On Sunday the delicate task of splicing the end of the deep sea cable on board the _Great Eastern_ to the shore end, laid the day before by the _Caroline_, was performed on board the latter vessel. The joint was then immersed in cold water for testing, and the signals proving perfect, the last protection of hemp and outside wire was added and the joint sunk again into the sea that its perfectness as to conductivity and insulation might be ascertained from the extreme end of the whole length of the cable on board the _Great Eastern_. It was past four o’clock when the last of these tests was concluded. By that time the _Great Eastern_, which had always kept moving her paddles at intervals, had forged ahead of the _Caroline_ some two or three miles, paying out the cable slowly as she went on, and leaving the latter vessel the only float by which one portion of the wire was kept above water. The instant, however, the flags went down, the last fastenings which held it to the _Caroline_ were cast adrift, and with a great splash the final joint of the Atlantic Telegraph and the first thirty miles or so of its length went slowly down into the blue water and were out of sight. The _Great Eastern_ fired two guns from her bows at 5.30 to mark the commencement of her journey, and Sir Robert Peel, mounting to the little quarter-deck of the _Hawk_, marked time, while three small but earnest cheers were given by the select company on board to the success of the great enterprise. In return came back a swelling hearty roar from all on the cable ship, as with the last salute of waving hats and caps and handkerchiefs, the tender dropped astern leaving the _Great Eastern_ dipping slowly but steadily ahead at the rate of about six knots an hour. As long as signs could be made, or hats waved, the vessel was anxiously watched; but she soon hid herself in her own smoke, and when the _Hawk_ neared the Irish coast a mere brown cloud in the horizon was all that showed where the greatest ship in the world was steaming away to endeavour to accomplish the realisation of an idea even more important than that which she herself embodies. May she be successful! Several telegrams of a satisfactory character have been received. We give the latest. “_Thursday morning._ The _Great Eastern_ telegraphs that 300 miles were paid out at 5.30 a.m. to-day, and that 300 miles were run at 9.50 a.m. All is going well. The signals are perfect.” THE FENIAN CONSPIRACY (1865). =Source.=--_Annual Register_, 1865; _English History_, pp. 172–174.