, 1875-02-24

years ago the k~een-sighted, lnqulsitive
Greeks had set about to inquire into the
source of that marvellous power which we
call electricity, and it is equally true that
this invisible force must have existed a
long time prior to the inquiries of these
ancient Greeks. But the practical appli-
cation of it, as it exists in our day, is o
thing of comparatively recent origin
so recent, indeed, that many OF the early
disciples of Electric Telegraphy have lived
to witness the realization of all their hopes,
and more. As early as the year 1900 the
subject of electricity and magnetism began
to engage the attention of thinking men
in England and throughout Europe; and
to this period belongs the Latin treatise
of Dr.. Gilbert, of Colchester, which may
be said to have been the first really practi-
cal work on the subject. Then followed
the discoveries of Stephen Gray, q
pensioner of the Charterhouse, Du Faye,
Franklin, Galvani, Volta, Sir Humphry
Davy, Ritter of Munich, Oersted, the
celebrated Danish philosopher, Arago,
Sturgeon, and Faraday. These, however,
had all laboured more or less In the higher
field of electrical science; although, as q
matter of course, their labours tended in
no small degree to bring about the con,
summation which very speedily followed
the important discoveries of Faraday about
the year 1880. Prior to this-viz., in
1753-one Charles Morrison, described
in the Scots Magazine, under the initials
&C. NJ" his so-called Expeditions
Method of Conveying Intelligence )" but
although his system may be said to have
contained the germ of that now in use,
it twas so costly and so little expeditions
that it required q separate wire for each
letter of the alphabet, and practically a
separate apparatus for each wire. Morri-
sons plan was reproduced some 90 years
later-in 1774-by one LIE Sage, a French
man, who submitted it to Frederick
of Prussia as an original method of Elec-
trio Telegraphy. But it soon dropped out
of notice, both in this country and
abroad and, as is we'll known, the first
really practical teIegraphs belong to the
wear 1887, when Messrs, Cooke and
Wheatstone took out their first patent.
The subsequent history of the Electric
Telegraph need not be dealt with here,
except so far as it derives additional
interest from the perusal of q somewhat
curious work published about Ii years
prior to the inventions of Messrs. Cooke
and Wheatstone, which probably attracted
little notice at the time, and has long
since been forgotten. In 1823-just SO
wears ago-Francis Ronalds, of Hammer
smith, whose Iabours in the cause of
Electric Telegraphy were as ardent and
persevering as they proved disheartening
and Improbable, published for private
circulation a little work entitled "Descrip-
tions of an Electric Telegraph" which it
is interesting and instructive to read in the
light of what has been achieved in regard
to Geographic communication during the
past haIt-century. Mr.. Ronalds appears
to have been the first to make the expert
ment, on any great scale, Of sending a cur
rent of electricity through an aerial wire,
which he erected on a "lawn or grass
plot near his residence at Hammersmith.
Of course, it was impossible to erect any
great length of single continuous wire in
such a situation but Mr.. Ronalds very
ingeniously surmounted this difficulty by
erecting two wooden frames, placed at a
distance of 30 yards from each other, each
frame being traversed by 10 horizontal
bars, and each bar, having 81 hooks from
which depended silken cords, supporting
and also insulating a small iron wire.