Payment of dividends delayed.--Concern for welfare of his country.-- Indignation at corrupt proposal from California.--Kendall hampered by the Vails.--Proposition by capitalists to purchase patent rights.--Cyrus W. Field.--Newfoundland Electric Telegraph Company.--Suggestion of Atlantic Cable.--Hopes thereby to eliminate war.--Trip to Newfoundland.--Temporary failure.--F.O.J. Smith continues to give trouble.--Financial conditions improve.--Morse and his wife sail for Europe.--Fêted in London.-- Experiments with Dr. Whitehouse.--Mr. Brett.--Dr. O'Shaughnessy and the telegraph in India.--Mr. Cooke.--Charles R. Leslie.--Paris.--Hamburg.-- Copenhagen.--Presentation to king.--Thorwaldsen Museum.--Oersted's daughter.--St. Petersburg.--Presentation to Czar at Peterhoff CHAPTER XXXVI AUGUST 23, 1856--SEPTEMBER 15, 1858 Berlin.--Baron von Humboldt.--London, successful cable experiments with Whitehouse and Bright.--Banquet at Albion Tavern.--Flattering speech of W. F. Cooke.--Returns to America.--Troubles multiply.--Letter to the Honorable John Y. Mason on political matters.--Kendall urges severing of connection with cable company.--Morse, nevertheless, decides to continue.--Appointed electrician of company.--Sails on U.S.S. Niagara.-- Letter from Paris on the crinoline.--Expedition sails from Liverpool.-- Queenstown harbor.--Accident to his leg.--Valencia.--Laying of cable begun.--Anxieties.--Three successful days.--Cable breaks.--Failure.-- Returns to America.--Retires from cable enterprise.--Predicts in 1858 failure of apparently successful laying of cable.--Sidney E. Morse.--The Hare and the Tortoise.--European testimonial: considered niggardly by Kendall.--Decorations, medals, etc., from European nations.--Letter of thanks to Count Walewski CHAPTER XXXVII SEPTEMBER 3. 1858--SEPTEMBER 21, 1863 Visits Europe again with a large family party.--Regrets this.--Sails for Porto Rico with wife and two children.--First impressions of the tropics.--Hospitalities.--His son-in-law's plantation.--Death of Alfred Vail.--Smithsonian exonerates Henry.--European honors to Morse.--First line of telegraph in Porto Rico.--Banquet.--Returns home.--Reception at Poughkeepsie.--Refuses to become candidate for the Presidency.--Purchases New York house.--F.O.J. Smith claims part of European gratuity.--Succeeds through legal technicality.--Visit of Prince of Wales.--Duke of Newcastle.--War clouds.--Letters on slavery, etc.--Matthew Vassar.-- Efforts as peacemaker.--Foresees Northern victory.--Gloomy forebodings.-- Monument to his father.--Divides part of European gratuity with widow of Vail.--Continued efforts in behalf of peace.--Bible arguments in favor of slavery CHAPTER XXXVIII FEBRUARY 26, 1864--NOVEMBER 8, 1867