OCTOBER 3, 1837--MAY 16, 1838
The Caveat.--Work at Morristown.--Judge Vail.--First success.--Resolution
in Congress regarding telegraphs.--Morse's reply.--Illness.--Heaviness of
first instruments.--Successful exhibition in Morristown.--Exhibition in
New York University.--First use of Morse alphabet.--Change from first
form of alphabet to present form.--Trials of an inventor.--Dr. Jackson.--
Slight friction between Morse and Vail.--Exhibition at Franklin
Institute, Philadelphia.--Exhibitions in Washington.--Skepticism of
public.--F.O.J. Smith,--F.L. Pope's estimate of Smith.--Proposal for
government telegraph.--Smith's report.--Departure for Europe.
I have incidentally mentioned the caveat in the preceding chapter, but a
more detailed account of this important step in bringing the invention
into the light of day should, perhaps, be given. The reports in the
newspapers of the activities of others, especially of scientists in
Europe, led Morse to decide that he must at once take steps legally to
protect himself if he did not wish to be distanced in the race. He
accordingly wrote to the Commissioner of Patents, Henry L. Ellsworth, who
had been a classmate of his at Yale, for information as to the form to be
used in applying for a caveat, and, after receiving a cordial reply
enclosing the required form, he immediately set to work to prepare his
caveat. This was in the early part of September, 1887, before he had met
Vail. The rough draft, which is still among his papers, was completed on
September 28, and the finished copy was sent to Washington on October 3,
and the receipt acknowledged by Commissioner Ellsworth on October 6. The
drawing containing the signs for both numbers and letters was attached to
this caveat. Having now safeguarded himself, he was able to give his
whole mind to the perfecting of the mechanical parts of his invention,
and in this he was ably assisted by his new partner, Alfred Vail, and by
Professor Gale.
The next few months were trying ones to both Morse and Vail. It must not
be supposed that the work went along smoothly without a hitch. Many were
the discouragements, and many experiments were tried and then discarded.
To add to the difficulties, Judge Vail, who, of course, was supplying the
cash, piqued by the sneers of his neighbors and noting the feverish
anxiety of his son and of Morse, lost faith, and would have willingly
abandoned the whole enterprise. The two enthusiasts worked steadily on,
however, avoiding the Judge as much as possible, and finally, on the 6th
of January, 1838, they proudly invited him to come to the workshop and
witness the telegraph in operation.
His hopes renewed by their confident demeanor, he hastened down from his
house. After a few words of explanation he handed a slip of paper to his
son on which he had written the words--"A patient waiter is no loser." He
knew that Morse could not possibly know what he had written, and he said:
"If you can send this and Mr. Morse can read it at the other end, I shall
be convinced."
Slowly the message was ticked off, and when Morse handed him the
duplicate of his message, his enthusiasm knew no bounds, and he proposed
to go at once to Washington and urge upon Congress the establishment of a
government line. But the instrument was not yet in a shape to be seen of
all men, and many years were yet to elapse before the legislators of the
country awoke to their opportunity.
Morse and Vail were, of course, greatly encouraged by this first triumph,
and worked on with increased enthusiasm.
Many years after their early struggles, when the telegraph was an
established success and Morse had been honored both at home and abroad,
he thus spoke of his friend:--
"Alfred Vail, then a student in the university, and a young man of great
ingenuity, having heard of my invention, came to my rooms and I explained
it to him, and from that moment he has taken the deepest interest in the
Telegraph. Finding that I was unable to command the means to bring my
invention properly before the public, and believing that he could command
those means through his father and brother, he expressed the belief to
me, and I at once made such an arrangement with him as to procure the
pecuniary means and the skill of these gentlemen. It is to their joint
liberality, but especially to the attention, and skill, and faith in the
final success of the enterprise maintained by Alfred Vail, that is due
the success of my endeavors to bring the Telegraph at that time
creditably before the public."
The idea of telegraphs seems to have been in the air in the year 1837,
for the House of Representatives had passed a resolution on the 3d of
February, 1887, requesting the Secretary of the Treasury, Hon. Levi
Woodbury, to report to the House upon the propriety of establishing a
system of telegraphs for the United States. The term "telegraph" in those
days included semaphores and other visual appliances, and, in fact,
anything by which intelligence could be transmitted to a distance.
