The _Telegraphist_ newspaper publishes an account of what must be regarded as a truly marvellous triumph of electrical communication, before which Puck’s proposal to ‘put a girdle round the earth in forty minutes’ seems to be quite a second-rate achievement. A correspondent of the paper in question visited the office of the Indo-European Telegraph Company by invitation, in order to note how good signalling could be maintained over thousands of miles of wire. First, a few words of conversation were exchanged with the telegraphist of a German town. The wire was next connected with Odessa, and next with the Persian capital (Teheran). In a few more minutes the experimenters in London were talking with the clerk in charge at Kurrachee; next they had a chat with a gentleman at Agra; and as a final triumph of science, the line was made direct between London and Calcutta, a distance of seven thousand miles. It is said that the signals were excellent, and the speed attained about thirteen words per minute. In a recent lecture upon gas-lighting, Mr Thomas Fletcher pointed out that blackened ceilings and darkened picture-frames are not due to smoke from the gas-burners, but are caused by floating particles of dust being caught in the flame and thrown against the ceiling. It is easily proved, by holding a glass tumbler for a few seconds over a flame, that water is one of the products of combustion of gas. This water condenses upon a cold ceiling when the gas in a room is first lighted, so that the burnt particles of dust readily adhere to the flat surface. The servant who lights the gas on a dark morning before she proceeds to sweep and dust the room does practically all the smoking of the ceiling that takes place. That unfortunate commercial experiment, but marvellous triumph of engineering skill, the _Great Eastern_ steamship, will shortly proceed to Gibraltar to take up her position in the harbour as a coal-hulk. The gigantic paddles with their engines will be removed, leaving the screw propeller only to carry the ship to her last berth. The Admiralty authorities look with much favour upon the scheme, for the immense ship will supersede a number of small coal-hulks which now encumber the harbour, and are a source of much inconvenience to other vessels. We are glad that a use has been found for the unwieldy vessel, whose only serviceable work has been as the layer of the first Atlantic cables. She was far too big to be profitably worked, and has for many years been lying idle. Her new vocation, although of a lowly kind, is at anyrate better than pauperism.