The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1883-08-04

required to make the new anal or widen
I the existing one. No such scheme could
be concocted of course without a fe"
threatening ways Of the head between
France and England, but the latest l. thaI
/ after a cabinet council, Sir Charles Rivers
Wilson j. to 80 To Paris and interview De
Lesseps, and amended proposals are locke
for i'm regard TO the canal by the House of
Commons, proposals emitting the provis-
ion pledging England to find the honey
for the new feat of engineering.
STRIKE OF TELEGRAPH OPERATORS.
If the Old World is calm as to the labor
ing classes, the United States decidedly is
not. AT II o'clock Washington time, on
the 18th of July, the operators in the West
ern Union Telegraph Company's employ
all over the Union and also those in the en-
ploy Of the Great Northwest Telegraph Com
pany in Canada, struck almost to IA man
and are holding out still. The strike had
been expected and threatened for several
days, but there was a rumor just before the
actual outbreak that a compromise had been
effected with the employers. Sympathy is
decidedly with the strikers. Their demands
for an advance upon their salaries are
founded in sound justice. relegraphy as a
calling make immense demands Oh the
nervous system, involves the mental strain
Of responsibility besides, and for the most
part telegTaphers work in hot, gas-poisOned
rooms. 1t is scientifically true that they
break down early, often becoming deaf from
the ~unremitting effort of the ear. So much
for the labor, now how about compensation.
The Western Union Company condescend-
ed to consider the proposition of allowing
the men to rest ON Sunday, or to draw extra
pay when they work on that day, but still
they must work one Sunday in six for moth
ing. The men have suffered reductions in
their wages from time To time amounting
to twenty-five per cent, and they only ask
for an advance of 10 per cent, and for reas-
Onably short hours Of labor. There exists
an organization called the Brotherhood of
T~eIegraphers, and it is the Executive Com
mittee Of this body that organized the strike.
Their newspaper, the TeLegrapher's AdUO-
cate, printed a statement on the tyranny of
employers towards operators, which has
been going on for ten years, during which
time three general reductions of wages have
been made, while the net profits of hand
ling messages are much greater han in
gCilSJ Oi dCCOuill Vi III pIONcu u4h-
chinery and the more skillful labor now
employed. The present average of pay for
operators is S54 II month, and
for railroad operators $3.50, and NO extra
pay for Sunday work. Railroad operators
at stations where but one man is employed,
are required to work from fourteen to six
teen hours a day. Another reasonable de-
maud is that women shall receive the same
pay as men. The strikers are behaving
Usually telegraph operators
from Il good class of people, and the
very cipher dispatch which commanded the
strike, contained the words do no unlaw-
full act Many of the stations used the
words General Grant dropped dead" as
the signal to quit the keys, because such a
was sure of speedy and universal
transmission. The strikers do not make the
least attempt to interfere with those who
those who hasten to offer their services
a number of such applicants and the en-
boast loudly that they shall not
miss the strikers at all, but an honest, earn
est strike always comes to be a matter of
endurance at the end, which can tire out
the other soonest. Twice as much work is
Of course being demanded from the skilled
operators who remain at the keys and the
real shock of war will be when these are
used up and retire to recuperate, when the
new zeal of the raw recruits from colleges
rusty knowledge of retired operators
who have pressed into the field, is wrung
TO its last gasp by a few consecutive nights
ut the instruments until three and four
Certainly as yet there has been
queer about the dispatches re-
,eived, nor have the wires been ~disconnect-
ed anywhere, while in a number of the cit
les the strikers have met to pass a resolution
10 abstain from intOXicants until the strike
IS decided one way or the Other. The men
N Chicago say that they have the Knights
If Labor at their back to provide them with
unds and that they mean to max a long
light. Here in San Francisco some of the
title telegraph messenger boys thought it
to "strike'' and managed to kick
Up quite a dust by so doing. a number of
Of their comical speeches were reported
about the length of time they were going to
hang out the advance of a cent which they
demanded and the condign punishment
hey would inflict upon any boys who offer
ID their services to fill the vacancies. The
title sinners actually caused more i%nconven-
ence and genuine obstruction to business
han the detection of the telegraph opera
themselves. This emergency is giving
/ fair trial to Sir Charles Wheatston's au-
omatic transmitter about which a great
leal has been said lately. 1t enables 500
words a minute to be transmitted, while
he Morse method transmits but 40 words a
minute even at good speed. The process is
thus Long strips of paper ar
perforated by a machine constructed for
hat purpose, with apertures grouped to rep
,esent the letters of the telegraphic alpha
'et. The strip thus prepared is placed in an
associated with a rheomotor or
ource of electric power, which, on being
ct i'm motion, move it along and causes it
o act on two pins in such a manner that
one of them is elevated, the current
s transmitted to the Geographic circuit in
me direction, and when the other is elevat-
it l. transmitted in a reverse direction.