S. F. B. MORSE.

The message was sent over the wires by a young lady operator and Mr.

Morse transmitted the signature.

The writer was at Brockville, Ont., at the time and received this now

historic message simultaneously with hundreds, perhaps thousands of

others.

Mr. Morse did not long survive this dramatic event. It was his last

public appearance but one previous to his death.

[Illustration: O. S. WOOD.]

_O. S. Wood, Esq._

One of the most notable telegraph men in America, the first pupil of

Professor Morse and the first to inaugurate an electric telegraph

system in Canada on an extensive scale.

Born in 1817, near Ithaca, N.Y., after a grammar school and collegiate

course, he studied and became a civil engineer, and was for some time

employed in that capacity by the New York State Government.

When Mr. Morse was exhibiting his telegraph at Washington, in 1844,

Mr. Wood was induced to join the inventor, and became his associate in

constructing and working the experimental line between Washington and

Baltimore, and the first to operate the line when opened for public

business and afterwards engaged in constructing telegraph lines in

other directions.

Early in 1847, when the Montreal Telegraph Company was formed, his

services were sought, and he was appointed its first General Manager.

By the end of this year a telegraph line was in operation between

Montreal and Toronto, and to Quebec the following year, and in time

extended throughout the whole country.

Owing to Mr. Wood’s able administration the Company became one of the

most important institutions in Canada.

After a long and successful career Mr. Wood retired in 1865, carrying

with him the good will of the public and the respect and esteem of the

directors and employees of the Company.

He subsequently engaged in other telegraphic enterprises in the United

States, in all of which he was equally fortunate.

After amassing a considerable fortune he retired from active business

pursuits many years ago, and is now spending the evening of his days at

a quiet suburb of New York.

He is a man of commanding presence, tall, dignified and face bearing a

very striking resemblance to Washington.

He possesses a highly cultured mind, a humane and benevolent

disposition, coupled with an agreeable and attractive manner.

He is, and was always, a patriotic American citizen. During his sojourn

in Canada he never relinquished his birthright.

The name of Orrin S. Wood will be long remembered by telegraph men

as the first telegraphist on the continent of America, a distinction

worthy of record in the annals of telegraphy, and is the oldest

telegraph man living at the present time in America.

Long may he be spared is the fervent hope of the telegraph

fraternity.

[Illustration: SIR HUGH ALLAN.]

_Sir Hugh Allan._

The name of this gentleman will be remembered in connection with the

Montreal Telegraph Company. He was its President from 1851 until the

day of his death.

It was largely through his efforts in conjunction with Mr. Wood that

the telegraph system was extended to the most remote points in Canada.

It may not be generally known that, although a very busy man, he

acquired a knowledge of telegraphy and became an expert telegraphist.

He had a private wire erected from his palatial residence, Ravenscrag,

and connected with the general telegraph office, and by this means kept

in constant touch with the inward and outward movements of his large

steamship fleet.

He was for many years a director of the Western Union Telegraph

Company, and one of the early contributors to the first Atlantic cable,

and for a time one of its directors, but Sir Hugh Allan will be better

known as the originator of the Montreal Ocean Steamship Company (now

known as the Allan Line.)

There was no limit to his superabundant energy; no important enterprise

was thought of unless his name and influence was sought. He was

president or director in nearly every financial or industrial company

in Montreal. No one before or since has occupied such a commanding

position in business life in Canada.

He received the honor of knighthood from the late Queen personally in

recognition of his great public services; this honor was never more

worthily bestowed.

Sir Hugh Allan was a native of Scotland, born at Saltcoats, Ayrshire,

Sept. 29, 1810. His death took place in Edinburgh while there on a

visit Dec. 9, 1882.

The wonder is that some enduring mark of public appreciation has not

been formulated to perpetuate the name of one who has done so much for

the land of his adoption.

A statue on Dominion Square would be a fitting momento.

“Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And departing leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time.”

[Illustration: JAMES DAKERS.]

_James Dakers, Esq._

Born in Forfar, Scotland, in 1811, on completing his studies at the

parochial school, he served his apprenticeship in an attorney’s office

in his native town, and came to Canada in 1840.

He entered the service of the Montreal Telegraph Company shortly after

its organization as Secretary. When Mr. Wood separated from the Company

in 1865, Mr. Dakers was appointed Manager of the Eastern division,

acting as Secretary in addition. Owing to his faithful and energetic

services the success of the company was greatly enhanced.

“Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy might,” seemed

to be his guiding principle. Like the restless sea, always moving, if

not engaged at his own special work, he would repair to the operating

department and give a helping hand, here and there, where most needed,

then to the receiving counter attending to customers.

In the early telegraph days during a pressure of business, he not

infrequently would take a handful of messages and deliver on his way

to meals, and kept a vigilant eye on every department of the company’s

operations.

When the Montreal Telegraph Company leased its business to the Great

North Western Company, in 1881, he was not in accord with the

directors in this move, and resigned, retaining, however, the good will

of the shareholders, many of whom shared his views, and the respect of

the business community by whom he was long and favourably known.

The following tribute to his worth by the late Rev. Dr. Ormiston in a

letter to a friend is deserving a place here:

“James Dakers is in many respects a remarkable man. Notwithstanding

many disadvantages, he has fairly earned the high position of

influence, independence and usefulness which he now occupies. He

is characterized by indomitable energy, great force of character,

unyielding tenacity of purpose, his intellect is of a high order,

and eminently practical, inflexibly upright in all his dealings,

conscientiously faithful to all his obligations, punctual and thorough

in the performance of all his duties, incapable of meanness, his word

as good as his bond, he is a man universally trusted; his sympathies

with the suffering and the struggling are wide and tender.

“Many bless him for his wise counsels and efficient aid; the extent

and genuineness of his Christian charity is as manifest as the

steadfastness of his religious life; as a true friend, he is one among

a thousand.

“Were I asked by a young man for a model of a man, earnest and

indefatigable, pure and firm in principle, exemplary and consistent in

character, desirable and valuable in friendship, I would not hesitate

to point him to James Dakers, of Montreal.”

This was a very high testimonial of the character of Mr. Dakers by one

who knew him intimately for many years.

After giving up his connection with telegraph interests, with which he

had been so long associated, he lived in retirement until his death,

which occurred on April 15, 1887.

[Illustration: H. P. DWIGHT.]

_H. P. Dwight, Esq._

For the long period of fifty-six years Mr. Dwight has been continuously

engaged in the telegraph service, and only quite recently retired from

the more active duties of his calling.

Born on December 23, 1828, at Belleville, Jefferson County, N.Y., he

entered the service of the Montreal Telegraph Company in 1847, the

year of its organization, and placed in charge of the Belleville,

Ontario, Office, where he remained for a time, and afterwards employed

at the Head Office, Montreal. When the wires connected Toronto he was

appointed agent there and soon made superintendent of the Western

Section. In 1881, when the Montreal Telegraph Company leased its

business to the Great North Western Telegraph Company he was appointed

general manager of the latter.

When Mr. Wiman resigned the presidency of that company, Mr. Dwight

succeeded him and filled the dual positions until a few months ago,

when he resigned the general managership, the duties being too onerous

and exacting for one at his time of life.

Mr. Dwight is associated with many other enterprises. He is president

of the Canadian General Electric Company and a director of the Toronto

and London Electric Company, president of Birkbeck Investment

Company and chairman of the Governors of the Royal Humane Society. He

is a man of fine physique, has lived a regular and careful life, which

accounts for the vigorous and evergreen appearance at his time of life.

He is a keen sportsman and a devoted disciple of Isaac Walton. Every

year he finds time to spend a few weeks in the happy summer-time, in

the wilds of Northern Ontario, in quest of the speckled beauties of

that region, or in the lower St. Lawrence, seeking the haunts of the

lordly salmon in the Restigouche or other famous streams. In closing

we wish him long life and many years to indulge in this his favorite

recreation.

[Illustration: WILLIAM CASSILS.]

_William Cassils, Esq._

Born in the village of Renton, Dunbartonshire, on June 25, 1832,

after acquiring a rudimentary training in the parochial school, and

equipped for a business career, he engaged in a commercial house for

a time, but his prospects were not equal to his youthful ambition,

and his attention was directed to Canada wherein he had relatives and

was encouraged to join them. He arrived at Montreal in 1852. Shortly

after his arrival he entered the service of the Montreal Telegraph

Company; his abilities were soon recognized--within a short time he was

appointed manager of the Quebec Office, the second in importance to

Montreal, and later was made superintendent of the Eastern Division;

while in this position he had the wires extended to Father Point, the

extreme eastern limit of the Company’s system at that time.

In 1865 he left the telegraph service to engage in a wholesale business

in Montreal, but his heart was never quite divorced from his first

calling.

In 1876 he organized the Canadian District Telegraph Company and became

its president.

When the telephone first made its appearance he foresaw its great

possibilities, when he, in association with others, established in 1878

the first telephone exchange in Canada, which was afterwards merged

with the Bell Telephone System.

He was a Director of the Montreal Telephone Company, President of

the Canada Central Railway and administrator of the St. Lawrence and

Ottawa Railway, both of which are now linked to the Canadian Pacific

Railway; he was also President of the Dominion Transport Company, but

his interest and sympathies were always keenly directed to the progress

and development of telegraphy. He himself was an expert telegraphist

and always took a lively interest in the welfare and success of the

telegraph fraternity. He was amiable in manner, kind in disposition

and generous to a fault; his purse was ever open to the needy or

unfortunate.

He possessed a fine tenor voice in his young days. When at social

gatherings he rendered the songs of his native land with a sweetness

and pathos few could equal. He took a great interest in young men, and

many were indebted to him for advice and assistance in beginning the

battle of life.

He passed away at a comparatively early age (in his fifty-ninth year)

on December 25, 1891.

“Howe’er it be, it seems to me

’Tis only noble to be good

Kind hearts are more than coronets,

And simple faith than Norman blood.”

[Illustration: JAMES POUSTIE.]

_James Poustie, Esq._

Born at Montrose, Scotland, in 1830. While yet an infant, his parents

came to Canada in the historic brig “Favorite,” owned and commanded by

the father of the late Sir Hugh Allan.

Mr. Poustie is the pioneer telegraph line builder of Canada. He

was engaged by the Montreal Telegraph Company shortly after its

organization.

After the contractors had finished the line between Montreal and

Toronto, all line extensions thereafter were under his personal

supervision.

He would start early in the spring with gangs of linemen, equipped with

tools and provisions, live under canvas during the building season and

return in the fall to prepare for the next year’s operations. This

continued on from one year to another until the whole country was

covered with a network of wires.

In purchasing material Mr. Poustie was a shrewd and careful buyer,

getting the very best to be had at the lowest figure. In hiring labor,

while paying liberal wages, he took good care to receive in return a

fair day’s work for a fair day’s wage from his men. Though stern and

exacting, he was not unkind. His gangs of men were chiefly French

Canadians; he knew their language and could apply it forcibly, if

not elegantly, when circumstances required it.

His men were devoted to him and worked like beavers. It is no

exaggeration to say that owing to inherent shrewdness in handling his

men and purchasing supplies the lines were constructed at half the cost

of similar work in the United States; this fact the Company soon became

cognizant of.

Finally the system became so extensive as to demand a division of

labor and responsibility when foremen were placed in charge of

important sections of the line, and Mr. Poustie directed operations

from headquarters at Montreal and became General Superintendent of

Construction.

This position he held for many years. At length he resigned to rest

for a while. He is at present associated with R. G. Reid & Co., of

Newfoundland, in their Montreal office.

Mr. Poustie is a man liberally endowed with good common sense, dislikes

humbug or insincerity, a keen observer of men and possesses a retentive

memory and a happy vein of dry caustic humor with a merry twinkle in

his clear penetrating greyish blue eyes. He can relate many interesting

tales generally, from a humorous point of view, in reference to his

own varied experience, all of which are well worth listening to. He is

still vigorous and hearty, and we hope has many years before him. Like

Yorick, “A man of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.”

[Illustration: CHAS. R. HOSMER.]

_Charles R. Hosmer, Esq._

“Some are born great. Some achieve greatness. Some have greatness

thrust upon them.” It is no difficult task to determine to which class

Mr. Hosmer belongs.

