The first meeting of shareholders took place on December 9, 1856, when a board of directors was elected. This included the late George Peabody, Samuel Gurney, T. H. Brooking, T. A. Hankey, C. M. (afterward Sir Curtis) Lampson, and Sir William Brown, of Liverpool, no less than nine (representing the interests of different towns) being also directors of the "Magnetic" Company, including Mr. J. W. Brett. The first chairman was Sir William Brown, subsequently succeeded by the Right Hon. James Stuart-Wortley, M.P. Two names may be further specially referred to as destined, in different ways, to have the greatest possible influence in the subsequent development of submarine telegraphy. Mr. (afterward Sir John) Pender, who was then a "Magnetic" director, afterward took a leading part in the vast extensions that have followed to the Mediterranean, India, China, Australasia, the Cape, and Brazil, besides several of the subsequent Atlantic lines. Up to the time of his death he was chairman of something like a dozen, more or less allied, cable companies, representing some £30,000,000 of capital, and mainly organized through his foresight and business ability. Then, again, Prof. William Thomson, of Glasgow University, was a tower of scientific strength on the Board. He had been from the outset an ardent believer in the Atlantic line. His acquisition as a director was destined to prove of vast importance in influencing the development of transoceanic communication, for his subsequent experiments on the cable during 1857-'58 led up to his invention of the mirror galvanometer and signaling instrument, whereby the most attenuated currents of electricity, which are incapable of producing visible signals on other telegraphic apparatus, are so magnified by the use of a reflected beam of light as to afford signals readily legible. (A full description of this invention will be found in its proper place--farther on.) Mr. (afterward Sir Charles) Bright was appointed engineer-in-chief, with Mr. Wildman Whitehouse (who had become closely associated with the project) as electrician, while Mr. Cyrus Field became general manager. * * * * *