Note 49 — Chapter X · WORKING THE LINE

In his presidential address to the Institution of Electrical Engineers in 1889, Lord Kelvin (the Professor Thomson referred to in these pages) said: “The first Atlantic cable gave me the happiness and privilege of meeting and working with the late Sir Charles Bright. He was the engineer of this great undertaking—full of vigor, full of enthusiasm. We were shipmates on the Agamemnon on the ever-memorable expedition of 1858, during which we were out of sight of land for thirty-three days. To Sir C. Bright’s vigor, earnestness, and enthusiasm was due the successful laying of the cable. We must always feel deeply indebted to our late colleague as a pioneer in that great work, when other engineers would not look at it, and thought it absolutely impracticable.”