The Secretary issued a circular to "Collectors of Customs, Commanders of
Revenue Cutters, and other Persons," requesting information. Morse
received one of these circulars, and in reply sent a long account of his
invention. But so hard to convince were the good people of that day, and
so skeptical and even flippant were most of the members of Congress that
six long years were to elapse, years filled with struggles,
discouragements, and heart-breaking disappointments, before the victory
was won.
Morse had still to contend with occasional fits of illness, for he writes
to his brother Sidney from Morristown on November 8, 1837:--
"You will perhaps be surprised to learn that I came out here to be sick.
I caught a severe cold the day I left New York from the sudden change of
temperature, and was taken down the next morning with one of my bilious
attacks, which, under other treatment and circumstances, might have
resulted seriously. But, through a kind Providence, I have been thrown
among most attentive, and kind, and skilful friends, who have treated me
more like one of their own children than like a stranger. Mrs. Vail has
been a perfect mother to me; our good Nancy Shepard can alone compare
with her. Through her nursing and constant attention I am now able to
leave my room and have been downstairs to-day, and hope to be out in a
few days. This sickness will, of course, detain me a while longer than I
intended, for I must finish the portraits before I return."
This refers to portraits of various members of the Vail family which he
had undertaken to execute while he was in Morristown. Farther on in the
letter he says:--
"The machinery for the Telegraph goes forward daily; slowly but well and
thorough. You will be surprised at the strength and quantity of
machinery, greater, doubtless, than will eventually be necessary, yet it
gives the main points, certainty and accuracy."
It may be well to note here that Morse evidently foresaw that the
machinery constructed by Alfred Vail was too heavy and cumbersome; that
more delicate workmanship would later be called for, and this proved to
be the case. The iron works at Morristown were only adapted to the
manufacture of heavy machinery for ships, etc., and Alfred Vail had had
experience in that class of work only, so that he naturally made the
telegraphic instruments much heavier and more unwieldy than was
necessary. While these answered the purpose for the time being, they were
soon superseded by instruments of greater delicacy and infinitely smaller
bulk made by more skilful hands.
The future looked bright to the sanguine inventor in the early days of
the year 1838, as we learn from the following letter to his brother
Sidney, written on the 13th of January:--
"Mr. Alfred Vail is just going in to New York and will return on Monday
morning. The machinery is at length completed and we have shown it to the
Morristown people with great _éclat_. It is the talk of all the people
round, and the principal inhabitants of Newark made a special excursion
on Friday to see it. The success is complete. We have tried the
experiment of sending a pretty full letter, which I set up from the
numbers given me, transmitting through two miles of wire and deciphered
with but a single unimportant error.
"I am staying out to perfect a modification of my portrule and hope to
see you on Tuesday, or, at the farthest, on Wednesday, when I shall tell
you all about it. The matter looks well now, and I desire to feel
grateful to Him who gives success, and be always prepared for any
disappointment which He in infinite wisdom may have in store."
We see from this letter, and from an account which appeared in the
Morristown "Journal," that in these exhibitions the messages were sent by
numbers with the aid of the cumbersome dictionary which Morse had been at
such pains to compile. Very soon after this, however, as will appear from
what follows, the dictionary was discarded forever, and the Morse
alphabet came into practical use.
The following invitation was sent from the New York University on January
22, 1838:--
"Professor Morse requests the honor of Thomas S. Cummings, Esq., and
family's company in the Geological Cabinet of the University, Washington
Square, to witness the operation of the Electro-Magnetic Telegraph at a
private exhibition of it to a few friends, previous to its leaving the
city for Washington.
"The apparatus will be prepared at precisely twelve o'clock on Wednesday,
24th instant. The time being limited punctuality is specially requested."
