Robin encountered again at the station. “He’s a wiry subject, I s’pose, like the rest of ’em?”

“He’s a very pleasant gentleman,” answered Robin warmly.

“Oh, of coorse he is. All the Smiths are so—more or less. They’re a glorious family. I knows at least half a dozen of ’em in what superfine people call the ‘slums’ of London.”

“And I know more than half a dozen of ’em,” retorted Robin, somewhat sharply, “in what unrefined people call the haristocracy of London.”

“Whew!” whistled Mister Slagg, gazing at Robin in silent surprise.

What the whistle implied was not explained at that time, because the locomotive whistle took up the tune with intense violence, causing a rush to the train, in which the two lads—like many other friends—were abruptly parted for a season.

Chapter Six.

Tells of our Hero’s Visit to the Great Cable

Robin Wright returned home with a bounding heart. Since his electrical appointment he had become, figuratively speaking, an indiarubber ball—a sort of human “squash.” His heart bounded; his feet bounded; if his head had fallen off, it also would have bounded, no doubt.

On arriving he found his father’s elder brother—a retired sea-captain of the merchant service—on a visit to the family.

There was not a more favourite uncle in the kingdom than uncle Rik—thus had his name of Richard been abbreviated by the Wright family. Uncle Rik was an old bachelor and as bald as a baby—more so than many babies. He was good-humoured and liberal-hearted, but a settled unbeliever in the world’s progress. He idolised the “good old times,” and quite pleasantly scorned the present.

“So, so, Robin,” he said, grasping our hero by both hands (and uncle Rik’s grasp was no joke), “you’re goin’ in for batteries—galvanic batteries an’ wires, are you? Well, lad, I always thought you more or less of a fool, but I never thought you such a born idiot as that comes to.”

“Yes, uncle,” said Robin, with a pleasant laugh, for he was used to the old captain’s plain language, “I’m going to be an electrician.”

“Bah! pooh!—an electrician!” exclaimed uncle Rik with vehemence, “as well set up for a magician at once.”

“Indeed he won’t be far short of that,” said Mrs Wright, who was seated at the tea-table with her husband and Madge—“at least,” she added, “if all be true that we hear of this wonderful science.”

“If only half of it be true,” interjected Mr Wright.

“But it ain’t true,” said Captain Rik firmly. “They talk a deal of stuff about it, more than nine-tenths of which is lies—pure fable. I don’t believe in electricity; more than that, I don’t believe in steam. Batteries and boilers are both bosh!”

“But, uncle, you can’t deny that they exist,” said Robin.

“Of course not,” replied the captain. “I know as well as you do—maybe better—that there’s a heap o’ telegraph-wires rove about the world like great spiders’ webs, and that there are steamboats hummin’ an’ buzzin’—ay, an’ bu’stin’ too—all over the ocean, like huge wasps, an’ a pretty mess they make of it too among them! Why, there was a poor old lady the other day that was indooced by a young nephy to send a telegraphic message to her husband in Manchester—she bein’ in London. She was very unwillin’ to do it, bein’ half inclined to regard the telegraph as a plant from the lower regions. The message sent was, ‘Your lovin’ wife hopes you’ll be home to-morrow.’ It reached the husband, ‘Your lowerin’ wife hopes you’ll be hung to-morrow.’ Bad writin’ and a useless flourish at the e turned home into hung. The puzzled husband telegraphs in reply, ‘Mistake somewhere—all right—shall be back three o’clock—to-morrow—kind love.’ And how d’ye think this reached the old lady?—‘Mistake somewhere—all night—stabbed in back—through cloak—two more rows—killed, love.’ Now, d’you call that successful telegraphing?”

“Not very,” admitted Robin, with a laugh, “but of the thousands of messages that pass to and fro daily there cannot be many like these, I should think.”

“But what did the poor wife do?” asked Madge anxiously.

“Do?” repeated Rik indignantly, as though the misfortune were his own—for he was a very sympathetic captain—“do? Why, she gave a yell that nigh knocked the young nephy out of his reason, and fell flat on the floor. When she came to, she bounced up, bore away for the railway station under full sail, an’ shipped for Manchester, where she found her husband, alive and hearty, pitchin’ into a huge beefsteak, which he very properly said, after recovering from his first surprise, was big enough for two.”

