“fore” tank, a “main” tank, and an “after” tank.  The main tank was the largest, and eight hundred and sixty-four miles of cable were coiled in it.  Eight hundred and thirty-nine miles in addition were coiled in the after tank, and six hundred and seventy miles in the fore tank, making in all two thousand three hundred and seventy-four miles of cable.  The food taken on board for the long voyage in prospect consisted of twenty thousand pounds of butcher-meat, five hundred head of poultry, one hundred and fourteen live sheep, eight bullocks, a milch cow, and eighty tons of ice.

[Illustration:  SECTION OF THE GRAPPLING LINE.]

What is called the shore-end of the cable—­i.e., that part nearest the shore, which is thicker than the rest—­was first laid by a smaller steamer.  It extended from Valentia to a point twenty-eight miles at sea.  Here it was buoyed, until the great ship arrived.  On a wet day in July, 1866, it was joined with the main cable on board the “Great Eastern,” and on the same day that vessel started on her voyage to Newfoundland.

[Illustration:  SECTIONS OF CABLES (REDUCED). 1.  Main cable of 1858. 1a.  Shore end, abandoned cable of 1858. 2.  Main cable of 1866. 2a.  Shore-end, recovered cable of 1865. 3.  Shore end of cable of 1866.]

It may seem a simple matter to distribute or “pay out” the cable, but in practice it is exceedingly difficult.  Twenty men are stationed in the tank from which it is issuing, each dressed in a canvas suit, without pockets, and in boots without nails.  Their duty is to ease each coil as it passes out of the tank, and to give notice of the marks painted on the cable one mile apart.  Near the entrance of the tank it runs over a grooved wheel and along an iron trough until it reaches that part of the deck where the “paying out” machine is placed.  The latter consists of six grooved wheels, each provided with a smaller wheel, called a “jockey,” placed against the upper side of the groove so as to press against the cable as it goes through, and retard or help its progress.  These six wheels and their jockeys are themselves controlled by brakes, and after it has been embraced by them the cable winds round a “drum” four times.  The drum is another wheel, four feet in diameter and nine inches deep, which is also controlled by powerful brakes; and from it the cable passes over another grooved wheel before it gets to the “dynamometer” wheel.  The dynamometer is an instrument which shows the exact degree of the strain on the cable, and the wheel attached to it rises and falls as the strain is greater or less.  Thence the cable is sent over another deeply grooved wheel into the sea.