Born some fifty years ago in the little French Canadian village, Coteau

Landing. On receiving an elementary training at the village school he

turned his attention to telegraphy, and, instructed in its mysteries by

the operator and agent at the railway station there, qualifying as an

operator he secured a position with the Montreal Telegraph Company and

was in its employ for some years.

When the Dominion Telegraph Company came into being he entered the

service and rose step by step to the highest position attainable.

When that Company merged with the Great North Western, Mr. Hosmer was

offered and accepted the offices of President and General Manager of

the Canada Mutual Telegraph Company, then recently organized. A few

years later when the Canadian Pacific Railway Company were about to

establish a commercial telegraph business, he was made General Manager,

and held this for some thirteen or fourteen years, during which period

he was very successful in organizing and carrying on this branch of

the Company’s business. He was also a leading factor in exploiting

the Commercial Cable and the Postal Telegraph Cable Companies; he is

a Vice-President of the former and a director of the Canadian Pacific

Railway, director of the Merchants’ Bank and many other financial

concerns; President of the Ogilvie Milling Company, said to be the

largest of the kind existing; a member of St. James’ Club and at

one time President; he is also a member of Mount Royal (yclept the

millionaires’ club).

Mr. Hosmer is a recognized leader in financial circles in Montreal; he

is possessed of a cheery, bright and winning personality, affects no

airs, gracious in manner with a pleasant word for all.

Although not actively connected with the Canadian Pacific Telegraph

System, his guiding hand is always reached.

He is yet a young man, full of life and energy, there is no saying the

number and kind of activities may further engage his busy and restless

mind.

His motto seems to be:

“Still achieving, still pursuing,

And a heart for any fate.”

[Illustration: HON. GEO. A. COX.]

_Hon. George Albertus Cox._

Born at Colborne, Ont., May 7, 1840, he commenced business life there

as an operator in the service of the Montreal Telegraph Company.

After two years spent in the office of his native town he was in May,

1858, placed in charge of the Peterboro office of the Company and in

addition a few years later was made agent of the Canadian Express

Company.

He took an active part in the municipal, educational and commercial

interests of the town and was for seven years its mayor.

In 1888 he left Peterboro, and from that time has resided in Toronto

where there is a wider scope for his energies.

He was appointed to the Senate in 1896 by Lord Aberdeen.

Mr. Cox is a strong temperance man and a warm supporter of the

Methodist Church, of which he is a member; is Bursar of Victoria

University and President of the Ladies’ College, Whitby; President of

the Bank of Commerce, the Canada Life Insurance Company, the Western

Fire Insurance and on the directorate of many other companies; is one

of the leading financiers in the Dominion.

His name has been publicly mentioned as one likely to receive honors

at the hands of the King at no distant date. As “coming events cast

their shadows before,” this is not at all improbable.

Senator Cox was one of a syndicate to build the Canadian Pacific

Railway in opposition to the syndicate formed at Montreal. His name is

now prominently connected with the Grand Trunk Pacific project.

His success in life has been phenomenal when his humble beginning

is considered, and is a tolerably fair model for young Canadians to

imitate in the battle of life.

[Illustration: SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE.]

_Sir William Cornelius Van Horne._

Born near Joliette, Ill., February 3, 1843. On quitting school he began

life as an office boy at the Railway Station there, and later became

telegraph operator on the Illinois Central Railway. He was afterwards

despatcher then superintendent of telegraph, and in a short time was

made divisional superintendent of the Chicago and Alton Railway,

and in 1872 general superintendent of the St. Louis and Kansas City

and Northern Railway; from there he went, in 1874, to the Southern

Minnesota Railway as its general manager.

In 1878 he returned to the Chicago and Alton Railway as general

superintendent, but two years later he was called to the position of

general superintendent of the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway,

and in 1881 he was asked to take control of the Canadian Pacific

Railway, then in process of construction. Under his vigorous and

energetic direction the line was built in one-half of the time required

by the contract between the government and the Company.

He has been successively Vice-President and President of the Company

and is now Chairman of the Board of Directors.

The construction and successful management for years of this great

enterprise has not impaired his wonderful energies. He has built a

railway in the Island of Cuba some four hundred miles in length in the

usual expeditious manner. This work being completed, he is now, it is

said, turning his attention to the distant Philippines in order to

provide Railway facilities for the people of that country.

He is a director of many companies, including the Postal Telegraph and

Commercial Cable Company, and a member of St. James and Mount Royal

Clubs.

Sir William Van Horne is not only a famous railway man, but possesses

artistic talents of a high order. Had he followed art as a profession

he would have taken high rank. He is looked upon as one of the best art

connoisseurs in Canada.

He was created a K. C. M. G. by the late Queen in acknowledgment of his

public services in connection with the Great Transcontinental Railway

and Imperial Highway.

Sir William is a man of fine presence, wears his honors with ease and

dignity, affable and courteous in manner, and approachable to all.

“Honour and shame, from no condition rise,

Act well your part, there all the honor lies.”

[Illustration: ANDREW CARNEGIE.]

_Andrew Carnegie._

Born in the ancient Royal Burgh Dumfermline, Fifeshire, in 1837. His

father and mother emigrated to the United States in 1848, settling in

Alleghany, Pa.

The senior Carnegie was a master weaver and a man of exceptional

intelligence, who was obliged to relinquish his business owing to the

development of steam mills with which the handicraftsmen could not hope

to compete.

At the age of fourteen young Carnegie began work as a messenger in the

office of the Ohio telegraph company; in a short time he became an

operator.

When the Pennsylvania Railway was carried to Pittsburgh he received an

appointment as train despatcher and rose to be superintendent of the

Pittsburgh division of the system.

At the outbreak of the American civil war Carnegie was made

Superintendent of military roads.

After the war he went into numerous ventures, in all of which he was

eminently successful.

His first big manufacturing venture was the organization of the

Keystone Bridge Company. Iron bridges were coming into fashion, and he

got the lead everywhere. He soon acquired other manufacturing plants in

the iron line.

By 1888 he had control of the Homestead Steel Works and many other

plants which were capitalized at about one hundred million dollars.

Some ten or fifteen years ago Mr. Carnegie began to feel the oppression

of wealth and its responsibilities and made arrangements by which his

employees became sharers in his profits. After getting free of the

greater part of the personal care of the properties in which he was the

chief owner, Mr. Carnegie has devoted himself largely to philanthropic

objects, his gifts being chiefly in the line of building public

libraries.

He takes a warm interest in everything relating to telegraphy and

telegraph men, and is rather pleased to be remembered as an old-time

telegraphist.

His chief place of residence is Skibo Castle, Scotland, but he pays

frequent visits to the United States.

“Ring in the valiant man and free

The larger heart, the kindlier hand.

Ring out the darkness of the land,

Ring in the Christ that is to be.”

[Illustration: SIR SANDFORD FLEMING.]

_Sir Sandford Fleming, C.E., LL.D._

Was born at Kircaldy, Fifeshire, Scotland, on the 7th day of January,

1827. He left school at the age of 14, and was immediately articled as

a student of surveying and engineering. At the age of 18 he came to

Canada.

In 1852 he was appointed one of the engineering staff of the Northern

Railway then known as the Ontario and Lake Huron road.

In 1863 he went to England as a representative of the Red River

settlement to invoke the aid of the Imperial Government toward the

construction of a railway to connect with the Canadian railways, but

the scheme was not carried out.

When the Intercolonial Railway was projected he was made Chief of

Surveys and Construction. When nearing its completion he was called

upon by the Government to undertake the survey of the proposed route to

the Pacific.

After exhaustive surveys had been made and the construction of the

Canadian Pacific had been well advanced and some six or eight hundred

miles of the heaviest sections built, political exigencies arose, and

in 1880 he resigned. In that year he was elected Chancellor of Queen’s

University, and in 1882, while on a visit to Scotland, was presented

with the freedom of Kircaldy Burghs, and in 1884 received the honorary

degree of LL.D., from St. Andrew’s University.

In 1881 he went as a delegate from the Canadian Institute and the

American Meteorological Society to the International Geographical

Congress at Venice, and in 1884 he was appointed a delegate of Great

Britain to represent the Dominion of Canada at the International Prime

Meridian Conference at Washington, where he had the pleasure of finding

his views which he had been pressing on the public for years with

regard to Cosmic time and a prime meridian for all nations, accepted by

the representatives of the civilized world.

As early as 1879 Sir Sandford submitted to the Canadian Government a

scheme for spanning the Pacific Ocean by electric cables which would,

in connection with existing land and cable wires, complete the electric

girdle of the globe, and bring Great Britain, Canada, Australia and

New Zealand in unbroken electric touch with each other without passing

over foreign territory. The proposition was given due consideration and

the subject was laid before successive parliaments, but, while much

interest had been awakened, nothing practical was accomplished, owing

to the many obstacles in the way, and the matter was, for a time, held

in abeyance. Meanwhile its energetic projector did not despair. Year

after year he took every favorable opportunity to bring it before the

public men of Great Britain and the Colonies, travelling thousands of

miles to attend Conferences at London, Brisbane, Ottawa and elsewhere,

wherever the subject was under review. At length the reasons and

arguments adduced on all these occasions in support of this scheme were

found to be convincing, and its feasibility so apparent that it was

finally accepted and practically applied.

On the 31st day of December, 1900, the Imperial and five Colonial

governments joined in an interstate partnership to carry out the

work so long and ably advocated by its originator and promoter.

Exactly twenty-two months after the agreement, 8,272 miles of cable

had been manufactured and safely embedded in the vast depths of

the Pacific, nearly a third of the earth’s circumference, on the

31st day of October, 1902, electric communication was successfully

established between Canada, New Zealand, Fiji and Australia, and has

been uninterruptedly maintained ever since. The success of this great

telegraph enterprise, the most stupendous ever taken, was a fitting

prelude to the dawn of the new century and a splendid triumph to the

genius and foresight of Sir Sandford Fleming.

During nearly a quarter of a century he had given his time and talents,

as well as his private means, to accomplish the end he had in view, and

it must have been peculiarly gratifying to him that his labors all

these years had not been in vain. His patriotic and self-sacrificing

efforts should receive some suitable public acknowledgment in some

substantial form.

In 1877 he was made a Companion of St. Michael and St. George, and in

1897 he was promoted to be a commander of the same distinguished order

on the occasion of the sixtieth year of Her Majesty’s reign.

“Peace hath her victories,

No less renowned than war.”

[Illustration: FRED. N. GISBORNE.]

_Frederick N. Gisborne_

Was born at Broughton, Lancashire, England, March 8, 1824, and came to

Canada in 1845.

When the Montreal Company was organized he was employed as one of its

first operators, opening the first office of the Company at Quebec.

He was afterwards engaged in various telegraph enterprises in the

Maritime Provinces.

In 1851 he laid the cable connecting New Brunswick and Prince Edward

Island, the first submarine cable in America.

In 1856 he laid the cable connecting Cape Breton and Newfoundland (85

miles in length), this being an important link in the Atlantic cable

system.

Previous to this he had secured a charter from the Newfoundland

Government to construct a telegraph line across the Island, which,

with the projected cable crossing the Gulf of St. Lawrence connecting

with the land telegraphs, would provide the quickest news on the

arrival of steamers from Europe. In this project he was associated

with several American capitalists, but financial difficulties arose,

and in the winter of 1853-4 Mr. Gisborne visited New York to secure

further capital, and there met Mr. Cyrus W. Field, with the result

that Mr. Field returned with him to Newfoundland. The Legislature,

at Mr. Gisborne’s request, cancelled the original thirty years’

charter granted to himself and associates, for a new charter for a

term of fifty years to the New York, Newfoundland and London Company.

The object of this Company was to complete the land lines begun by

Gisborne, lay the cable in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and to lay a cable

across the Atlantic. The latter attempt, however, proved a failure,

and the franchise of this Company was subsequently acquired by the

Anglo-American Telegraph and Cable Company.

Meanwhile Mr. Gisborne dropped out of the enterprise, probably losing

all the interest in it he possessed. Some years later he was appointed

Superintendent of the Canadian Government Telegraph and Signal Service,

which he filled until his death, which occurred on Aug. 30, 1892.

[Illustration: THOS. A. EDISON.]