“But what objection have you to steamers, uncle Rik?” asked Mrs Wright; “I’m sure they are very comfortable and fast-going.”

“Comfortable and fast-goin’!” repeated the old sailor, with a look of supreme contempt, “yes, they’re comfortable enough when your berth ain’t near the paddles or the boilers; an’ they’re fast-goin’, no doubt, specially when they bu’st. But ain’t the nasty things made of iron—like kitchen kettles? and won’t that rust? an’ if you knock a hole in ’em won’t they go down at once? an’ if you clap too much on the safety-valves won’t they go up at once? Bah! pooh!—there’s nothin’ like the wooden walls of old England. You may take the word of an old salt for it,—them wooden walls will float and plough the ocean when all these new-fangled iron pots are sunk or blowed to atoms. Why, look at the Great Eastern herself, the biggest kettle of ’em all, what a precious mess she made of herself! At first she wouldn’t move at all, when they tried to launch her; then they had to shove her off sidewise like a crab; then she lost her rudder in a gale, an’ smashed all her cabin furniture like a bad boy with his toys. Bah! I only hope I may be there when she bu’sts, for it’ll be a grand explosion.”

“I’m sorry you have so bad an opinion of her, uncle, for I am appointed to serve in the Great Eastern while layin’ the Atlantic Cable.”

“Sorry to hear it, lad; very sorry to hear it. Of course I hope for your sake that she won’t blow up on this voyage, though it’s nothin’ more or less than an absurd ship goin’ on a wild-goose chase.”

“But, uncle, submarine cables have now passed the period of experiment,” said Robin, coming warmly to the defence of his favourite subject. “Just consider, from the time the first one was laid, in 1851, between Dover and Calais, till now, about fifteen years, many thousands of miles of conducting-wire have been laid along the bottom of the sea to many parts of the world, and they are in full and successful operation at this moment. Why, even in 1858, when the first Atlantic Cable was laid, the Gutta-percha Company had made forty-four submarine cables.”

“I know it, lad, but it won’t last. It’s all sure to bu’st up in course of time.”

“Then, though the attempt to lay the last Atlantic Cable proved a failure,” continued Robin, “the first one, the 1858 one, was a success at the beginning, no one can deny that.”

“Ay, but how long did it last?” demanded the skipper, hitting the table with his fist.

“Oh, please, have pity on the tea-cups, uncle Rik,” cried the hostess.

“Beg pardon, sister, but I can’t help getting riled when I hear younkers talkin’ stuff. Why, do you really suppose,” said the captain, turning again to Robin, “that because they managed in ’58 to lay a cable across the Atlantic, and exchange a few messages, which refused to travel after a few days, that they’ll succeed in layin’ down a permanent speakin’ trumpet between old England and Noof’nland—2000 miles, more or less—in spite o’ gales an’ currents, an’ ships’ anchors, an’ insects, an’ icebergs an’ whales, to say nothing o’ great sea-sarpints an’ such like?”

“Uncle Rik, I do,” said Robin, with intensely earnest eyes and glowing cheeks.

“Bravo! Robin, you’ll do it, I do believe, if it is to be done at all; give us your hand, lad.”

The old sailor’s red countenance beamed with a huge smile of kindness as he shook his enthusiastic nephew’s hand.

“There,” he added, “I’ll not say another word against iron kettles or Atlantic cables. If you succeed I’ll give batteries and boilers full credit, but if you fail I’ll not forget to remind you that I said it would all bu’st up in course of time.”

With note-book and pencil in hand Robin went down the very next day to the works of the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company, where the great cable was being made.

Presenting his letter of introduction from Mr Smith, Robin was conducted over the premises by a clerk, who, under the impression that he was a very youthful and therefore unusually clever newspaper correspondent, treated him with marked respect. This was a severe trial to Robin’s modesty; nevertheless he bore up manfully, and pulling out his note-book prepared for action.

The reader need not fear that we intend to inflict on him Robin’s treatise on what he styled the “Great Atlantic Cable,” but it would be wrong to leave the subject without recording a few of those points which made a deep impression on him.

“The cable when completed, sir,” said the clerk, as he conducted his visitor to the factory, “will be 2300 nautical miles in length.”