Similar invitations were sent to other prominent persons and a very
select company gathered at the appointed hour. That the exhibition was a
success we learn from the following account in the "Journal of Commerce"
of January 29, 1838:--
"THE TELEGRAPH.--We did not witness the operation of Professor Morse's
Electro-Magnetic Telegraph on Wednesday last, but we learn that the
numerous company of scientific persons who were present pronounced it
entirely successful. Intelligence was instantaneously transmitted through
a circuit of TEN MILES, and legibly written on a cylinder at the
extremity of the circuit. The great advantages which must result to the
public from this invention will warrant an outlay on the part of the
Government sufficient to test its practicability as a general means of
transmitting intelligence.
"Professor Morse has recently improved on his mode of marking by which he
can dispense altogether with the telegraphic dictionary, using letters
instead of numbers, and he can transmit ten words per minute, which is
more than double the number which can be transmitted by means of the
dictionary."
A charming and rather dramatic incident occurred at this exhibition which
was never forgotten by those who witnessed it. General Cummings had just
been appointed to a military command, and one of his friends, with this
fact evidently in mind, wrote a message on a piece of paper and, without
showing it to any one else, handed it to Morse. The assembled company was
silent and only the monotonous clicking of the strange instrument was
heard as the message was ticked off in the dots and dashes, and then from
the other end of the ten miles of wire was read out this sentence
pregnant with meaning:--
"Attention, the Universe, by kingdoms right wheel." The name of the man
who indited that message seems not to have been preserved, but, whoever
he was, he must have been gifted with prophetic vision, and he must have
realized that he was assisting at an occasion which was destined to mark
the beginning of a new era in civilization. The attention of the universe
was, indeed, before long attracted to this child of Morse's brain, and
kingdom after kingdom wheeled into line, vying with each other in
admiration and acceptance.
The message was recorded fourfold by means of a newly invented fountain
pen, and was given to General Cummings and preserved by him. It is here
reproduced.
[Illustration: "ATTENTION THE UNNIVERSE! BY KINGDOMS RIGHT WHEEL!"
Facsimile of the First Morse Alphabet Message, now In the National
Museum, Washington]
It will be noticed that the signs for the letters are those, not of the
first form of the alphabet as embodied in the drawing attached to the
caveat, but of the finally adopted code. This has led some historians,
notably Mr. Franklin Leonard Pope, to infer that some mistake has been
made in giving out this as a facsimile of this early message; that the
letters should have been those of the earlier alphabet. I think, however,
that this is but an added proof that Morse devised the first form of the
code long before he met Vail, and that the changes to the final form, a
description of which I have given, were made by Morse in 1837, or early
in 1838, as soon as he became convinced of the superiority of the
alphabetic mode, in plenty of time to have been used in this exhibition.
The month of January, 1838, was a busy one at Morristown, for Morse and
Vail were bending all their energies toward the perfecting and completion
of the instruments, so that a demonstration of the telegraph could be
given in Washington at as early a date as possible. Morse refers
feelingly to the trials and anxieties of an inventor in a letter to a
friend, dated January 22, 1838:--
"I have just returned from nearly six weeks' absence at Morristown, New
Jersey, where I have been engaged in the superintendence of the making of
my Telegraph for Washington.
"Be thankful, C----, that you are not an inventor. Invention may seem an
easy way to _fame_, or, what is the same thing to many, _notoriety_,
different as are in reality the two objects. But it is far otherwise. I,
indeed, desire the first, for true fame implies well-deserving, but I
have no wish for the latter, which yet seems inseparable from it.
"The condition of an inventor is, indeed, not enviable. I know of but one
condition that renders it in any degree tolerable, and that is the
reflection that his fellow-men may be benefited by his discoveries. In
the outset, if he has really made a _discovery_, which very word implies
that it was before unknown to the world, he encounters the incredulity,
the opposition, and even the sneers of many, who look upon him with a
kind of pity, as a little beside himself if not quite mad. And, while
maturing his invention, he has the comfort of reflection, in all the
various discouragements he meets with from petty failures, that, should
he by any means fail in the grand result, he subjects himself rather to
the ridicule than the sympathy of his acquaintances, who will not be slow
in attributing his failure to a want of that common sense in which, by
implication, they so much abound, and which preserves them from the
consequences of any such delusions.
"But you will, perhaps, think that there is an offset in the honors and
emoluments that await the successful inventor, one who has really
demonstrated that he has made an important discovery. This is not so.
