THE TELEPHONE AND THE CABLE.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2867, 24 April 1878, Page 3

THE TELEPHONE AND THE CABLE.

Some further experiments have been carried out on the telegraph cable connesting St. Margarot's Bay, near Dover, and the village of Sandgatte, on the French coast. The Mayor of Dover and several other gentlemen connected with the town drove over to the bay, and assembled in the little telegraph hut erected on the beach within a few yards of the shaft of the borings connected with the proposed Chanuel tunnel—a gross and material way of connecting the two countries compared with the delicate communication we were about to establish. Mr Bordeaux the superintendent of the Submarine Telerraph Company, at once established a communication with the opposite coast, and at his request, conveyed by an ordinary pocket telegraph instrument, the , telephones were attached to fcbe French ' end of the cable, and in a few minutes we were conversing across twenty-two and a half miles of wire at the bottom of the sea. The portable instruments, made in polished mahogany, and in shape like a champagne glass without a foot, were used. By placing one to the ear, and ■peaking into the cup of the other, a continuous conversation was kept up without difficulty. Although the wires were being used on the ordinary busi"^fes of the station, and the clickings of the Morse instruements being worked at j • Dover and Calais were going on all the time, yet the voices could be plainly heard and their tones distinguished. The songs ■ung in that little wild hut on the French coast were produced note for note and word for word, "piano" and "forte," like the distant murmur of a shell—a small far-off voice—in that on which we stood. " Star of the EveniDg " and " Auld Lang Syne " came rolling across that rough and stormy Channel, down which ships were staggering- with shortened sails, and through that tumbling surf, without the loss of a tone or a note. Whistling was tried with equal success, and the tunes were equally distinguishable with the songs. It was suggested that the popping of a cork might be made out, and our •French friends were asked to listen attentively to what would happen. Unfortunately, no bottles were at hand; but a rev. gentleman, equal to the occasion, put his fingers into his cheek and admirably imitated the drawing of a cork. " You have just drawn a cork," came the Toice from the other side, with a shade of melancholy in its tone. A hearty laugh was faked by this mistake. — Times, February 1. _.