“Indeed,” said Robin, recording the statement with solemn gravity and great accuracy; “but I thought,” he added, “that the exact distance from Ireland to Newfoundland was only 1600 miles.”

“You are right, sir, but we allow 700 miles of ‘slack’ for the inequalities of the bottom. Its cost will be 700,000 pounds, and the whole when finished will weigh 7000 tons.”

Poor Robin’s mind had, of course, been informed about ton-weights at school, but he had not felt that he realised what they actually signified until the thought suddenly occurred that a cart-load of coals weighed one ton, whereupon 7000 carts of coals leaped suddenly into the field of his bewildered fancy. A slightly humorous tendency, inherited from his mother, induced 7000 drivers, with 7000 whips and a like number of smock-frocks, to mount the carts and drive in into the capacious hold of the Great Eastern. They turned, however, and drove instantly off his brain when he came into the august presence of the cable itself.

The central core of the cable—that part by which the electric force or fluid was to pass from the Old World to the New, and vice versa, was made of copper. It was not a solid, single wire, but a strand composed of seven fine wires, each about the thickness of a small pin. Six of these wires were wound spirally round the seventh. This was in order to prevent what is termed a “breach of continuity,” for it will be at once perceived that while a single wire of the core might easily break in the process of laying the cable, and thereby prevent the flow of electricity, the probability of the seven small wires all breaking at the same spot was so remote as to be almost impossible, and if even one wire out of the seven held, the continuity would remain. Nay, even all the seven might break, but, so long as they did not all break at the same place, continuity would not be lost, because copper would still continue to touch copper all throughout the cable’s length.

In the process of construction, the central wire of the copper core was first covered with a semi-liquid coating of gutta-percha, mixed with tar—known as “Chatterton’s Compound.” This was laid on so thick that when the other wires were wound round it all air was excluded. Then a coating of the same compound was laid over the finished conductor, and thus the core was solidified. Next, the core was surrounded with a coating of the purest gutta-percha—a splendid non-conductor, impervious to water—which, when pressed to it, while in a plastic state, formed the first insulator or tube to the core. Over this tube was laid a thin coat of Chatterton’s Compound for the purpose of closing up any small flaws or minute holes that might have escaped detection. Then came a second coating of gutta-percha, followed by another coating of compound, and so on alternately until four coats of compound and four of gutta-percha had been laid on.

This core, when completed, was wound in lengths on large reels, and was then submerged in water and subjected to a variety of severe electrical tests so as to bring it as near as possible to a state of perfection, after which every inch of it was examined by hand while being unwound from the reels and re-wound on the large drums on which it was to be forwarded to the covering works at East Greenwich, there to receive its external protecting sheath.

All this, and much more besides, did Robin Wright carefully note down, and that same evening went home and delivered a long and luminous lecture, over which his mother wondered, Madge rejoiced, his father gloried, and uncle Rik fell asleep.

Next day he hastened to the covering works, and, presenting his credentials, was admitted.

Here he saw the important and delicate core again carefully tested as to its electrical condition, after which it received a new jacket of tanned jute yarn to protect it from the iron top coat yet to come. Its jute jacket on, it was then coiled away in tanks full of water, where it was constantly kept submerged and continuously tested for insulation. Last of all the top coat was put on. This consisted of ten wires of peculiarly fine and strong iron. Each of these ten wires had put on it a special coat of its own, made of tarred Manilla yarn, to protect it from rust as well as to lighten its specific gravity. The core being brought from its tank, and passed round several sheaves, which carried it below the factory floor, was drawn up through a hole in the centre of a circular table, around the circumference of which were ten drums of the Manilla-covered wire. A stout iron rod, fastened to the circumference of the table, rose from between each drum to the ceiling, converging in a cone which passed through to the floor above. Our core rose in the middle of all, and went through the hollow of the cone. When all was put in noisy and bewildering motion, the core which rose from the turning-table and whirling drums as a thin jute-clad line, came out in the floor above a stout iron-clad cable, with a Manilla top-dressing, possessing strength sufficient to bear eleven miles of its own length perpendicularly suspended in water—or a margin of strength more than four and a half times that required,—and with a breaking strain of seven tons fifteen hundredweight.

When thoroughly charged and primed, Robin went off home to write his treatise.