_Thomas A. Edison._

Born in Milan, Erie county, Ohio, February 11, 1847, he attended school

for a few months only, being educated at home by his mother, a woman of

superior ability and attainments.

The boy was an apt scholar, showing preference for historical and

scientific subjects.

In 1854 his father removed to Port Huron, Mich., where, at the age

of twelve, he was engaged as a newsboy on the Grand Trunk Railway.

While thus employed he took every occasion to watch the operations of

the telegraph at the various stations on the line. He erected a wire

between his father’s house and that of a neighbour, himself making the

instruments to save the cost of battery material; he experimented with

a tom-cat, using the fore and hind feet as electrodes. The connections

having been duly made he tried to start an induced current by rubbing

the back of the feline. This amusing experiment was not a success,

however, and was abandoned; later on he was rewarded for bravery in

rescuing the child of the station master from the front of a moving

train by receiving lessons in telegraphy, which he soon mastered, and

was employed as telegraph operator on the Grand Trunk Railway for a

time, leaving thereafter for the United States, where he worked in

various cities, meanwhile devoting himself to the study of electrical

science then little understood in America.

While working as operator in New Orleans, La., he invented the

automatic repeater. In 1864 he conceived the idea, which he afterwards

perfected, of duplex telegraphy, but it was not put into practical

operation until 1872. His next important inventions were the quadruplex

and the printing telegraph for stock quotations.

In time his inventions were numerous and varied. On the lists of

inventions at the patent office, Washington, in 1895, no less than

600 were credited to his name. The most notable amongst these are the

quadruplex, the phonograph and the incandescent light.

Although Edison had acquired considerable wealth, yet in 1896 he

publicly declared that he would have been at least $600,000 better off

if he had never taken out a patent or defended one, and that all the

money he ever made was made by manufacturing his inventions or in their

practical use.

In 1896 he established the village of Edison, N. J., in the very centre

of an iron ore deposit, a plant for the magnetic separation of iron

from the rock in which it is embedded in the mine, the process being

purely automatic. He first invented a crusher capable of reducing ten

tons of rock to dust every minute; he then invented apparatus whereby

the iron ore was separated from the dust by means of a magnet, the

extracted ore being made into briquettes and easily handled for

transport to the blast furnace.

Mr. Edison is one of the simplest and unostentatious of men, careless

in his costume, abstemious and simple in his habits, unselfish and

generous in dispositions.

He married in 1874, and has four sons and one daughter.

[Illustration: ISAAC D. PURKIS.]

_Isaac D. Purkis, Esq._

Was born in Laprairie, Que., in 1827. He was son of the Rev. Isaac

Purkis, who came from England in 1821, and was a lineal descendant of

the Purkis who carried the body of King William Rufus from the New

Forest to Winchester in Hampshire, when shot by Sir Walter Tyrell,

while hunting in the New Forest.

Mr. Purkis learned telegraphy under Mr. O. S. Wood and was located

at Prescott, Ont., from 1849 to 1851, in the employ of the Montreal

Telegraph Company. In 1851, on the very flattering recommendation

of Mr. Wood, he entered the service of the British North American

Telegraph Association and was appointed Superintendent (equivalent to

General Manager at the present date). This company had a line from

Quebec city east, to Rivière du Loup, thence southerly to St. John,

N.B., etc. In 1853, on the recommendation of Mr. Purkis, the line was

extended to Montreal, along the north shore of the river, and thus

entered into competition with the Montreal Telegraph Company, whose

line was from Point Levi, along the south shore to Montreal and thence

westward. Connection was first made between Quebec and Point Levi by a

long span of wire on masts, in the spring when the ice was breaking

up. None of the linemen would attempt to cross on the floating, broken

ice. Mr. Purkis then got a ladder, and placing himself in the centre

with the coil of wire over his shoulder succeeded in making the

passage, at the same time paying out the wire over the edges of the

ice. His exertions were so great that he was completely exhausted when

he finally got across.

This company established at Rivière du Loup, Que., a signal office

under the Lloyd code, whereby all vessels passing were signalled and

information at once telegraphed to the owner or agent and to the press.

In addition to this a boat manned with capable oarsmen, swivel gun on

bow to signal the approaching steamer, more particularly at night, was

used to intercept and receive from the inward steamer the despatches

and latest newspapers from Europe. The method was to throw a tin

cylinder in which were enclosed the despatches and newspapers with a

small flag attached to the end; this was attached to a lanyard, and

when secured by the Telegraph boat, the steamer was given a signal and

she proceeded on her way, the despatches being promptly brought ashore

and delivered to the telegraph and signal officer in charge.

In December 29, 1854, the British North American Telegraph Association

and the Canada Grand Trunk Telegraph Company (whose lines extended

from Montreal westward) entered into an agreement for the mutual

interchange of business, and Mr. Purkis was appointed Superintendent

of both companies. This position he held until both companies were

amalgamated with the Montreal Telegraph Company in the latter part of

1856. When he left the telegraph business in August of that year his

subordinates presented him with a signet ring, which he wore to the day

of his death.

He engaged in the forwarding and ferry business at Prescott until

1870, when he was appointed General Manager of the Dominion Telegraph

Company, with headquarters at Toronto. He resigned from this position

in 1874 and again returned to Prescott taking up his former business.

Besides himself he had three brothers engaged in the telegraph service,

George, Arthur and William, all of whom predeceased him many years

since.

Mr. Purkis was a citizen of the highest type, always eager for the

welfare of the town and its inhabitants.

Personally, he was of a most genial and kindly disposition, a true and

sincere friend to all who shared his confidence.

He passed away recently at his home at Prescott after a brief illness,

in his 78th year.

_Submarine Telegraphy._

When the electric telegraph had been successfully established in Great

Britain, the public soon became alive to the necessity of extending its

operations beyond the confines of the United Kingdom.

As early as 1840 Professor Charles Wheatstone, of England, suggested

the practicability of connecting Dover and Calais, in France, by an

electric wire, but it was ten years later before a submarine line was

laid. This first attempt proved a failure, owing to the wires being

imperfectly insulated.

In 1851 a second cable, containing four copper wires insulated with

gutta percha and surrounded by tarred hemp and protected by ten

galvanized iron wires wound round spirally, was laid connecting England

and France. This proved successful. All submarine cables thereafter

were made on this pattern.

It was now evident that the sea offered no barrier to international

telegraphic communication.

In the same year (1851) a submarine cable ten miles in length was laid

connecting Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick.

In 1852 six submarine lines were laid connecting England with Ireland,

Scotland and the continent, the longest of which was one about one

hundred nautical miles, and in 1854 five additional cables were laid

in European waters.

In 1856 Newfoundland and Cape Breton was connected by submarine wire,

the distances being some eighty-five miles. The successful laying of

this cable led to the more gigantic undertaking, viz., to connecting

the old and the new worlds electrically. There are three names

prominently connected with the origination of the idea, Bishop Mulock,

of Newfoundland, Frederick Gisborne and Cyrus W. Field.

The following interesting remarks of Mr. Mackay, of Newfoundland, is

worth producing.

In a speech he made at a banquet given by the old-time Telegraphers’

Association, held at the Windsor Hotel in the summer of 1901, he said;

“If you please, I shall now refer to a matter that I think may be far

more interesting to you all than anything I have said thus far. I mean

to refer to the matter of the Atlantic telegraph, as it is a subject

that must always occupy a large share of the attention of the telegraph

world, because at the present time telegraphing by cable is one of the

most important factors in the whole service that makes the telegraphy

of the world as valuable as it is. The subject that I wanted to mention

to you is the question as to who was the person that initiated or gave

birth to the idea of an Atlantic telegraph, which, of course, gave

birth to all deep-sea and long-distance telegraphy.

“As a matter of fact, in Newfoundland, where this subject has been

given considerable attention, it is stated that the Right Rev. Dr.

Mulock, Roman Catholic Bishop of Newfoundland, was one of the parties.

Others contend that the late F. N. Gisborne is the person, others that

Cyrus W. Field is the person.

“I would like to refer to those gentlemen, beginning first with Dr.

Mulock.

“I trust you will pardon me for saying that I consider my opinion on

the matter is worth something, inasmuch as I think I am the only man

of those that were connected with the Atlantic telegraph at the time

of its inception, in an executive capacity, all the others having gone

before, as far as I know.

“Now with regard to Dr. Mulock, I think there is not the least doubt

he got his information from Mr. Gisborne in regard to the Atlantic

telegraph, and that his only connection with it was the expression of

his belief in the possibility of its establishment, just as a man might

say, for instance, we will in the next generation fly in the air; but

he contributed nothing towards the direct accomplishment of the object.

There is not the least doubt in my mind, therefore, that it lies

between Mr. F. N. Gisborne and Cyrus W. Field.

“Mr. Gisborne’s friends contend now that he was unjustly treated by

Field, and that he really had advised Mr. Field of the possibility

of accomplishing this great work. Mr. Gisborne did not make this

contention in his lifetime.

“I had the privilege of seeing him some years before he died, long

subsequent to the establishment of the Atlantic telegraph, and he

said that on his meeting Cyrus W. Field, in the month of January,

1854, whilst foreshadowing the possibility and the desirability of

establishing Atlantic communication between Newfoundland and the

Continent of America, he did not refer to the possibility of a cable

to England, but only relied on the success of that enterprise by

contributing to its coffers messages obtained from steamers arriving

in Newfoundland and transmitted from thence by carrier pigeons, and

ultimately by telegraphic cable.

“Mr. Gisborne made that statement, and he admitted that he did not, in

his first interview with Cyrus W. Field, foreshadow the possibility of

the Atlantic telegraph.

“Now Mr. Field on being questioned in regard to that interview which

took place in Mr. Field’s house in January, 1854, said exactly the same

thing.

“He only contended for the pigeons in the first place and the

possibility of a cable to Cape Breton in the second place, and the

clever far-seeing commercial man, as he was considered, said that

there was no possibility of such a scheme ever paying, and, therefore,

he would not have anything to do with it; but on seeing Gisborne, he

turned over the Globe, and, in turning it over, seeing that Cape

Breton was only an inch or two on the Globe from Newfoundland, and that

Ireland was only six inches, with his shrewdness and cleverness he

said at once, ‘If a cable can be laid to Cape Breton, why can’t it be

laid to Ireland?’ and the next morning he wrote a letter to Professor

Morse and asked him if a cable could be laid to Ireland and whether it

could be worked. He also wrote a letter to Lieutenant Maury, of the

United States Navy, and asked him whether it would be possible to lay

a cable to Ireland. Satisfactory answers being obtained to these two

questions, he at once embarked in the enterprise and threw his whole

influence (rich man that he was at that time) into the work of laying

the Atlantic cable. You will see, therefore, that Mr. Gisborne did not

communicate the idea of the Atlantic cable, but he communicated _the

idea of a cable_ that was quite enough for a man of Cyrus W. Field’s

foresight and ingenuity to suggest the possibility of an Atlantic

cable, so that there is really no difference as to credit due these

two gentlemen for the initiation of the project, and I can assure you

it is most satisfactory to me because I have always been a warm friend

of both gentlemen (applause). I think I am the only living witness to

these facts I have related, and I am glad to have this opportunity to

state it publicly. I know it is a matter of interest to all telegraph

men. Now the question comes to my mind, Who then was the author of the

first idea of the Atlantic cable.

“In this connection I will go back to the year 1850. In 1854 the New

York, Newfoundland and London Telegraph Company obtained a charter

which gave them exclusive rights to land a cable in Newfoundland for

fifty years. This charter terminates in 1904, and I hope to live to

see that charter expire. I am confident it will never be renewed,

because the British Government would never consent, now that deep-sea

telegraphy is an assured fact, to exclusive rights, of that nature

being conferred on anybody or corporation. (Applause.)

“We will now go back to, Who was the first man that started the idea of

the Atlantic cable? and I find no difficulty in naming the man, as far

as my opinion goes.

