The entire amount of voltaic power employed by this company throughout the country consists of 96,000 cells composed of 1,500,000 square inches of copper, and an equal surface of zinc. These are kept in action by the consumption of six tons of acid annually.

In the half year ending 31st December, 1851, the paid up capital of the company was augmented, and the tariff for the transmission of messages was reduced in the large proportion of 50 per cent. upon its original rate. The extent of the line was increased 8 per cent., and that of the conducting wires nearly 35 per cent. The average number of wires upon the lines was augmented by this change from 4 to 5. The effect of this, and the gradual increase from month to month in the next half year was an increase of above 60 per cent. in the amount of business, and nearly 13 per cent. in the receipts, the dividends having been augmented from 4 to 6 per cent.

Among the more recent improvements in the transaction of telegraphic business which have been made by this company, the following may be mentioned.

"Franked message papers," pre-paid, are now issued, procurable at any stationer's. These, with the message filled in, can be dispatched to the office when and how the sender likes; and the company intend very quickly to sell electric stamps, like Queen's heads, which may be stuck on to any piece of paper, and frank its contents without any further trouble. Another very important arrangement for mercantile men is the sending of "remittance messages," by means of which money can be paid in at the central office in London, and, within a few minutes, paid out at Liverpool or Manchester, or by the same means sent up to town with the like dispatch from Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Edinburg, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Hull, York, Plymouth, and Exeter. There is a money-order office in the Lothbury establishment to manage this department, which will, no doubt, in all emergencies, speedily supersede the government moneyorder office, which works through the slower medium of the post-office.

THE MAGNETIC TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

This company has established an underground line of ten wires from London to Liverpool, by Manchester, and one of six wires from Liverpool to Portpatrick, and from thence to Belfast. The line from Belfast to Dublin, and from thence to Cork, with branches, is overground on poles. The underground system is again adopted from Cork to Queenstown.

Lines are in progress of construction along the Waterford and Limerick Railway, and six additional wires are being laid between Dublin and Belfast.

The instruments used are the needle-telegraph, and chiefly the double needle instruments, the current being produced not by galvanic batteries, but by magneto-electrice machines, on the principle patented by Messrs. Henley and Forster, improved in various details by the Messrs. Bright, the secretary and engineer of the company.

The speech delivered by the Queen on opening the parlia mentary session of 1854, was supplied verbatim to the Belfast journals at 2 h. 25 m., to those of Dublin at 2 h. 40 m., and to those of Cork at 3 h. 20 m. on the afternoon of its delivery.

The tariff is regulated upon principles similar to that of the Electric Telegraph Company.

Although this company was not incorporated until the middle of 1852, it has now (July, 1854) upwards of 2,000 miles of telegraphic lines, and 13,000 miles of wire in active operation, and from the rapid progress it has hitherto made, and its power to extend its capital of 300,000l. to 600,000l., it is probable that ere long its scale of operation' will be much further extended, to the great benefit of the public.

SUBMARINE COMPANIES.

The CHARTERED SUBMARINE TELEGRAPH COMPANY, between Great Britain and the Continent, has been formed with a nominal share capital of 150,000l., of which the half has been for the present reserved, the actual amount of the subscribed capital being only 75,000l.

The operations of this company have hitherto (1854) been limited to the establishment of electric eommunication with Belgium, by means of the cable already described, connecting Dover with Ostend.

This company has recently coalesced with the Submarine Telegraph Company.

The SUBMARINE TELEGRAPH COMPANY, between France and England, has a nominal share capital of 100,000l., of which about 75,000l. have been subscribed and expended, the shares representing the remainder being still unallotted. The operations of this company have been limited to the establishment of electric communication between France and England, by means of the submarine cable laid between Dover and Calais.

The EUROPEAN and AMERICAN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH COMPANY has been established to form a link between the cables

of the two submarine companies, and London, Manchester, and Liverpool, and intermediate places. This company has laid underground wires from Dover to London, and from London by Birmingham and Manchester to Liverpool. Of this line, the first section between Dover and London was opened for public correspondence on 1st November, 1852, and has since been in constant operation. Of the remainder, 190 miles were completed on 1st March, 1854, passing through Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Stafford, and Macclesfield, to Manchester. The remaining 30 miles to Liverpool has been since completed, and the entire line is now in operation. The total cost of this line, with its accessories, has been 100,0007.