Trials of another kind are ready for him after the appropriate
difficulties of his task are over. Many stand ready to snatch the prize,
or at least to claim a share, so soon as the success of an invention
seems certain, and honor and profit alone remain to be obtained.
"This long prelude, C----, brings me at the same time to the point of my
argument and to my excuse for my long silence. My argument goes to prove
that, unless there is a benevolent consideration in our discoveries, one
which enables us to rejoice that others are benefited even though we
should suffer loss, our happiness from any honor awarded to a successful
invention is exposed to constant danger from the designs of the
unprincipled. My excuse is that, ever since the receipt of your most
welcome letter, I have been engaged in preparing to repel a threatened
invasion of my rights to the invention of the Telegraph by a
fellow-passenger from France, one from whom I least expected any such
insidious design. The attempt startled me and put me on my guard, and set
me to the preparation for any attack. I have been compelled for some
weeks to use my pen only for this purpose, and have written much in the
hope of preventing the public exposure of my antagonist; but I fear my
labor will be vain on this point, from what I hear and the tone in which
he writes. I have no fear for myself, being now amply prepared with
evidence to repel any attempt which may be made to sustain any claim he
may prefer to a share with me in the invention of the Telegraph."
I have already shown that this claim of Dr. Jackson's was proved to be
but the hallucination of a disordered brain, and it will not be necessary
to go into the details of the controversy.
These were anxious and nerve-racking days for both Morse and Vail, and it
is small wonder that there should have been some slight friction. Vail in
his private correspondence makes some mention of this. For instance, in a
letter to his brother George, of January 22, 1838, he says:--
"We received the machine on Thursday morning, and in an hour we made the
first trial, which did not succeed, nor did it with perfect success until
Saturday--all which time Professor M. was rather _unwell_. To-morrow we
shall make our first exhibition, and continue it until Wednesday, when we
must again box up. Professor M. has received a letter from Mr. Patterson
inviting us to exhibit at Philadelphia, and has answered it, but has said
nothing to me about his intentions. He is altogether inclined to operate
in his own name, so much so that he has had printed five hundred blank
invitations in his own name at your expense."
On the other hand, this same George Vail, writing to Morse on January 26,
1838, asks him to "bear with A., which I have no doubt you will. He is
easily vexed. Trusting to your universal coolness, however, there is
nothing to fear. Keep him from running ahead too fast."
Again writing to his brother George from Washington, on February 20,
1838, Alfred says: "In regard to Professor M. calling me his
'_assistant_,' this is also settled, and he has said as much as to
apologize for using the term."
Why Vail should have objected to being called Morse's assistant, I cannot
quite understand, for he was so designated in the contract later made
with the Government; but Morse was evidently willing to humor him in
this.
I have thought it best to refer to these little incidents partly in the
interest of absolute candor, partly to emphasize the nervous tension
under which both were working at that time. That there was no lasting
resentment in the mind of Vail is amply proved by the following extract
from a long letter written by him on March 19, 1838:--
"The great expectations I had on my return home of going into partnership
with George, founded, or semi-founded, on the promises made by my father,
have burst. I am again on vague promises for three months, and they
resting upon the success of the printing machine.
"I feel, Professor Morse, that, if I am ever worth anything, it will be
wholly attributable to your kindness. I now should have no _earthly_
prospect of happiness and domestic bliss had it not been for what you
have done. For which I shall ever remember [you] with the liveliest
emotions of gratitude, whether it is eventually successful or not."
Aside from the slight friction to which I have referred, and which was
most excusable under the circumstances, the joint work on the telegraph
proceeded harmoniously. The invitation from Mr. Patterson, to exhibit the
instrument before the Committee of Science and Arts of the Franklin
Institute of Philadelphia, was accepted. The exhibition took place on
February 8, and was a pronounced success, and the committee, in
expressing their gratification, voiced the hope that the Government would
provide the funds for an experiment on an adequate scale.