“In 1850, whilst studying telegraphy with Mr. Gisborne in Halifax, he

was very communicative in all his methods and actions, and he showed

me letters at that time from Mr. Brett. There were two Bretts. I think

the first was John and the second Jacob, but it was the elder Brett who

was in communication with him then by letter, and he had given birth to

the idea of a cable. He not only gave birth to it in 1850, but in 1852

he laid the cable from Dover in England to France, and that cable was

working until within a few years of the present time. He, therefore,

not only gave birth to the idea, but he gave actual presence to the

cable, and I think it is not unlikely, and I find it easy for me to

say, that there never was an inventor who was wont to appreciate his

own invention. I think it is not unlikely that Brett, when he had the

idea of a cable at all, although only twenty-one miles in length, that

he had within his vision thousands of miles, covering all bays, all

waters and all seas (applause); that is my idea that John Brett was the

originator and inventor of the submarine cable.”

Mr. Mackay, whose testimony we have given, was the superintendent of

telegraphs for the Anglo-American Telegraph and Cable Company for the

Island of Newfoundland and held this position for many years.

The circumstances which brought Gisborne and Field together was as

follows: The former had planned a line of telegraph from St. John’s,

Nfld., through four hundred miles of dense wilderness and forest to

Cape Ray, there to connect by steamers or by carrier pigeons or by

cable.

To enable him to carry out this project the Legislature of Newfoundland

granted £500 for a survey of the route.

An Act was also passed incorporating the Newfoundland Telegraph Company

with an exclusive right of way for thirty years, including amongst

other privileges valuable concessions of public lands. Having thus laid

the groundwork of his scheme Gisborne immediately left for New York to

raise capital; in this he was successful. Horace B. Tebbets and D. H.

Holbrook were among the more prominent to join him, and a company was

organized under the charter which had been granted. Soon after the

formation of the Company Mr. Gisborne left for England, to purchase a

submarine cable to connect Cape Ray and Cape Breton.

In 1852 thirty miles of the land line had been completed, and Mr.

Gisborne had skilfully and successfully laid the first submarine cable

of any considerable length in America between Cape Ray and Cape Breton

and Cape Tormentine and Cape Traverse in Northumberland Straits.

In 1853, however, the cable gave out, about the same time the New

York stockholders withheld their support; this caused the work to

be suspended and the Company became bankrupt. Mr. Gisborne, finding

himself unable to proceed, gave up all he possessed to pay the accrued

debts, and for a time abandoned the enterprise.

Under such circumstances and with renewed courage Mr. Gisborne in 1854

returned to New York, to try, if possible, to resuscitate interest in

his work. Among others to whom he now found access was Mr. Matthew D.

Field, a New York Engineer, to whom he communicated his position and

plans. Mr. Field, however, declined to interest himself, but politely

offered to introduce him to his brother, Cyrus W. Field, at that time

retired from active business. This led to several interviews, which

had the effect of exciting a general interest in telegraph affairs in

Mr. Field’s mind. Standing one evening over a large globe after one

of these interviews with Mr. Gisborne, and tracing the lines overland

to St. John’s, Nfld., an idea dawned on his mind which gradually

strengthened its hold upon his imagination and soon absorbed his whole

heart and life.

While following with his finger the track of the inland lines to the

ocean, it was natural to traverse also the course of the steamships

across the Northern Atlantic. It was but a step further to plant his

finger on London and to feel that to reach the centre of English

commercial life by telegraph, were this practicable, would be an

achievement worth striving for.

Mr. Field, thus aroused to a comprehension of a possible opportunity to

embark in a grand enterprise worthy of the age, began to make enquiry

respecting the project of laying a cable on the bed of the Atlantic.

He found that a recent survey of the Northern Atlantic, under the

direction of Lieutenant Maury, had been made, and a plateau extending

from Newfoundland to Ireland had been discovered, forming a safe and

easy pathway for a submarine wire.

Professor Morse also assured Mr. Field that the project was entirely

feasible, and warmly encouraged him in it, and asserted the certainty

of its ultimate accomplishment.

Being now thoroughly convinced Mr. Field communicated with some of

his intimate friends, amongst whom were Peter Cooper, Moses Taylor,

Marshall O. Roberts and Chandler White, names familiar in the history

of American enterprise. The scheme met with earnest attention and ready

response. Mutual consultations resulted soon after in the organization

of a company with a capital of one million and a half dollars to carry

out the project and the immediate purchase of the Gisborne charter, it

resulted also in the generous enlargement of the franchises granted by

the colony of Newfoundland, the exclusive right to land ocean cables

during fifty years, £50,000 to aid the work and fifty square miles of

land when the cable was successfully laid was granted.

The Government of Prince Edward Island also made liberal grants of

money and land. With these important arrangements completed on May 6,

1854, a company was formally organized under the corporate name of the

New York, Newfoundland and London Electric Telegraph Company.

Peter Cooper was elected President.

Chandler White, Vice-President.

Moses Taylor, Treasurer.

Professor Morse, Electrician.

Matthew D. Field, Engineer.

The latter immediately proceeded to Newfoundland to begin operations,

first honorably paying the debts due to workmen under Mr. Gisborne.

Mr. Field, with six hundred men, pushed the work of construction

through the vast forests of Newfoundland until the wires were erected

between St. John’s and Cape Ray. Meanwhile, Cyrus W. Field made

his first voyage to England to contract for a new cable to connect

Newfoundland with Nova Scotia, and to continue his enquiries into the

scientific obstacles to the laying and operating a cable between the

shores of the Old World and the New.

In England Mr. Field met Mr. John W. Brett, the originator and inventor

of submarine cables, who gave every encouragement to Mr. Field in the

Atlantic cable project, and to show his faith in its success Mr. Brett

purchased a considerable number of shares in the concern.

In 1855 the cable for Cape Ray was shipped from England. It weighed 400

tons, and was manufactured by W. Kupert & Co., London. The steamer,

“James Adger,” was chartered by Mr. Field, to convey a large party to

Newfoundland to witness the submergence.

Among these were Peter Cooper, Robert W. Lowber, Professor Morse, Rev.

H. M. Field, Rev. Gardiner Spring, Rev. J. M. Sherwood, Dr. James A.

Sayre, Bayard Taylor, Fitzjames O’Brien and John Mullarky.

The cable had arrived in an English brig, which had to be towed by the

steamer from shore to shore. Everything seemed favorable. A hawser

was thrown from the steamer to the brig and the cable began to find

its way to its appointed bed. Unfortunately, while yet in mid-channel,

a furious gale set in when the overloaded brig became unmanageable,

and, fearing destruction, the cable was cut and the work for the time

abandoned.

In 1856 a steamer amply provided for the purpose was chartered, by

which after lading the cable it was easily and successfully submerged

without a hitch.

The line was now finished. Although it had to wait during many years

for the completion of the great work for which it was a link, it

ultimately showed the wisdom of its construction and became of much

value to its projectors; it had cost so far $1,000,000.

On the formation of the Atlantic Telegraph Company, the charter of

the New York, Newfoundland and London Telegraph Company, conferring

the exclusive right for fifty years to land cables on the Island of

Newfoundland, was made over to the new Company.

In 1855 Chandler White died; on his death, Wilson G. Hunt, a name

well-known among merchant princes of New York, took his place as

director, and gave the company during its existence the benefit of his

able counsel and active and intelligent support. Mr. Cyrus W. Field was

at the same time elected vice-president and Robt. W. Lowder, secretary.

In 1857 the first attempt was made to lay a cable across the Atlantic,

the length of which was 2,500 miles. After paying out 255 miles the

cable broke, and the work was given up for that year.

In 1858 another attempt was made, the British naval ship “Agamemnon”

and the United States frigate “Niagara,” each carrying one-half of the

cable, proceeded to mid-ocean, spliced the ends, and going in opposite

directions reached Newfoundland and Ireland the same day, August 5,

after each having successfully accomplished the submergence. There

was great rejoicing on both sides of the Atlantic over the event, but

disappointment soon followed. On the 1st of September, the cable ceased

working and the project for a time was abandoned. Seven years after

another attempt was made, a new cable had been prepared and stowed in

the hold of the “Great Eastern.” The big ship, lightly carrying her

great burden, steamed out to sea paying out the cable as she proceeded.

Half the Atlantic was passed over in safety when the cable broke and

the “Great Eastern” returned to her moorings. Such, however, had been

the indications of success in laying the cable in 1865, that in 1866

the Anglo-American Telegraph Company was organized with a new capital,

and the “Great Eastern” once more started across the deep, when the

great work was at last accomplished. Universal joy followed the

announcement that the cable was successfully laid, not only so, but

the lost cable of the previous year was, to the general wonder, found,

picked up and spliced and continued to the American shore.

The cable was thrown open for public traffic August 26, 1866. A large

and remunerative business followed, which has continued unbroken ever

since.

There are now fourteen cables spanning the bed of the Atlantic between

Europe and America, the total length of these being 40,000 miles.

In the present year (1902) the total length of submarine cables in the

world is about 200,000 miles, all but 20,000 of which are owned by

commercial concerns and the remainder by different Governments.

The amount of capital invested in cables is estimated at about

$210,000,000.

The cost of the cable before laying depends upon the dimensions of

the cars, or conducting wire, which is copper; gutta percha, which

still forms the only trustworthy insulating material, constituting the

principal item of expense.

For an Atlantic cable of the most recent construction, the cost may be

taken at £250 to £300 per nautical mile.

The system of submarine cables originating in Great Britain has

continued to develop in her hands, until the world has been covered

with a veritable network of cables, which has hitherto done much to

prevent the decline of her commercial supremacy. During the last few

years, however, other maritime nations in Europe have begun to realize

the importance of submarine cable enterprise in this respect, and

France and Germany have made some progress towards freeing themselves

from British monopoly; both are now connected with America by cables

which are owned in their respective countries, though their manufacture

and submergence was effected by an English Company.

This spread of the cable system has naturally followed trade routes,

and thus, with the exception of the cables to America, their trend has

been eastwards as far as Australia and Japan. During the year 1902

the Dominion of Canada was connected by cable with New Zealand and

Australia, the total length of cable, 8,272 miles, and cost £1,795,000.

An agreement was entered into between the Imperial Government and the

Governments of Canada, Victoria, New South Wales, New Zealand and

Queensland, and it was through the persistent efforts and advocacy of

Sir Sandford Fleming that this great work was accomplished.

Owing to the experience gained with many thousand miles in all depths

and under varying conditions of weather and climate, the risks, and,

consequently, the cost of laying, has been greatly reduced, but the

cost of effecting a repair still remains a very uncertain quantity,

success being dependent on quiet conditions of sea and weather.

The _modus operandi_ is briefly as follows: The position of the

fracture is determined by electrical tests from both ends with more

or less accuracy depending on the nature of the fault, but it can

be located within a few miles. The repair steamer, on reaching the

given position, lowers one or perhaps two mark buoys, mooring them

by mushroom anchors, chain and rope, using these buoys to guide the

direction of tow. Grapnel, a species of five pronged anchors attached

to a strong compound rope formed of strands of steel and manilla, is

lowered to the bottom and dragged at a slow speed, as it were ploughing

a furrow in the sea-bottom in a line at right angles to the cable route

until the behavior of the dynamometer shows that the cable is hooked.

The ship is then stopped and the cable gradually hove up towards the

surface; but in deep water, unless it has been caught near a loose end,

the cable will break on the grapnel before it reaches the surface, as

the catenary strain on the bight will be greater than it will stand.

Another buoy is put down marking this position, fixing at the same

time the actual line of the cable. Grappling will then be recommenced

so as to hook the cable near enough to the end to allow of its being

hove to the surface. When this has been done an electrical test is

applied, and, if the original fracture is between the ship and shore,

the heaving in of the cable will continue until the end comes on board.

Another buoy is then lowered to mark the spot, and the cable on the

other side of the fracture grappled for brought to the surface, and, if

communication is found perfect with the shore, buoyed with sufficient

chain and rope attached to allow of the cable itself reaching the

bottom. The ship now returns to the position of original attack and by

similar operations brings on board the end which secures communication

with the shore. The gap between the two ends has now been closed by

splicing on new cable and paying out until the buoyed end is reached,

which is then hove up and brought on board. After the “final splice,”

as it is termed, between these ends has been made, the bight made fast

to a rope is lowered overboard, the slip rope cut and the cable allowed

to sink by its own weight to its resting place on the sea-bed. The

repairs being thus completed the various mark buoys are picked up and

the ship returns to her usual station.

