Sentence Completion

Complete the sentence with ONE word from the passage for each blank.

The first attempts to send messages across the Atlantic by cable failed repeatedly in the 1850s. The early lines snapped under their own weight or stopped working after only a few weeks. Success finally came in 1866, when a much stronger cable was laid by the largest ship of the age. Once it worked, a message that had taken ten days to cross by boat could be sent in a matter of minutes.

Early Atlantic cables often because of their own weight, but a reliable connection was achieved in .