From Philadelphia Morse proceeded to Washington accompanied by Vail,
confidently believing that it would only be necessary to demonstrate the
practicability of his invention to the country's legislators assembled in
Congress, in order to obtain a generous appropriation to enable him
properly to test it. But he had not taken into account that trait of
human nature which I shall dignify by calling it "conservatism," in order
not to give it a harder name.
The room of the Committee on Commerce was placed at his disposal, and
there he hopefully strung his ten miles of wire and connected them with
his instruments. Outwardly calm but inwardly nervous and excited, as he
realized that he was facing a supreme moment in his career, he patiently
explained to all who came, Congressmen, men of science, representatives
of foreign governments, and hard-headed men of business, the workings of
the instrument and proved its feasibility. The majority saw and wondered,
but went away unconvinced. On February 21, President Martin Van Buren and
his entire Cabinet, at their own special request, visited the room and
saw the telegraph in operation. But no action was taken by Congress; the
time was not yet ripe for the general acceptance of such a revolutionary
departure from the slow-going methods of that early period. While
individuals here and there grasped the full significance of what the
mysterious ticking of that curious instrument foretold, they were vastly
in the minority. The world, through its representatives in the capital
city of the United States, remained incredulous.
Among those who at once recognized the possibilities of the invention was
Francis O.J. Smith, member of Congress from Portland, Maine, and chairman
of the Committee on Commerce. He was a lawyer of much shrewdness and a
man of great energy, and he very soon offered to become pecuniarily
interested in the invention. Morse was, unfortunately, not a keen judge
of men. Scrupulously honest and honorable himself, he had an almost
childlike faith in the integrity of others, and all through his life he
fell an easy victim to the schemes of self-seekers. In this case a man of
more acute intuition would have hesitated, and would have made some
enquiries before allying himself with one whose ideas of honor proved
eventually to be so at variance with his own. Smith did so much in later
years to injure Morse, and to besmirch his fame and good name, that I
think it only just to give the following estimate of his character, made
by the late Franklin Leonard Pope in an article contributed to the
"Electrical World" in 1895:--
"A sense of justice compels me to say that the uncorroborated statements
of F.O.J. Smith, in any matter affecting the credit or honor due to
Professor Morse, should be allowed but little weight.... For no better
reason than that Morse in 1843-1844 courteously but firmly refused to be
a party to a questionable scheme devised by Smith for the irregular
diversion into his own pocket of a portion of the governmental
appropriation of $30,000 for the construction of the experimental line,
he ever after cherished toward the inventor the bitterest animosity; a
feeling which he took no pains to conceal. Many of his letters to him at
that time, and for many years afterward, were couched in studiously
insulting language, which must have been in the highest degree irritating
to a sensitive artistic temperament like that of Morse.
"It probably by no means tended to mollify the disposition of such a man
as Smith to find that Morse, in reply to these covert sneers and open
insinuations, never once lost his self-control, nor permitted himself to
depart from the dignified tone of rejoinder which becomes a gentleman in
his dealings with one who, in his inmost nature, was essentially a
blackguard."
However, it is an old saying that we must "give the devil his due," and
the cloven foot did not appear at first. On the other hand, a man of
business acumen and legal knowledge was greatly needed at this stage of
the enterprise, and Smith possessed them both. Morse was so grateful to
find any one with faith enough to be willing to invest money in the
invention; and to devote his time and energy to its furtherance, that he
at once accepted Smith's offer, and he was made a partner and given a
one-fourth interest, Morse retaining nine sixteenths, Vail two
sixteenths, and Professor Gale, also admitted as a partner, being
allotted one sixteenth. It was characteristic of Morse that he insisted,
before signing the contract, that Smith should obtain leave of absence
from Congress for the remainder of the term, and should not stand for
reelection. It was agreed that Smith should accompany Morse to Europe as
soon as possible and endeavor to secure patents in foreign countries,
and, if successful, the profits were to be divided differently, Morse
receiving eight sixteenths, Smith five, Vail two, and Gale one.
