How Man Learned to Send Messages.
From the time when man had learned to protect himself from the beasts
of the forest, and thus was able to move about more freely, and live by
himself rather than remain with the tribe, he has found it necessary to
send messages.
One of the most interesting of the early methods for sending messages
was the Indian way of smoke signalling with the simple equipment of a
fire with its rising column of smoke and a blanket or shield. Messages
were sent, relayed, received and answered, at points hundreds of miles
apart. Among savages still found in remote parts of the earth this and
other primitive methods are still in use. In the wilds of Africa to-day
at points where the electric telegraph service has not yet penetrated,
the natives by the simple method of beating drums, which can be heard
from one relay point to another, are able to send the “news of the day”
across the country with marvellous rapidity. In some parts of South
America, the natives long ago discovered that the ground is a good
conductor of sound and send their messages almost at will, making their
signals by tapping against poles which they have planted in the ground
at various points and which constitute both their sending and receiving
instruments.
The Signal Corps in the army uses flags for sending messages, where
the telegraph is not available, the flags being of different colors,
and the signals are produced by waving the flags in different ways.
The army heliograph is also used as a telegraph line--a mirror which
reflects the sun’s rays in a manner understood by a prearranged code.
These and other similar methods are merely elaborations of devices
developed and used by the savages as a solution of the ever present
need of sending a message to some other point.
[Illustration: THE FIRST MESSENGER BOY