The grappling of the cable and raising it to the surface from a depth

of 2,000 fathoms seldom occupies less than twenty-four hours, and,

since any extra strain due to the pitching of the vessel must be

avoided, it is clear that the state of the sea and weather is the

predominating factor in the time necessary for effecting the long

series of operations which, under the most favorable circumstances,

are required for a repair. In addition the intervention of heavy

weather may mar all the work already accomplished and require the whole

series of operations to be undertaken _de novo_.

As to cost, one transatlantic cable repair cost £75,000.

The repair of the Aden Bombay cable, broken in a depth of 1,900

fathoms, was effected with the expenditure of 176 miles of new cable,

and, after a lapse of 251 days, 103 being spent in actual work, which

for the remainder of the time was interrupted by the monsoon. A repair

of the Lisbon Porthcarrow cable broken in the Bay of Biscay in 2,700

fathoms, eleven years after the cable was laid, took 215 days with an

expenditure of three hundred miles of cable.

All interruptions are not so costly, for in shallow waters, with

favorable conditions of weather, a repair may be only a matter of a few

hours, and it is in such waters that the majority of breaks occur, but

still a large reserve fund must be laid aside for the purpose.

As an ordinary instance it has been stated that the cost of repairing

the direct United States cable up to 1900 from its submergence in 1874

averages £8,000 per annum.

Nearly all the cable companies possess their own steamers of sufficient

dimensions, and specially equipped for making ordinary repairs, but for

exceptional cases where a considerable quantity of new cable may have

to be inserted, it may be necessary to charter the service of one of

the larger vessels owned by a cable manufacturing company at a certain

sum per day, which may well reach £200 to £300.

This fleet of cable ships now number forty, ranging in size from

vessels of 300 tons to 10,000 tons’ carrying capacity.

The life of a cable is usually considered to continue until it is

no longer capable of being lifted for repair, but, in some cases

the duration and frequency of interruptions as affecting public

convenience with the loss of revenue and cost of repairs, must together

decide the question of either making very extensive renewals or

even abandoning the whole cable. It is a well ascertained fact that

the insulator--gutta percha--is, when kept under water, practically

imperishable, so that it is only the original strength of the sheathing

wires and the deterioration allowable in them that have to be

considered.

Cables have frequently been picked up, showing after many years of

submergences, no appreciable deterioration in this respect, while in

other cases ends have been picked up which in the course of twelve

years had been corroded to needle points, the result, no doubt, of

metalliferous deposits in the locality.

The experience gained in the earlier days of ocean telegraphy from the

failure and abandonment of nearly 50 per cent. of the deep-sea cables

within the first twelve years, placed the probable life of a cable

as low as fifteen years, but the weeding out of unserviceable types

of construction and the general improvement in materials, have, by

degrees, extended that first estimate until now the limit may be safely

placed at not less than forty years.

In depths beyond the reach of wave motion and apart from the suspension

across a submarine gully which will sooner or later result in a rupture

of the cable, the most frequent cause of interruption is seismic or

other shifting of the ocean bed, while in shallower waters and near

the shore the dragging of anchors or fishing trawls have been mostly

responsible.

Since by international agreement the wilful damage of a cable has been

constituted a criminal offence and the cables have avoided crossing the

fishing banks or have adopted the wise policy of refunding the value of

anchors lost on their cables, the number of such fractures have been

greatly diminished.

_Cable Instruments._

The apparatus in use on land lines are not adapted for cables except

for comparatively short distances not exceeding four or five hundred

miles.

When the Atlantic cable was laid a special instrument had to be devised

to transmit signals to the distant end. The man to accomplish this was

Professor Thomson (now Lord Kelvin), who invented the mirror system.

A beam of light was thrown on a minute mirror an eighth of an inch

in diameter and the light reflected on to a scale by means of which

the signal was interpreted into letters. This necessitated one person

constantly scanning the spot of light as it moved to the right and to

the left of the scale and calling out the individual letters, which

were taken down by another person. This tedious and trying method of

receiving signals was superceded by another device of Lord Kelvin, the

siphon recorder.

The siphon, by which the cable signals are automatically recorded, is

a thin glass tube, about the thickness of a strong linen thread, and

quite flexible. It is suspended in a frame and attached by a single

silk fibre to one side of a rectangular coil of fine insulated wire,

moving about a soft iron bar fixed in the magnetic field of two large

permanent magnets. The coil is held down at the lower end by a silk

thread, fastened to an adjustable spring, to regulate or confine the

lateral motion of the siphon, the magnets are placed vertically and

are two inches apart, one end of the siphon is twice bent at right

angles, and dips into an ink well filled with filtered aniline ink.

The other end has a minute thread or short piece of soft iron cemented

longitudinally to it, and sways in close proximity to a narrow fillet

of paper five-eighths of an inch wide, which is drawn along by a small

motor. The small motors by which the paper is drawn along receive

their current generally from lead-lined trays, 18 by 20 inches, at the

bottom of which is placed a copper sheet, the zinc is wrapped in stout

manilla paper which serves the purpose of a porous cup for the sulphate

of copper. The cable current passes through the small rectangular

coil, which is about two inches long, as both positive and negative

currents are sent into the condensers, and thereby disturb the static

electricity of the cable. The coil is deflected to the right and left

respectively, tending to place itself at right angles to the lines

of magnetic force between the fixed bar magnets and which lines of

force are concentrated by the small bar above mentioned of the best

soft iron within the coil. The siphon has, therefore, a corresponding

motion to the coil. As the mechanical force of the suspended coil is

very small in deflecting, it is necessary that the siphon be not in

continuous contact with the fillet of paper otherwise its motion would

cease. The difficulty of obtaining a record is overcome in an ingenious

manner. The siphon is made to vibrate by means of a local battery

on the principle of the push button electric bell by the breaking

of the circuit--the vibration is communicated to the siphon by the

interposition of another electro-magnet in the local circuit and placed

underneath the fillet of paper, the small thread of iron on the tip

of the siphon acts as the armature to the latter electro-magnet. The

number of vibrations made in a second depends on the siphon, different

siphons having different periods or inherent notes, but 55 is about the

number of vibrations a second, every pulsation of the siphon deposits

a drop of ink on the paper, and, as the paper is moving at the rate of

over half an inch a second, an apparently continuous line is drawn.

From the description of the working of the siphon--of its lateral

movements--it will be evident that the cablegram, as shown on the

fillet of paper, will look like the contour line across the Rocky

Mountains. The undulations made by the siphon correspond to the

clicking we hear in the ordinary telegraph instruments. A cable office

is very quiet compared to the bewildering clatter in a large telegraph

office.

It was found that on the Atlantic (and shorter cables) a greater speed

of signals was possible than could be sent through by hand with the

double key. This called forth the invention of the so-called automatic

transmitter.

For this purpose the messages are in the first place punched into a

strip of oiled and prepared paper, the characters on the strip are

represented by holes at varying distances on each side of a central

line. This strip of continuous paper is then fed into the transmitter,

in which metallic points slide along the under side of the strip.

Wherever a hole is encountered electric contact is made and a signal

sent. The speed of running the strip through the transmitter can be

regulated as desired.

The “auto” can easily keep two men busy punching.

Within recent years an improvement has been effected for transmitting

signals or messages automatically from one cable to another. Formerly

it was necessary after receiving the signals from one cable to transmit

them by hand to the connecting cable at the station. Now, however, this

can be done automatically by means of Taylor, Brown and Dearlove’s

Translator. The siphon in it instead of carrying ink contains a

metallic thread which rests, instead of on the fillet of paper, on

a rapidly, revolving, perfectly, smooth, small wheel, in which the

surface of the circumference is divided into three parts, the central

one known as “no man’s land” being a non-conductor such as glass, while

the outer ones are of silver. As the siphon sways to one side or the

other it makes metallic contact, which is communicated by means of

“brushes” which press against each side of the wheel to the outgoing

cable.

This translator simplifies the work and reduces the office staff which

would be otherwise necessary.

At the present time nearly all cables use the duplex system, that is,

messages can be sent and received at the same time on one wire.

The speed of a cable is given in words per minute, the conventional

number of five letters per word being understood, though in actual

practice, owing to the extensive use of special codes, the number of

letters per word is really between eight and nine, and this forms a

considerable factor in the earning capacity of the cable, but the

speed depends upon the length of the cable and the experience of the

operator. Tests made over the Vancouver and Fanning Island section of

the Pacific cable give 85 letters per minute with hand working and 100

letters a minute with automatic curb working, and approximately 168

letters a minute (84 letters each way) with duplex and curbed automatic

working. This section of the cable is 3,455 nautical miles in length,

the longest cable that has ever been laid, and about twice the length

of the Atlantic cables. On shorter cables a greater speed can be

attained.

[Illustration: CYRUS W. FIELD.]

_Cyrus W. Field._

Born in 1819, at Stockbridge, Mass., at the age of fifteen, he left

home and became a clerk in a leading house in New York. At twenty-one

he married and settled down in life as a wholesale paper merchant.

Having been very successful he wished to retire, but yielded to the

wishes of his junior partner and allowed his name to remain as the head

of the firm. He withdrew, however, so far as to make a six months’ tour

to South America, returning in 1853.

He was led to turn his attention to ocean telegraphy through an

interview with Mr. Gisborne, who was then engaged in constructing

a telegraph line across the Island of Newfoundland, and laying a

submarine cable from there to Nova Scotia, in connection with a

projected line of steamships to Ireland. It struck him that if a cable

of such length could be laid there was nothing to hinder a still longer

being carried from one side of the Atlantic to the other. Turning

over this thought in his mind he consulted with Professor Morse and

Lieutenant Maury, and receiving encouragement from them he devoted his

energies in the enterprise in conjunction with his brother Dudley.

Other friends joined him, and the first Atlantic Telegraph Company was

organized with a favorable charter, granting them the sole right for

fifty years of landing a telegraph cable on Newfoundland and with a

subsidy as soon as the line was completed.

The first thing was to connect the Continent with Newfoundland. This

part of the scheme was successfully accomplished in 1856.

The next step was the formation of the Atlantic Telegraph Company and

the sounding the way for the cable which was undertaken by both the

British and American Governments separately. The British Government

gave every encouragement to the projectors by promising £14,000 a year

for the transmission of its messages and the use of the ships of its

navy to lay the cable.

£350,000 was asked for and in a short time subscribed, Mr. Field taking

80 shares of £1,000 each.

In 1857 the first attempt to lay the cable proved a failure, but in the

following year (1858) a second attempt was made, but a terrific storm

met the vessels in the middle of the Atlantic, the cable broke again

and the expedition returned to England once more. A third effort met

with better success, and on the 5th of August, 1858, the two ends were

safely landed, one in Valentia Bay, Ireland, the other in Trinity Bay,

Newfoundland.

The first message sent from the Old World to the New was worthy the

occasion.

“Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace and good-will to men.”

A few weeks later the cable ceased to act, but a new cable was prepared

and the “Great Eastern” was sent out with it, only, however, to lose it

also when 1,200 miles from Ireland.

It seemed a hopeless dream to bind the two worlds by electric wire, but

Mr. Field did not despair. A better cable was once more made; another

company was formed with a capital of £600,000.

In 1866 the “Great Eastern” again sailed, and this time carried the

thin thread triumphantly from shore to shore, not only so, but fished

up the broken cable from the abysses of the ocean, united it and joined

England and America by two telegraphic wires.

The moving spirit throughout was Mr. Field, who spent some thirteen

years of his life and made forty trips across the Atlantic, imperilling

his health and means in pursuit of this great enterprise before his

efforts were crowned with success.

He died on the 12th day of July, 1892.

[Illustration: MICHAEL FARADAY.]

_Michael Farady._

The pupil of Sir Humphrey Davy, and himself the greatest philosophical

chemist of his time, was born on the 22nd of September, 1791. The

son of a smith, who was unable to give him any better education than

that afforded by a common day-school in the neighborhood, reading,

writing and arithmetic embraced all his training for life, so far as

schools were concerned; but he had that within him which from these

poor beginnings made a magnificent end. A fondness for reading filled

his mind with miscellaneous knowledge and paved the way for all that

followed.

