MAURITIUS.

Colonist, Volume II, Issue 166, 24 May 1859, Page 4

MAURITIUS.

By way of Melbourne we (Sydney Herald) have news to the 25th of March. The most interesting piece of intelligence received by this opportunity is that which refers to the arrival at Port Louis ofthe Imperador, with the electric cable for the Red Sea. : The quantity she brings is nine hundred miles, which is to be supplemented by nine hundred miles more, daily expected in the sister vessel, the Imperatrice. The. whole will form part of the vasty chain of telegraphic communication which is to connect London with the most remote .dependencies of the; empire— which is first to stretch to the antipodes, and finally to put an electric girdle round the globe itself. The contractors who have engaged to manufacture and lay down the line are the Messrs. Newall, of Birkenhead; and pur readers form some idea of the vast scale on which this private company has proceeded with the work when we state that the Imperador, Imperatrice, and Bahiana, first-class steamships, of 2000 tons each, ' have been purchased arid expressly fitted for this special service, and have thereby been unfitted for any other public service afterwards. The arrangements for the reception, stowage, and paying out of the cable on board the Imperador are similar to those previously adopted so successfully in the Agamemnon and the Niagara, and the tests have been applied daily on the voyage out to ascertain the perfect insulation of the central wires. The cable is constructed substantiall}"- on the same principle, and nearly of the same thickness as the. Newfoundland chain, which now maintains its stubborn silence in the depth Of tho Atlantic. The electricians who are to conduct the undertaking to Aden will join the steamers at Suez, and it is expected that the wprk will be completed to that station within three months at farthest. The same ships will immediately thereafter return to England for the remainder of the cable which is to extend from Aden to Bombay, or some other more advantageous point on the north west coast of India, a distance from Suez of altogether some 4000 miles. Within another twelve-month it is therefore probable that the politicians of Leadenhanstreet and the merchants on' Change may be placed in almost instantaneous communication with every important station throughout our wide Indian empire. Whether, however, it will prove a permanent success or not is more than human prescience can foretel.■ The misfortune of the Atlantic telegraph may be repeated in the Red Sea or in the Arabian Gulf. The ; comparative shallowness of the sea into which the present cable is to be submerged is one consideration in its favor; and the experience of the past leading to new precautions, in the future is another.' Both of these,"however, are counterbalanced by the hard uneven structure of the coral ridges on which the line is to be laid. Should it succeed, as ultimately and notwithstanding all chances, of failure we may rest assured it will, we may confidently anticipate that before many years are past, a branch cable will be extended from Aden to Mauritius, arid thence to Bourbon, Madagascar, Mozambique, Natal,' and every important station in South Africa.