Evening journal., 1894-09-29
CABLE RATES AND RULES.
How They May 10 Utilized to Transfer
Cash ne Small Cost.


Cash nc Small Cost.
It "a possible 70 take advantage Of tho
rules OF the cable companies regarding pre-
payment Of messages 70 transfer small
amounts Of money by wire Cablegrams
win not be sent collect, neither may the
sender guarantee the payment 81 tolls upon
q reply to a message, but he can prepay
such reply to the extent Of 80 words by de-
posting cash to that amount at the origi-
mating Office and stating in his cablegram,
REPLY, 10 words prepaid" or whatever
number Of words he may mention within
the limit
For this phrase lie pays usual tolls.
When the message is delivered to the per
son addressed, the cable company 40 tho
same time hands him in cash the amount
of prepayment. The party getting the mon
ey can use it to send the reply wanted or
otherwise as he sees fit. The smallness Of
the amount involved prevents any undue
advantage being taken OF this system,
which has been found Of great convenience
ia legitimate way, as even the shortest
cablegram is expensive, while prepayment
reasonably guarantees reply.
Considering the fact that very few cable
grams are intelligible to the operators, the
mistakes made are surprisingly few, and
such as do occur are quite as often due to
tho poor penmanship of the writer as TO
carelessness on the part olcable employees
When mistakes do creep in, however, the
result may be serious il not detected, as an
error in single letter may radically alter
the meaning Of q message.
For example, cheaper" may be used to
signify, send 5000 bags of coffee To our
careat Boston, while eheapenN may stand
for the same phrase, except the substitu-
ton Of Philadelphia for Boston.
"a careless writer or negligent operator
would here have an excellent opportunity
to make a costly blunder. The codes are
arranged So far as possible to preclude mis-
takes Of this kind arising through similari-
/ ty Of cipher words, but risks cannot be en-
tirely eliminated.
1t costs nothing to register an address
| with the telegraph and cable companies in
/ America and Great Britain, whereby one
| word will stand for the full name Of the
/ firm, and thus reduce the cost of cable
grams, but on the continents the various
| governments impose a yearly tax for the
/ privilege, small rs it is.
The average citizen has no doubt often
| speculated how the cable people handle
messages written in foreign languages
/ that is how a native operator at say St.
Petersburg or Mecca can intelligently trans.
nit kilograms written in English. The ex-
! PLANTATION is exceedingly simple.
The only requirement Of the cable lines
is that all messages must be written in
Roman letters. This being done. it is az
easy for the operator to send or receive the
French word "guerre" as its English equiv
| alent, war; etc.
A telegram written in Russian or hen
track Turkish paralyzes the Morse alpha
bet until it is translated into equivalent
French, English or other Roman text, when
it can be ticked oil merrily by an operator
absolutely yunfamiliarwitht these languages
but who knows the telegraphic signs fol
the letters
The tariff books issued by the cable
companies make interesting reading. Ths
rate per word from New York to South
Africa is s2.49; to Cape Colony and Trans
vaal, $2.43 Mozambique, S2.41, and Zanzi
bar, S2.i5 To New South Wales via ons
route the rate is s1.45 per word and via an
other line S835. To Burmah 81. - is charged
and to Beloochistan, Sl,l3. The rate {,
China is Sl.96 and to Japan S2.2i.-phila
J delphia Times,