At thirteen he was apprenticed to a bookseller and binder, but his

heart was even thus early in science rather than trade, and he paid

more attention to rude experiments than to his immediate calling. A

gentleman having taken him to hear some of Sir Humphrey Davy’s last

lectures at the Royal Institution, Faraday wrote out the notes he had

taken in a quarto volume, and sent them to Sir Humphrey Davy, with a

letter asking that, if he could, would he give him a chance of escaping

from trade to philosophy. The result was his employment as an assistant

in the laboratory of the Royal Institution in 1813, at the age of

22, after he had been a bookseller for nine years.

From this time Faraday’s progress was rapid. In 1820 his name was first

made prominent for chemical discoveries, and from that date every year

recorded some new research and new triumph, till in 1832 his eminence

was so thoroughly felt that the University of Oxford made him a

D. C. L., and in 1835 Lord Melbourne’s Government gave him a pension of

£300 a year. Honours meanwhile were showered upon him; he became one of

eight foreign associates of the Imperial Academy of Science at Paris,

a commander of the Legion of Honour, a knight of the Prussian Order of

Merit and member of numerous scientific bodies in Europe and America.

The secret of his success, apart from his genius, lay in his wonderful

industry and calm and careful attention to every detail of what he

essayed.

In electricity and magnetism his researches made him one of the

foremost; his language in lecturing was always simple; his experiments

convincing, and his enthusiasms so catching, that every one felt

engrossed by subjects which so absorbed the lecturer.

He was a true philosopher, taking nothing for granted, and thinking

nothing too insignificant to follow out to the utmost. Many books have

been written on his discoveries, and several on his life and character,

but it is felt that no one who did not know him could realize the man

as he was.

With a European fame his was modest as a child. The greatest authority

in his day on natural science, he was a humble Christian.

Faraday never married. When he died in 1867 his pension was continued

to his maiden sister, who survived him.

In Faraday, as in others, genius seemed largely to be what Carlyle

calls it, only a faculty of infinite labor.

[Illustration: LORD KELVIN.]

_Lord Kelvin._

Born at Belfast, Ireland, 26th June, 1824, his father being then

teacher of mathematics in the Royal Academical Institution. In 1832

James Thomson accepted the chair of mathematics at Glasgow and migrated

there with his two sons, James and William, who in 1834 matriculated in

that University, William being little more than ten years of age, and

having acquired all his education through his father’s instruction.

In 1841 William Thomson entered Cambridge; in 1845 took his degrees,

second wrangler, to which honour he added that of the first Smith’s

prize.

At that time there was few facilities for the study of experimental

science in Great Britain. At the Royal Institution Faraday held a

unique position, and was feeling his way almost alone.

In Cambridge science had progressed little since the days of Newton.

Thomson, therefore had recourse to Paris and for a year worked in the

laboratory of Regnault, who was engaged in his classical researches

on the thermal properties of steam; but his stay in Paris was

comparatively short, for in 1846, when only twenty-two years of age, he

accepted the chair of Natural Philosophy in the University of Glasgow,

which he filled for fifty-three years, attaining universal recognition

as one of the greatest physicists of his time.

The Glasgow chair was a source of inspiration to scientific men for

half a century, and many of the most advanced researches grew out of

the suggestions which Thomson scattered as sparks from the anvil.

Although his contributions to thermo-dynamics may properly be regarded

as his most scientific work, it is in the field of electricity,

especially in its application to submarine telegraphy, that Lord Kelvin

is best known.

From 1854 he is most prominent among telegraphists. The stranded

form of the conductor was due to his suggestion, but it was in the

letters which he addressed in November and December of that year to

Prof. Stokes, and which were published in the proceedings of the

Royal Society for 1855 that he discussed the mathematical theory of

signalling through submarine cables, and enunciated the conclusion that

in long cables retardation due to capacity must render the speed of

signalling inversely proportional to the square of the cable’s length.

Some held that if this were true ocean telegraphy would be impossible,

and sought in consequence to disprove Thomson’s conclusions. Thomson on

the other hand set to work to overcome the difficulty by improvement

in the manufacture of the cables, and first of all the production of

copper of high conductivity, and the construction of apparatus which

would readily respond to the slightest variation of the current in the

cable.

The mirror galvanometer and the siphon recorder, which was patented in

1867, were the outcome of these researches, but the scientific value of

the mirror galvanometer is independent of its use in telegraphy, and

the siphon recorder is the direct precursor of one form of galvanometer

(d’arsnovals), now commonly used in electric laboratories.

Thomson’s work in connection with telegraphy led to the production in

rapid succession of instruments adapted to the requirements of the

time, for measurements of every electrical quantity, and when electric

lighting came to the front, a new set of instruments was produced to

meet the needs of the electrical engineer.

His industry is universal, and he seems to take rest by turning from

one difficulty to another, difficulties that would appal most men, and

be taken as an enjoyment by no one else.

This life of unwearied industry and of universal honour has left Lord

Kelvin with a lovable nature, and charms all with whom he comes in

contact.

In 1866 he received the honour of knighthood in acknowledgment of his

services to transatlantic telegraphy, and in 1892 he was raised to the

peerage, with the title of Baron Kelvin of Largs.

_John Watkins Brett._

Telegraph engineer, was the son of a cabinet-maker, William Brett, of

Bristol, England, and was born in that city in 1805.

Brett has been styled, and with apparent justice, the founder of

submarine telegraphy.

The idea of sending electricity through submerged cables originated

with him and his brother; after some years in perfecting his plans, he

sought and obtained permission from Louis Phillipe in 1847 to establish

telegraphic communication with France and England, but the project

did not receive public attention, being regarded as too hazardous for

general support.

The attempt was, however, made in 1850, and met with success, and the

construction of numerous other submarine lines followed.

Brett always expressed confidence in the ultimate union of England and

America by means of electricity, but did not live to see its final

success.

He died on 3rd December, 1863, at the age of 58.

Brett published a book of 104 pages on the origin and progress of

oceanic telegraphy. He also contributed several papers on the same

subject to the Institute of Civil Engineers, of which he was a member.

A list of these contributions will be found in the index of the

Proceedings of the Society.

[Illustration: GUIGLIELMO MARCONI.]

_Signor Guiglielmo Marconi._

Born at Marzabotta, near Bologna, Italy, in April, 1875. His father

was a native of Italy and a man of substance, his mother was a Miss

Jamieson, born in Ireland, but of Scottish lineage.

Young Marconi early turned his attention to the wonders of electricity

and began his experiments in wireless telegraphy in 1891. While yet

a mere lad he came to England in 1896, and in co-operation with Sir

William Preece, then the head of the telegraph department in England,

began further experiments.

On March 27, 1899, he succeeded in sending messages across the British

channel from Boulogne to the south foreland.

The next and greatest achievement of all, on December 12, 1901, he

received a signal at St. John’s, Nfld., from Poldhu, Cornwall, nearly

2,000 miles distant.

On February 26, 1902, he received messages aboardship on the Atlantic

ocean from Poldhu, 2,099 miles away.

He is now engaged in further experiments and hopes to establish

permanent communication between England and America within a very

short time, and later extend the system over the entire globe.

At the present time all the leading steamship lines crossing the

Atlantic, and many ships of the British navy, are equipped with

wireless telegraph apparatus, by means of which vessels at sea are in

constant touch with Europe and America; thus each ship has become a

floating telegraph office.

The inventor is somewhat above medium height and of a highly strung

temperament. He is quiet and deliberate in his movements; he talks

little; is straightforward, unassuming, and has accepted his success

with calmness, almost with unconcern.

He is undoubtedly the most prominent man of the day and the wonder of

the age.

_Genesis of Wireless Telegraphy._

Professor McBride, M.A., D.Sc., of McGill University, in his inaugural

address as President of the Natural History Society of Montreal in

October, 1901, referred to wireless telegraphy as follows:--

“Take a discovery that is exciting the greatest interest at the present

time, and promises results of the most far-reaching importance, namely,

wireless telegraphy. Let us trace the apostolical succession, to borrow

a term from theology, of the idea which underlies the discovery.

“Thirty or forty years ago the great Cambridge physicist, Clerk

Maxwell, one of the greatest and most penetrative of the geniuses who

have filled the chairs of that ancient university, was engaged in

determining the value of the electric unit. As many of my hearers are

aware, there are two ways of doing this: we can estimate either the

push that an electric charge exerts on another similar charge, or else

the pull that an electric current effects on a magnetic needle. In this

way two different values for the unit are arrived at, and the relation

between them, or to put it more simply, the number obtained by dividing

the one by the other, gives the velocity of light in centimeters per

second. This remarkable result suggested to Clerk Maxwell that, that

mysterious thing called electricity had something to do with the

ether which fills all space and transmits the vibrations which we

call light, and he thereupon constructed this famous electro-magnetic

theory of light which conceives light to consist of vibrations not on a

comparatively gross material like ordinary matter, but of electricity

itself. This theory received at first little support from the German

physicists, who are inclined to scoff at every idea that is not of

German origin.

“Amongst a crowd of scoffers, however, one open-minded enquirer was

found who said to himself ‘If Clerk Maxwell is right, I ought to find

that if I start artificial electric vibrations they will propagate

themselves like light waves.’ This man’s name was Hertz, and he

promptly set about producing electric waves purely with a view of

testing Clerk Maxwell’s theory.

“He had many difficulties to overcome before he succeeded in

producing them in sufficiently rapid succession, but this was at last

accomplished and Maxwell’s theory triumphantly vindicated.

“The electric vibrations comported themselves like light. It is true

that a stone wall was as transparent for them as a sheet of glass is

for ordinary light, but they were reflected by a metal plate and could

be brought to a focus, etc., etc. Now this invisible light, as we may

call it, is what Marconi and others have employed in their so-called

wireless telegraphy, but, without Maxwell or Hertz, it would have

remained undiscovered to this day.”

_Historical._

Wireless telegraphy, or the transmission of signals through space by

means of electric waves, is of a comparatively recent origin, although

the idea of the existence of electric waves dates back some forty years

ago.

In 1868 Clerk Maxwell, then Professor of Physics in Cambridge

University, first published a theory showing that an intimate relation

between electricity and light existed. This theory, which has received

most conclusive substantiation since then by eminent physicists,

is known as the electro-magnetic theory. It tells us that electric

waves and light waves are similar; that they represent a transfer of

energy by means of the all-pervading universal ether; that they differ

radically in their effects on the physical senses in wave length and

period of vibration, and that both possess the same velocity, 186,000

miles per second.

Many of the exponents of the electro-magnetic theory discussed the

properties of electric waves long before they were experimentally

demonstrated.

Our experimental knowledge of the existence of electric waves dates

from about 1880.

Hertz, a German physicist, while working under the illustrious

Helmholtz, discovered that small sparks could be made to pass

between the two conductors when held near a circuit in which electric

oscillations were set up. He soon discovered that this was due to the

action of electric waves, and, realizing how fundamental in importance

this was to the thorough knowledge of the electro-magnetic theory, he

commenced a series of experimental researches which were of such a

brilliant and productive nature as to mark them as amongst the most

important investigations in the whole domain of science.

A number of experimenters then followed, amongst them Signor Marconi,

who has since become closely identified with its practical application.

In 1890 the coherer was discovered by Branly, and simultaneously by

Oliver Lodge.

Lodge’s coherer was a very delicate instrument, and by its means the

electric waves could be detected at a much greater distance than was

possible with the conductors used by Hertz.

In 1895, in Cambridge, Mr. Rutherford (now Professor of Physics in

McGill University), first showed that the waves could be observed by a

magnetic detector.

He discovered that a weakly magnetized steel wire becomes

instantaneously demagnetized under the influence of electrical

oscillations, such as electric waves. With his detector he succeeded in

establishing communication at half a mile.

In 1896 Marconi came from Italy to England, and, with the help of a

Government grant, obtained through the instigation of Sir William

Preece, head of the British telegraph department, commenced a series of

experiments in wireless telegraphy. Very rapid strides were made, and

the distance to which signals could be sent was very much increased.

An important development soon followed in regard to the use of a

vertical wire for transmitting the waves, instead of a horizontal one,

which increased the distance still more.

Although Marconi has come to be chiefly associated with the development

of wireless telegraphy, other systems have been established in various

countries which involve slight modifications in the apparatus employed.

In Germany the Arco Slaby system is used with success, and in the

United States the De Forest is being installed in many places.

Then there is the Armstrong, Orling and the Muirhead Lodge system. In

England a wireless telegraph company was organized in 1902.

