Oh, that the large prophetic Voice The burden of the isles, the word For I would frame a song to-day Sits with a triple coronet. To her the forest lent its lyre, She, the imperial Rhine's own child, White Danube's tide. MALVERN, JULY, 1886. She who beside an infant's bier Now from a People's sole acclaim Yet who is he who pines apart, An alien in his fand of birth, An outcast from his brethren's earth, Albeit with theirs his blood mixed well When Plevna fell? When all Roumania's chains were riven, Reaped by the sword,Wherefore was this poor thrall, whose chains Hung heaviest, within whose veins The oldest blood of freedom streamed, Still unredeemed? O Mother, Poet, Queen in one! For thine own people's sake who share His brother - Christ! Emma Lazarus. THE AMERICAN INVENTORS OF THE TELEGRAPH.* WITH SPECIAL REFERENCES TO THE SERVICES OF ALFRED VAIL. came impaired, and as his physical condition precluded the prosecution of his theological studies, he appears for a time to have labored under much uncertainty as to his future course. The problem of his life-work was, as the event proved, soon to be solved by a fortunate and unexpected incident. In the year 1832 Professor Morse, on a voyage from Havre to New York in the packet Sully, had conceived and drawn in his sketchbook an apparatus for recording signals at a distance by electro-magnetism. The history of the inception and early development of Morse's invention is familiar and need not be repeated, except as may be necessary to enable the successive steps by which it was wrought into a practical and commercial form to be properly understood. Until Morse became one of the faculty of the University, he had been prevented, by the nomadic life imposed upon him by his straitened circumstances, from making any effort beyond the molding and casting of a set of leaden type to reduce that conception to practice. This, according to his original scheme, was automatically to open and close an electric circuit and thereby transmit certain signals, to which an arbitrary numerical signification was to be given. Eleven years prior to this date, Alfred Vail, a youth of seventeen, having completed his studies in the village school of Morristown, New Jersey, found congenial opportunity to gratify his inherited mechanical tastes by going to work in the Speedwell Iron Works, of which his father, Judge Stephen Vail, was the proprietor. One of his characteristics, from an early age, had been a marked fondness for study and investigation in matters relating to the natural sciences; and as his mind gradually matured and unfolded itself, his aspirations for a broader and more systematic mental culture, and a higher degree of attainment than was possible under the conditions which then surrounded him, were with difficulty repressed. It was the natural desire and expectation of Judge Vail that both his sons, Alfred and George, should identify themselves with the manufacturing business, an extensive one for those days, which he himself had prosecuted with industry and success. In compliance with his father's wishes, Alfred contented himself for a time with the duties of his position. Upon attaining his majority, however, his inclination for a more appropriate field of labor could no longer be restrained; and, after much anxious consideration of the matter, he determined to prepare himself for the ministry of the Presbyterian Church. In 1832, at the age of twenty-five, he entered the University of the City of New York, from which institution he was graduated in due course in October, 1836. Towards the close of his term his health be*See also "Professor Morse and the Telegraph," by Benson J. Lossing, in this magazine for March, 1873, and a communication by Professor J. W. Draper, in May, 1873. During the latter portion of the time in which Alfred Vail had been a student in the University the chair of chemistry had been occupied by Professor Leonard D. Gale. In January, 1837, Professor Morse, who in the privacy of his apartments had constructed a rude but nevertheless operative experimental model, exemplifying the principle of the recording telegraph which he had devised on board the Sully, took Professor Gale into his confidence and exhibited to him the invention, so far as it had then been developed by his unaided hands and brain. Professor Gale, whose knowledge and acquirements were of a character which enabled him to appreciate the ingenuity of the inventor and to forecast the possible success of the invention, became at once deeply interested in the plans of his colleague, and thenceforth the assistance which he rendered Morse in his experiments was of the utmost importance and value. For some time, the experimental in strument remained substantially unchanged. Morse himself possessed but moderate mechanical skill, while his poverty debarred him from employing trained workmen to put the invention into a more permanent form. In February, 1837, the House of Representatives had passed a resolution requesting the Secretary of the Treasury to report upon the propriety of establishing a "system of telegraphs for the United States." With the view of gathering the necessary material for his report, the Secretary of the Treasury, on March 10, 1837, issued a circular of inquiry, a copy of which fell into the hands of Professor Morse, and doubtless led to his determination to complete his invention and, if possible, to secure its acceptance by the Government. VOL. XXXV.-126. On Saturday, September 2, 1837, Professor Daubeny of Oxford University, then visiting the United States, was invited with others to witness the operation of the electro-magnetic telegraph at the University. The apparatus had been set up with a circuit of copper wire, stretched back and forth along the walls of a large room. Among the spectators was Alfred Vail, who then saw the apparatus for the first time. Notwithstanding the crude and imperfect character of the machinery in which the invention was embodied, the results were such as conclusively to demonstrate the possibility of recording signals at a considerable distance by the instantaneous action of electricity. This exhibition produced a profound effect upon the mind of Vail. His inherited and acquired mechanical skill, and the knowledge of construction which his apprenticeship in his father's works had given him, satisfied him that it was possible to embody this grand conception in a concrete form, which should insure its successful employment for public purposes. More than this, his education and training at the University had given him some insight into the affairs of the world, and his mind intuitively formed a distinct conception of the vast scope and future importance of the invention. Among the papers left by Mr. Vail is one giving an account of this incident. Referring to his occasional visits to New York during the year following his graduation, he says: On one of these visits, prior to September 4, 1837, I accidentally and without invitation called upon Profes sor Morse at the University and found him, with Professors Torrey and Daubeny, in the mineralogical Professor Morse was exhibiting to these gentlemen an cabinet and lecture room of Professor Gale, where apparatus which he called his "Electro-Magnetic Telegraph." There were wires suspended in the room running from one end to the other and returning many times, making a length of seventeen hundred feet. The two ends of the wire were connected with an electro-magnet fastened to a vertical wooden frame. In front of the magnet was its armature, and also a wooden lever or arm fitted at its extremity to hold a became thoroughly acquainted with the principles of lead pencil. . . . I saw this instrument work and its operation, and, I may say, struck with the rude machine, containing, as I believed, the germ of what was destined to produce great changes in the condition and relations of mankind. I well recollect the impression which was then made upon my mind. I rejoiced to (FROM A DAGUERREOTYPE TAKEN IN HIS SEVENTY-THIRD YEAR, BY BESKER & RAW, 1852.) carry out his plans. I promised him assistance provided he would admit me in a share of the invention, to which proposition he assented. I then returned to my boarding-house, locked the door of my room, threw myself upon the bed, and gave myself up to reflection upon the mighty results which were certain to follow the introduction of this new agent in meeting and serving the wants of the world. With the atlas in my hand, I traced the most important lines which would most certainly be erected in the United States, and calculated their length. The question then rose in my mind whether the electro-magnet could be made to work through the necessary lengths of line; and after much reflection I came to the conclusion that provided the magnet would work even at a distance of eight or ten miles there could be no risk in embark apparatus, of repeating signals from one circuit into another. The explanation of this feature appears to have convinced him of the truth of Morse's remark, "If I can succeed in working a magnet ten miles, I can go round the globe." When Vail had once satisfied himself of the feasibility of the scheme of electric communication, his mind became fascinated with the. field of achievement which opened before him. Here was indeed the promise of a career which satisfied alike his scientific and mechanical tastes and his highest aspirations. Having an opportunity thus opened to him to acquire an |