The year 1846 is made yet more memorable by the discovery that whoever inhaled sulphuric ether would become insensible to pain.  The glory of this discovery has been claimed for two men:  Dr. Morton and Dr. Jackson.  Which one is entitled to it cannot be positively decided, though Dr. Morton seems to have the better right to be considered the discoverer.  Before this, however, anaesthesia by nitrous oxide (laughing gas) had been discovered by Dr. Wells of Hartford, Conn., and by Dr. Long of Georgia.

%415.  Communication with Europe; Steamships%.—­Progress was not confined to affairs within our boundary.  Communications with Europe were greatly advanced.  The passage of the steamship Savannah across the Atlantic, partly by steam and partly by sail, in 1819, resulted in nothing practical.  The wood used for fuel left little space for freight.  But when better machinery reduced the time, and coal afforded a less bulky fuel, the passage across the Atlantic by steam became possible, and in 1838 two vessels, the Sirius and the Great Western, made the trip from Liverpool to New York by steam alone.  No sails were used.  This showed what could be done, and in 1839 Samuel Cunard began the great fleet of Atlantic greyhounds by founding the Cunard Line.  Aided by the British government, he drove all competitors from the field, till Congress came to the aid of the Collins Line, whose steamers made the first trip from New York to Liverpool in 1850.  The rivalry between these lines was intense, and each did its best to make short voyages.  In 1851 the average time from Liverpool to New York was eleven days, eight hours, for the Collins Line, and eleven days, twenty-three hours, for the Cunard.  This was considered astonishing; for Liverpool and New York were thus brought as near each other in point of time in 1851 as Boston and Philadelphia were in 1790.

%416.  The Atlantic Cable%.—­But something more astonishing yet was at hand.  In 1854 Mr. Cyrus W. Field of New York was asked to aid in the construction of a submarine cable to join St. Johns with Cape Ray, Newfoundland.  While considering the matter, he became convinced that if a cable could be laid across the Gulf of St. Lawrence, another could be laid across the Atlantic Ocean, and he formed the “New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company” for the purpose of doing so.  The first attempt, made in 1857, and a second in 1858, ended in failure; but a third, in 1858, was successful, and a cable was laid from Valentia Bay in Ireland to Trinity Bay in Newfoundland, a distance of 1700 geographical miles.  For three weeks all went well, and during this time 400 messages were sent; but on September 1, 1858, the cable ceased to work, and eight years passed before another attempt was made to join the Old World and the New.