In spite of the incredulity of the many, Morse could not help feeling
encouraged, and in a long letter to Smith, written on February 15, 1838,
proposing an experiment of one hundred miles, he thus forecasts the
future and proposes an intelligent plan of government control:--
"If no insurmountable obstacles present themselves in a distance of one
hundred miles, none may be expected in one thousand or in ten thousand
miles; and then will be presented for the consideration of the Government
the propriety of completely organizing this _new telegraphic system as a
part of the Government_, attaching it to some department already
existing, or creating a new one which may be called for by the
accumulating duties of the present departments.
"It is obvious, at the slightest glance, that this mode of instantaneous
communication must inevitably become an instrument of immense power, to
be wielded for good or for evil, as it shall be properly or improperly
directed. In the hands of a company of speculators, who should monopolize
it for themselves, it might be the means of enriching the corporation at
the expense of the bankruptcy of thousands; and even in the hands of
Government alone it might become the means of working vast mischief to
the Republic.
"In considering these prospective evils, I would respectfully suggest a
remedy which offers itself to my mind. Let the sole right of using the
Telegraph belong, in the first place, to the Government, who should
grant, for a specified sum or bonus, to any individual or company of
individuals who may apply for it, and under such restrictions and
regulations as the Government may think proper, the right to lay down a
communication between any two points for the purpose of transmitting
intelligence, and thus would be promoted a general competition. The
Government would have a Telegraph of its own, and have its modes of
communicating with its own officers and agents, independent of private
permission or interference with and interruption to the ordinary
transmissions on the private telegraphs. Thus there would be a system of
checks and preventives of abuse operating to restrain the action of this
otherwise dangerous power within those bounds which will permit only the
good and neutralize the evil. Should the Government thus take the
Telegraph solely under its own control, the revenue derived from the
bonuses alone, it must be plain, will be of vast amount.
"From the enterprising character of our countrymen, shown in the manner
in which they carry forward any new project which promises private or
public advantage, it is not visionary to suppose that it would not be
long ere the whole surface of this country would be channelled for those
_nerves_ which are to diffuse, with the speed of thought, a knowledge of
all that is occurring throughout the land, making, in fact, one
neighborhood of the whole country.
"If the Government is disposed to test this mode of telegraphic
communication by enabling me to give it a fair trial for one hundred
miles, I will engage to enter into no arrangement to dispose of my
rights, as the inventor and patentee for the United States, to any
individual or company of individuals, previous to offering it to the
Government for such a just and reasonable compensation as shall be
mutually agreed upon."
We have seen that Morse was said to be a hundred years ahead of his time
as an artist. From the sentences above quoted it would appear that he was
far in advance of his contemporaries in some questions of national
policy, for the plan outlined by him for the proper governmental control
of a great public utility, like the telegraph, it seems to me, should
appeal to those who, at the present time, are agitating for that very
thing. Had the legislators and the people of 1838 been as wise and
clear-headed as the poor artist-inventor, a great leap forward in
enlightened statecraft would have been undertaken at a cost inconceivably
less than would now be the case. Competent authorities estimate that to
purchase the present telegraph lines in this country at their market
valuation would cost the Government in the neighborhood of $500,000,000;
to parallel them would cost some $25,000,000. The enormous difference in
these two sums represents what was foretold by Morse would happen if the
telegraph should become a monopoly in the hands of speculators. The
history of the telegraph monopoly is too well known to be more than
alluded to here, but it is only fair to Morse to state that he had sold
all his telegraph stock, and had retired from active participation in the
management of the different companies, long before the system of
stock-watering began which has been carried on to the present day.
And for what sum could the Government have kept this great invention
under its own control? It is on record that Morse offered, in 1844, after
the experimental line between Washington and Baltimore had demonstrated
that the telegraph was a success, to sell all the rights in his invention
to the Government for $100,000, and would have considered himself amply
remunerated.
But the legislators and the people of 1838, and even those of 1844, were
not wise and far-sighted; they failed utterly to realize what a
magnificent opportunity had been offered to them for a mere song; and
this in spite of the fact that the few who did glimpse the great future
of the telegraph painted it in glowing terms.