By an arrangement between this and the Submarine Company, all despatches between the offices of the latter from the Continent are transmitted upon the lines of the former, being delivered and received at the offices of the latter. In fact, so far as the public are concerned, the continental correspondence going or coming by France or Belgium is transmitted by these three companies, acting in common and as a single administration. Offices for correspondence between England and the Continent are established in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Gravesend, Chatham, Canterbury, Deal, Dover, Calais, Paris, Brussels, and Antwerp; despatches, however, being forwarded to England from all continental stations.

The tariff for all single messages between London and the Continent is 8s., in addition to the Continental charge for transmission between the Continental station to or from which the message is transmitted, and Calais or Ostend. If the message is sent to or from any provincial town (except Dover,) there is an additional charge for its transmission between London and such town.

The originators of the novel and bold project of submarine electric communication are stated to be the Messrs. Jacob and J. W. Brett Brothers, of Hanover-square, London. Their first propositions were addressed to the English government, and were directed to the deposition of a submarine cable between Holyhead and Dublin, which they offered to undertake if the government would make them a grant of £20,000, for which, of course, the state would have for public purposes the free use of the line. This offer was declined.

The next propositions, addressed to the French and Belgian governments, were attended with more success. An exclusive privilege was granted by both governments, to which the English government acceded for the use of such submarine conductors as the parties should succeed in depositing, and in consequence of this, the companies were formed, by which the pro

ject has since been realized, and the cables already described between the English coast near Dover and the coasts of France and Belgium, near Calais and Ostend, were laid, by which London, Paris, and Brussels have been brought into and now are in instantaneous electric communication; and through these capitals the whole Continent, wherever telegraphic wires have been established, has been put in connection with the United Kingdom.

The actual celerity with which correspondence can be transmitted between London and parts of Europe more or less remote, may be judged from the fact that the Queen's speech, delivered at the opening of the parliamentary session of 1854, was delivered verbatim and circulated in Paris and in Berlin before her majesty had left the House of Lords.

Messages have been sent from the office in Cornhill to Hamburg, Vienna, and, on certain occasions, to Lemberg, in Gallicia, being a distance of 1,800 miles, their reception being acknowledged by an instantaneous reply.

It is satisfactory to be able to state that measures are being taken by many of the most important continental states to extend the benefits of telegraphic communication by multiplying the stations, by increasing the number of conducting wires, and by lowering the tariff.

The electric communications with the continent may now be considered as secure from all chance of interruption. Accidents from the dragging of anchors may occur, by which any one of the submarine cables may be disabled for a time, but in that case the communication with the continent will be maintained by either or both of the others, such a coincidence as the simultaneous disabling of all the three not being within the bounds of moral possibility.

Art. V.-ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS IN EUROPE.

MEDITERRANEAN, FRENCH, BELGIAN, PRUSSIAN, AUSTRIAN, DANISH, AND THE LINES GENERALLY.

FROM the same author referred to in the former article, we gather the following valuable information relative to the respective telegraphs on the continent, and we also add additional data which we have collected during the year 1855, while travelling through Europe.

MEDITERRANEAN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

"Another company has been formed by the spirit and enterprise of the Messrs. Brett, under the auspices of the governments of France and Piedmont, for connecting the coasts of Europe and Africa by electric wires, in the manner already explained. This company is formed with a share capital of £300,000. An exclusive privilege for fifty years has been granted to it by the two governments, and a guarantee of interest of four per cent. on £180,000 is given by the French, and five per cent. on £120,000 by the Sardinian government.

This enterprise is now (1854) in rapid progress of realization, several hundred men being occupied in constructing the lines across the islands of Sardinia and Corsica. It is expected that the lines to the coast of Africa will be completed and in operation soon after these pages will be in the hands of our readers. While we write these lines, (June, 1854,) we learn that the cable has been laid between Spezzia and Corsica, and between Corsica and Sardinia, and is already in successful operation.

The condition and form of the bottom between coast and coast has been ascertained by soundings, and is found to present no obstacles, being free from any considerable inequalities of depth. The conducting wires within this cable have received a special form, the advantage of which is, that in case of the cable being bent by any accidental inequalities of the bottom, or accidents in the process of its deposition, the wires will not be strained, but will easily yield as a spiral spring would. In the cables already laid, it has been found that some of the wires have been more or less injured from this cause, so as to render their performance unsatisfactory.

The weight of this cable is at the rate of eight tons per mile. It contains six conducting wires, each of which is covered with a coating of gutta-percha, and the whole is surrounded with hemp, properly tarred, so as to form a compact