This company, having secured the Marconi patents, aimed to monopolize

that business in Great Britain, but, as the Government there controls

the telegraphs, this was not permitted.

The company complained as to the attitude of the British Government in

retarding instead of encouraging the enterprise. When the subject was

brought up in the House of Commons on June 8, 1903, Mr. Chamberlain,

the then Postmaster-General, explained that he had no desire to hamper

a new invention, but the Post-Office did not intend to throw away its

right to the monopoly in public communication as it had done in the

early days of the telephone.

He had not been dealing with Mr. Marconi, but with the company owning

Marconi’s invention. The company asked for a permanent exclusive right

to use wireless telegraphy in Great Britain.

This was refused, on the ground that it was not business. When the

company was prepared to talk business, he was prepared to deal with

it. When the company asked for a private wire to Poldhu he (Mr.

Chamberlain) had granted the request immediately.

At the time President Roosevelt sent his wireless message to King

Edward, and the latter replied by cable, the Post-Office had arranged

to convey the message from the nearest office to Poldhu at any hour,

although there was no difference whatever in telegraphing from London

to Poldhu.

The company next asked the Post-Office to act as its agent in

collecting messages in Great Britain for transatlantic marconigraphing,

but he had submitted certain conditions with the view of preventing

interference with the admiralty and for strategic reasons, adding

that when the conditions were accepted and the company satisfied

the Post-Office experts of its ability to send messages across the

Atlantic, the Post-Office would appoint the company as its agent, as it

already had done in the case of the cable companies.

That letter had been sent to the company on March 31, but no reply had

been received.

Mr. Chamberlain contended that the Post-Office was in no way to be

blamed for the delay, but it refused to take the public money for

messages until the company was willing to allow the Post-Office experts

to go to Poldhu and satisfy themselves that the wireless system is

workable. All this shows the company was not at that time in a position

to transact public business, otherwise the Post-Office experts would

have had access to its station at Poldhu. The subsequent failure showed

the contention of the Post-Office was correct.

In the early part of 1903 a transatlantic communication was established

for a short time and then collapsed; the system not having been fully

perfected, the company should hesitate to again make the attempt until

its plans are fully matured. As to the future of the system there

is not the shadow of a doubt of its ultimate success. Meanwhile the

Marconi Company has arranged with the British Government Telegraph

System and also with the leading Telegraph companies in the United

States and Canada to interchange traffic. Now nearly all passenger

steamers crossing the Atlantic are equipped with the Marconi apparatus

and are in a position while at sea to send and receive messages to and

from all parts of the world, and the company are doing a profitable

business even now with its limited area of operations; what must it

be when they shall have established communication over every sea and

continent in the world. This will be accomplished in no very long lapse

of time. The medium of communication provided by nature is ready and

waiting like a willing steed to be harnessed for the uses of man.

The man singled out by providence to perform this superhuman task is

Signor Guiglielmo Marconi.

_Wireless Telegraphy Apparatus._

Electric waves have long been harnessed by the use of wires for sending

communications to a distance, but the ether exists outside of the

wire as well as within; therefore, having the ether everywhere, it

must be possible to produce waves in it which will pass anywhere on

the earth’s surface, and if these waves can be controlled, messages

can be transmitted as easily and certainly as the ether within the

guiding wire. The problem lay in producing suitable instruments to

effect this result. Marconi adopted a device invented by an Italian

named Calzecchi, and improved by a Frenchman, Mr. Branley, called

the coherer, which he greatly improved. This instrument is merely

a small tube of glass about as big around as a lead pencil and two

inches in length; this is plugged at each end with silver. The plugs

almost touching within the tube, the narrow space between is filled

with finely powdered particles of nickel and silver, which possess

the property of being alternately good and very bad conductors of an

electric current or waves. The waves that come from the transmitter,

perhaps a thousand or two thousand miles away, are received, but

are so weak that they could not of themselves actuate any ordinary

telegraph instrument; they do, however, possess strength enough to

draw the little fragments of silver and nickel in the coherer together

in a continuous path; in other words, they make these metal filings

cohere, and the moment they cohere they become a good conductor for

electricity, and a current from a local battery operates the Morse

instruments. Then a little tapper actuated by the same current strikes

against the coherer, the particles of metal are separated or decohered,

becoming instantly a poor conductor and thus stopping the current from

the home battery; another wave comes through space into the coherer

there drawing the particles again together and another dot or dash is

printed. All these processes are continued rapidly until a complete

message is received.

The sending instrument, or transmitter, is called the oscillator, a

device somewhat similar to the familiar Morse telegraph key.

Marconi is now employed in perfecting an instrument by which the

station only with which communication is desired can hear the signal,

and receive the message. Thus the required secrecy will be preserved.

Marconi has patented over a hundred devices in connection with wireless

telegraphy, but the nature and application of these has not been given

to the public as yet.

_Thomas A. Edison’s Opinion of Wireless Telegraphy._

“There is absolutely no reason why Marconi may not develop a speed

of 500 words a minute in the transmission of translantic messages,”

said Thomas A. Edison in course of an interview; “on the other hand,”

continued the inventor, “there are technical, scientific and mechanical

obstacles which make it absolutely impossible to increase the speed of

transmission of ocean cables.

“There is not the least doubt but that the Marconi system is

successful. All this talk about lack of secrecy and interception of

messages is nonsense. At least ten men know the contents of every cable

message, and none of them receive very high salary. Personally I have

no doubt whatever that the Marconi system is both a commercial and

scientific success.”

_A Cable Manager’s Views of Wireless Telegraphy._

At the annual meeting of the Commercial Cable Company on March 3, 1903,

Mr. Ward, the Vice-President and General Manager, referring to wireless

telegraphy, said: “At the last annual meeting some remarks were made

by me in regard to wireless telegraphy and its effects upon submarine

cables. We see no reason to change the opinion expressed at that time.

“Admitting the recent transmission of a message across the Atlantic

without wires, radical improvements would have to be made in its

development before wireless telegraphy could possibly hope to meet the

demands of trade and commerce, and engage in successful competition

with submarine cables.

“A good deal has been said and advertised about the wireless systems

for the past three years. As yet there is nothing to show that messages

can be transmitted without wires even across short distances with

anything of the regularity, reliability, correctness and secrecy at

any time and all time during the day or night demanded of the present

telegraph systems, and necessary for the protection, interests and the

development of the telegraph business.

“Furthermore, the transmission of messages between European

and American coasts of the Atlantic is far from constituting a

transatlantic service as it exists to-day.

“The essential adjunct of an extensive inland system for the

distribution and collection of messages on the North American Continent

must not be lost sight of. A large part of the traffic passing by

the Atlantic cables is destined for places remote from the seaboard.

Messages to and from Chicago, St Louis, San Francisco, Montreal,

Toronto, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Vancouver, etc., require and receive

transmission which are measured by minutes. This important traffic

would be practically extinguished if the sender could not rely on

extremely rapid and accurate service.

“For the benefit of those who do not share my confidence I may say that

the etheric waves will be as obedient to us as to anybody, if it should

ever be found practicable to dispense with cables and wires.

“On the other hand, we have not been standing still in the matter of

improvements.

“The Commercial Cable Company will maintain its pre-eminence, and has

nothing to dread from the competition of wire or wireless telegraphy.

At the same time we are satisfied it has its limits.”

_An Interview with Signor Marconi._

The following interesting interview had with Signor Marconi by a

representative of the _Montreal Star_, Sept. 10, 1903, is worth

reproducing:--

“Seated in the rotunda of the Windsor Hotel to-day was a slightly

built man with a keen expressive face and grey eyes that flashed

incessantly. Probably not one of the guests that thronged the spacious

lobby was aware that the little man sitting there so quietly was Signor

Guiglielmo Marconi, the ‘Wizard of the Wireless.’

“Signor Marconi reached the city early to-day from New York, where he

has been for the past ten days. He is now on his way to Ottawa, where

he is to have an interview with the Government in regard to his future

plans. When approached by a _Star_ reporter Signor Marconi chatted

pleasantly of those plans and gave some interesting information of what

had been done in the past and the prospects of the future.

“He speaks English fluently with a slight accent, and appears to be

more eager to interview than be interviewed.

“‘I am glad to be in Canada once more,’ said the distinguished

inventor. ‘Canadians have always been extremely interested in my work

and I am beginning to feel quite at home when I get here.’

“‘Do you know,’ he said with a smile, ‘that this is my fourth visit to

Canada?’

“‘What is the object of your present visit to Canada?’

“‘I am here partly on a holiday trip and partly on business. I am

leaving for Ottawa to-night, and while there I shall go into a matter

I have long been considering, but which as yet I have not been able

to accomplish, namely, the establishment of Canadian stations for the

transmission of overland messages. These stations will reach from the

Atlantic to the Pacific, and I hope that in a short time the wireless

system of telegraphing communications will be thoroughly tested and

perfected overland.

“‘In case I obtain the permission I desire, I shall begin operations as

soon as possible, and Canada will offer exceptional advantages for the

testing of the system by reason of its tremendous distances.’

“‘It is merely a matter of time, then, before these stations are built

and experiments begun?’

“‘Yes, merely a matter of time. There is one point in regard to

wireless telegraphy that the general public do not seem to grasp

quite, and that point is the length of time that must be taken up by

the incessant private experiments in order that the system may be

perfected. One cannot go at matters of this sort too quickly; each

step has to be thought out carefully, and often weeks are spent in

perfecting some little detail; the progress of the work is, therefore,

slow.’

“‘Can you tell me anything of the negotiations you are conducting with

the British Admiralty?’

“‘All I can say is that a contract between myself and the British

Admiralty has already been signed and sealed for the adoption of

the Marconi system on all the ships of the navy. Sixty-three of the

battleships are already fitted up with the apparatus and the whole of

the navy is to be equipped.’

“‘The terms of the contract will allow me to use the different stations

of the navy for the erection of my receiving station and my masts;

negotiations have been going on for some time, and now everything

is arranged and the British navy will be equipped with the Marconi

wireless apparatus.’

“The distinguished inventor then gave a very lucid description of the

effectiveness of the wireless agency over marine areas; the unbroken

surface of the ocean enabled great distances to be obtained.

“In regard to the overland service, if the land was low lying, the

same conditions prevailed as at sea. Over tracts, where the usual

diversified topographical features were found, the potency of the

vibrations might be reduced. The vibrations seemed to reach farther in

fogs than in a clear atmosphere, but, as a rule, atmospheric conditions

did not appear to affect the transmission of messages. In regard to the

location of stations Signor Marconi said that proximity to the sea was

desirable for a station, as some geological formations were perverse

and others responsive.

“Before his return to England he would visit Cape Breton and his

Receiving Station at Glace Bay.

“He expected to be in Canada for some weeks.

“Signor Marconi spoke of the voyage he made on the ‘Campania’ a few

days ago. On that trip the ‘Campania’ was in constant touch with Poldhu

until nearing the Coast of America, when she picked up the Narraganset

Station.

“Throughout the voyage a daily bulletin was issued of the world’s

leading events, and the result of the yacht races were known on board a

few minutes after the conclusion of the various races.

“A few minutes’ chat with the ‘wizard’ is convincing proof that the

distinguished inventor has implicit faith in the future of his system.

“The great tone of assurance in which he speaks is only equalled by the

modest way in which he refers to the marvellous results that have been

obtained already.”

_The Trip of the SS. “Minneapolis.”_

“Signor Marconi has scored another triumph with his wireless telegraphy.

“The passengers on the Atlantic Transport Company’s steamship

‘Minneapolis,’ which reached London on Tuesday, enjoyed the distinction

of being the first transatlantic travellers to keep in touch with the

rest of the world throughout their voyage from the New to the Old World.

“The ‘Minneapolis’ left New York on January 31, and for five days kept

in touch with the Cape Cod Station; after that the wireless plant began

to respond to the messages at Cornwall.

“The varying phases of the Venezuelan question, the domestic troubles

of European potentates, the definition of true philanthropy by John

E. Rockfeller, jun., King Edward’s illness, the contest for the Fair

millions, the hurricane that destroyed 1,000 inhabitants of the Society

Islands, Sir Thomas’ latest plans, Count Montesquious’ New York debut,

the latest gossip from Washington and St. James’, these were among the

tit-bits of news that varied the monotony to ocean travel.