It is true that the House of Representatives had passed the resolution
referred to earlier in this chapter, but that is as far as they went for
several years. On the 6th of April, 1838, Mr. F.O.J. Smith made a long
report on the petition of Morse asking for an appropriation sufficient to
enable him to test his invention adequately. In the course of this report
Mr. Smith indulged in the following eulogistic words:--
"It is obvious, however, that the influence of this invention over the
political, commercial, and social relations of the people of this widely
extended country, looking to nothing beyond, will, in the event of
success, of itself amount to a revolution unsurpassed in moral grandeur
by any discovery that has been made in the arts and sciences, from the
most distant period to which authentic history extends to the present
day. With the means of almost instantaneous communication of intelligence
between the most distant points of the country, and simultaneously
between any given number of intermediate points which this invention
contemplates, space will be, to all practical purposes of information,
completely annihilated between the States of the Union, as also between
the individual citizens thereof. The citizen will be invested with, and
reduce to daily and familiar use, an approach to the HIGH ATTRIBUTE OP
UBIQUITY in a degree that the human mind, until recently, has hardly
dared to contemplate seriously as belonging to human agency, from an
instinctive feeling of religious reverence and reserve on a power of such
awful grandeur."
In the face of these enthusiastic, if somewhat stilted, periods the
majority of his colleagues remained cold, and no appropriation was voted.
Morse, however, was prepared to meet with discouragements, for he wrote
to Vail on March 15:--
"Everything looks encouraging, but I need not say to you that in this
world a continued course of prosperity is not a rational expectation. We
shall, doubtless, find troubles and difficulties in store for us, and it
is the part of true wisdom to be prepared for whatever may await us. If
our hearts are right we shall not be taken by surprise. I see nothing now
but an unclouded prospect, for which let us pay to Him who shows it to us
the homage of grateful and obedient hearts, with most earnest prayers for
grace to use prosperity aright."
This was written while there was still hope that Congress might take some
action at that session, and Morse was optimistic. On March 31, he thus
reports progress to Vail:--
"I write you a hasty line to say, in the first place, that I have
overcome all difficulties in regard to a portrule, and have invented one
which will be perfect. It is very simple, and will not take much time or
expense to make it. Mr. S. has incorporated it into the specification for
the patent. Please, therefore, not to proceed with the type or portrule
as now constructed: I will see you on my return and explain it in season
for you to get one ready for us.
"I find it a most arduous and tedious process to adjust the
specification. I have been engaged steadily for three days with Mr. S.,
and have not yet got half through, but there is one consolation, when
done it will be well done. The drawings, I find on enquiry, would cost
you from forty to fifty dollars if procured from the draughtsman about
the Patent Office. I have, therefore, determined to do them myself and
save you that sum."
The portrule, referred to above, was a device for sending automatically
messages which were recorded permanently on the tape at the other end of
the line. It worked well enough, but it was soon superseded by the key
manipulated by hand, as this was much simpler and the dots and dashes
could be sent more rapidly. It is curious to note, however, that down to
the present day inventors have been busy in an effort to devise some
mechanism by which messages could be sent automatically, and consequently
more rapidly than by hand, which was Morse's original idea, but, to the
best of my knowledge, no satisfactory solution of the problem has yet
been found.
Morse was now preparing to go to Europe with Smith to endeavor to secure
patents abroad, and, while he had put in his application for a patent in
this country, he requested that the issuing of it should be held back
until his return, so that a publication on this side should not injure
his chances abroad.
All the partners were working under high pressure along their several
lines to get everything in readiness for a successful exhibition of the
telegraph in Europe. Vail sent a long letter to Morse on April 18,
detailing some of the difficulties which he was encountering, and Morse
answered on the 24th:--
"I write in greatest haste, just to say that the boxes have safely
arrived, and we shall proceed immediately to examine into the
difficulties which have troubled you, but about which we apprehend no
serious issue....
"If you can possibly get the circular portrule completed before we go it
will be a great convenience, not to say an indispensable matter, for I
have just learned so much of Wheatstone's Telegraph as to be pretty well
persuaded that my superiority over him will be made evident more by the
rapidity with which I can make the portrule work than in almost any other
particular."
At last every detail had been attended to, and in a postscript to a
letter of April 28 he says: "We sail on the 16th of May for Liverpool in
the ship Europe, so I think you will have time to complete circular
portrule. Try, won't you?"