“When the English pilot picked up the ‘Minneapolis’ his two-day old

newspapers were accepted with disdain, and he was informed of the

latest news that had been flashed to the liner.”

_Valuable Use of Marconi System made by Disabled Steamer._

Queenstown, Dec. 10, 1903.

The saloon passengers of the steamer “Kroonland” are enthusiastic over

the utility of the Marconi wireless telegraph system, by means of which

news of the accident to that ship was received here yesterday.

The breakdown of the steering apparatus occurred at noon Tuesday,

when the “Kroonland” was 130 miles west of Fastnet. Captain Daxrud

immediately sent to Crookhaven a wireless message to the agents of

the line at Antwerp describing the damage and informing them that the

steamer must abandon her voyage. A reply was received within an hour

and a half. Whereupon Captain Daxrud complied with the instructions

sent to him to return to Queenstown. Meanwhile, three-fourths of the

saloon passengers and a number of those in the second cabin sent

wireless messages to friends in various parts of Great Britain and

Europe, and many of them received replies before Fastnet was sighted

from the steamer.

Some of the wireless messages were cabled to the United States. In some

cases the senders asked friends for money, and the replies authorizing

the purser to advance funds to them, which was done before land was

sighted.

The “Kroonland’s” twin screws steered the ship easily, the only

difference being steam was reduced.

_Another Use of Wireless Telegraphy._

New York, Oct. 17, 1903.

Wireless telegraphy was successfully used in tracing lost baggage on

the last outward trip of the Red Star Liner “Finland,” on Oct 10.

A passenger, who discovered some time after the steamer’s departure,

that he left some baggage behind on the dock, communicated with the

officials at the Pier through the Marconi Station at Babylon, L.I., and

in twenty minutes received a reply that the baggage had been found and

would be forwarded by the next steamer.

_A Newspaper’s Opinion of Wireless Telegraphy._

The Montreal _Witness_, in its issue Nov. 18, 1903, says: “Whatever

may be the actual achievement of the Marconi wireless system, so far

as telegraphing across the Atlantic is concerned, that system is now

an assured success in communicating from ship to ship and from ships

to lighthouses on the coasts. In this respect the system has passed

the stage of scientific curiosity and has become a necessity. The

Cunard and Allan Lines now, for instance, are able to communicate with

stations established on the south and northwest coasts of Ireland, so

that their owners as ‘Syren and Shipping’ puts it, are no longer in

a quandary during bad or thick weather as to whether their boats are

calling at Queenstown or at Moville, as the case may be. The Marconi

system was first installed upon the ‘Lucania,’ and so satisfied were

the Cunard people with results that it is now in regular operation on

the ‘Campania,’ ‘Etruria,’ ‘Umbria,’ ‘Ivernia,’ ‘Saxonia,’ ‘Aurania’

and ‘Carpothia.’

“Other shipping lines have similarly found the Marconi system

indispensable, so that now it is quite an ordinary occurrence for a

ship on the North Atlantic to be in electrical communication with

passing steamers or the shore during nearly the whole of the voyage.

“Such remarkable success as already attained is sufficient warrant for

the general belief that this system of aerial telegraphy is but in

its initial stages, and that its commercial success over wider spaces

is only a question of time. Presently the system will be used on the

Canadian Coast line, and then it is hoped that shipwreck caused by want

of knowledge of locality will be largely a thing of the past.”

_Wireless Telegraphy._

There has been no announcement in connection with science of recent

date which has such an important meaning as the very modest statement

recently made by Signor Marconi to the members of the Royal Institute

of London. His discoveries in connection with wireless telegraphy have

exceeded the expectations of many of the greatest scientists of the day

who gave him all credit for the work which he had done, but could not

bring themselves to believe that he could perfect his system within so

brief a time.

One of the principal handicaps which Mr. Marconi has endeavored to

overcome has been that of rapid and reliable transmission of messages.

For a time he found it very difficult to mechanically record messages

which were transmitted with high speed. It necessitated the use of a

telephone receiver which meant that the operator might take down the

message, but there was no mechanical record which would cause a mistake

in receiving it to be instantly detected.

Mr. Marconi says: “I have perfected a receiver which will permit

the transmission and receiving of messages at the rate of 100 words

per minute on an ordinary Wheatstone recorder. This obviates the

difficulty of relying upon the operator to take the message by sound

and permits of a double record of every message received.”

The ability to transmit and correctly receive wireless messages at this

rate means that this latest invention of science is now in a position

whereby it can compete on even terms with the great telegraph and

cable services of the world. Mr. Marconi further stated that his new

invention further combined accuracy with absolute reliability, and it

means that the future development of wireless telegraphy has received

an impetus which will carry it into a broader field than has heretofore

been conservatively looked for, and that this unlimited possibility can

and will be made an actuality in the immediate future.

No more important announcement could be made at this time when Mr.

Marconi is about to install the new, high-powered apparatus which will

allow uninterrupted communication between Glace Bay, Nova Scotia and

Poldhu, England.

[Illustration: SS. PARISIAN.]

_Wireless Telegraphy on the SS. “Parisian.”_

Through the courtesy of Major Fishback, Canadian Manager for the

Marconi Telegraph Company, the writer had permission to visit the

Marconi Cabin on the SS. “Parisian” in order to learn the _modus

operandi_ of wireless telegraph at sea.

On boarding the ship the first object noticeable is a wire leading from

the cabin to the peak of the main mast ending in a triangular form,

connecting the apparatus with the ether and another wire to the ship’s

hold going to earth.

Mr. McGee, the young man in charge, politely pointed out and explained

the uses of the various appliances comprising the Marconi outfit.

First was a large Rumford coil, a glass cylinder through which the

electric spark was discharged and a key or transmitter constituting the

sending apparatus.

Second, on the left was a large oblong box containing the coherer, the

chief instrument in wireless telegraphy, and in the centre an automatic

self-inking Morse register with an alarm bell attachment, these

being the receiving instruments, and underneath the accumulators or

storage batteries and six cells of a home battery to work the Morse

instrument. When the key was depressed for an instant a bright electric

spark emitted from the contact points in the glass cylinder, giving a

hard hissing sound; this imprinted a dot on the register, and a longer

impression marked a line, the two forming the letter “a” of the Morse

alphabet.

The characters or code used by the wireless system is what is known

as the European or Continental Code, that is the spaced letters are

eliminated and dots and lines substituted the same as the cable system.

All the vessels equipped with Marconi apparatus on the St. Lawrence

route have a capacity of eighty miles’ transmission, but a possible one

hundred and twenty, this distance being deemed great enough for all

practical purposes.

On the New York and Liverpool route the steamships have a much more

extensive equipment, which enables them to keep in touch with the one

side of the Atlantic or the other during the entire voyage.

The cost of the Marconi equipment of the former averages £200--or

$1,000.

Five Marconi stations have been erected on the Lower St. Lawrence

during the present summer and a fair, profitable traffic carried on so

far. These stations will be closed during the winter, but a station is

being erected at Cape Race, Nfld., which will be open throughout the

year.

The rates charged is two dollars for ten words and twelve cents for

each additional word plus cable or land line rates.

Mr. McGee informed me the “Parisian” was enveloped in a dense fog when

in the vicinity of Belle Isle on her inward trip. The captain was

surprised at not hearing the fog syren and the Marconi station was

communicated with to learn the reason. A response immediately came that

the fog horn had been and was then blowing since the fog had fallen,

thus showing the ship was out of range and in safety.

Many passengers took occasion to Marconigram friends of their

whereabouts and their probable arrival at Montreal.

Passengers by the St. Lawrence route are now enabled to communicate

with friends three days after departure and before arrival at Montreal

by means of the Marconi telegraph system. All the Marconi stations are

connected with the Canadian telegraphs.

Mr. McGee also stated this was his first trip as operator with the

Marconi Company.

He had attended the company’s Instructive School in London for a period

of three months, at the end of which time he was considered duly

qualified and was appointed to the “Parisian.” This shows the wonderful

and mysterious wireless telegraphy is acquired more rapidly than the

Morse system, which takes from six months to one year to become fairly

proficient.

The operations of the one is very similar to the other; each ship or

station has an individual call or signal, and should the current affect

any instruments within range, no attention is given unless its own

particular signal is heard.

Many objections have been raised against wireless telegraphy, for the

reason that any one with a wireless outfit could intercept a message.

The very same thing can be done on land by any competent operator if he

feels inclined to gratify his curiosity and incur the penalty for so

doing.

Taken altogether, the wireless system on shipboard will prove an

immense convenience to ocean travellers and shipping interests, and

will ensure greater safety to both life and property.

_The Future of Wireless Telegraphy._

When, at the close of 1901, Marconi first announced to the world his

marvellous achievement that he had received a signal from Poldhu at St.

John’s, Nfld., many were incredulous and doubted its possibility, even

many scientific men were sceptical and suggested many reasons why there

might be an error in the experiment made. Amongst these were Edison,

Graham, Bell, Sir Wm. Preece and others but, when the facts became

known, all had to admit the success of the experiment and the accuracy

of Marconi’s statement.

Mr. Edison became a warm believer in wireless telegraphy, and is now

identified with its development. Soon after this triumph of the young

Italian, the voice of the company promoter was heard in the land.

A wireless telegraph company was organized in England. This company

had the audacity to claim an exclusive monopoly to operate the Marconi

system, but this the British authorities refused to grant. Following

this a company was formed for the same purpose in the United States and

one in Canada, these being all more or less co-related.

The principal object being to establish wireless communication between

Europe and America, a wireless station was erected at Glace Bay, Cape

Breton and one at Cape Cod, Mass., early in 1903. When these were

completed communication was for a short time carried on.

A congratulatory message from President Roosevelt to King Edward was

transmitted and a reply returned by the King, but the system broke down

and it has so remained.

Mr. Marconi has been (ever since the mishap) devoting his inventive

genius to the perfecting of his devices, and, it is believed,

transatlantic communication will be once more re-established within a

very short period. Meanwhile, these companies are not standing still,

but are very busily engaged in equipping passenger steamships with

Marconi wireless instruments, enabling vessels to communicate with each

other or with the stations on land on either side of the Atlantic. The

wireless telegraph business is constantly increasing and becoming very

lucrative. Traffic is now interchanged between the British Government

telegraph lines, the American and Canadian telegraph companies and

the wireless companies, so that a message can now be sent from any

telegraph station to a person aboard ship, or _vice versa_, by payment

of the tolls required for each company’s service. This seems to be

naturally the proper sphere for wireless telegraphy.

In time every ship that floats, whether naval or mercantile, will

eventually be installed with Marconi apparatus. This should be made

one of the conditions of insurance, if not compulsory. As far as being

successful competitors with existing land or cable telegraph systems,

it is more than doubtful, except in places where no other telegraph

system can be maintained. Wireless telegraphy for a long time to

come will merely be auxiliary or supplementary to the land and cable

systems, and mutually beneficial to each instead of being antagonistic.

The wireless system of telegraphy will be of immense benefit to

Canadian shipping interests owing to the long stretch of river

navigation from Montreal to the Gulf.

Several minor stations have been erected recently on the Lower St.

Lawrence and are now working satisfactorily.

The Canadian Government recognized the importance of wireless

telegraphy in its inception and granted Marconi a substantial sum to

enable him to build his wireless station at Glace Bay. The public

hardly yet realize its great possibilities.

_Dominion Wireless Telegraph Company, Limited._

PRINCIPAL OFFICE: 160 ST. JAMES STREET, MONTREAL.

CAPITAL STOCK, $1,200,000. PAR VALUE, $5.

This company proposes to build and operate stations at all important

points in the Dominion of Canada and do a general telegraphic business

between stations in the United States or elsewhere, owned or controlled

by the American DeForest Wireless Telegraph Company or any of their

subsidiary companies. It will also build and operate stations on both

the Atlantic and Pacific Coasts for transmission of messages abroad,

and will work in harmony with like stations built by foreign DeForest

companies, will erect and operate stations along all of the important

rivers, gulfs and lakes, as well as on the sea coast, and will equip

vessels with Wireless Telegraph instruments, keeping them in touch with

their home office until their destination has been reached.

This company proposes to erect and operate stations as follows: