The silver messenger. (Challis, Idaho) 1890-1912, 1906-11-20
MENTAL TELEGRAPH
Az ITS USE LOST PARTS OF MA
cHINERY WERE FOUND.
Civil Engineer Has Remarkable e~
perience While Building Road IN
India-Developed to a Won
derful Degree.

"Many persons deride the idea OF
mental telegraphy, but If they Wouiu
snond a wear or two in India, as did,
and work shoulder to WIN
the educated East Indians they Woulu
cease their soothing" said G.. X. Scrug-
ham. organization manager for the
international policyholders' committee
and one of the most prominent eiec-
tric railway men in Ohio. 1t is won
darful To what a degree of perfection
those people yer there nave deVei-
oped the faculty of wireless communl'
cation without the aid of any lnstru'
ment other than their sensitive brains
They we're using the wireless system
over there centuries before Maroon
and De Forest we're born.
Let me give you an instance In
point, and it is only one OF many
which changed me from a skeptlc &c
a convert. Several years ago, when
was in. active work as a civil engineer
with railroad construction as my spe
cialtv. | went to India to assist III
building a line into the interior. we
came to a heading where the use OF
rock drills, of the tripod style you see
in use here in New York in making
excavations was absolutely necessary.
This had been foreseen in the surveys
made in advance of the construction
work. and we had ordered a battery
of those steam drills. Finally we
worked right up to the place where
we needed them, and we could not do
much more effective work until we
got them.
81 was in the office n day, Tuning
and fretting about those drills and
wondering whether the steamship up
on which they should have arrived
had reached Calcutta and whether the
drills were in her cargo. / asked one
of my assistants if he had heard any
thing from Calcutta, which was many
miles away. He replied in the mega
tive. He had not even received adj
vices that the steamship had arrived.
| was turning away in discomfort
when one of the East Indians who had
been assigned by the government to
assist us, stepped forward. He was
educated highly and spoke English flu
emily.
Excuse me- he said, were you
asking if the steamship had arrived?'
"'Yes-we are expecting several
steam drills on her and cannot do
much more work until we get them
1 replied.
"'She arrived this morning and the
drills have been Nunloaded from her,
said the East Indian. They are on the
pier now, but something seems to be
missing from them. Are they funny
looking things that stand on three
legs?'
Il told him they were and showed
to him a picture of one of the drills.
He looked at it carefully and then re-
piled:
Eyes; they're what are in those
long packages on the pier, but that
part is missing from each of them
He indicated an essential part in
the body of the drill as that which
was missing from each. At first / was
inclined to regard what he said as a
joke, but his seriousness impressed
me. / instructed the operator to wire
to Calcutta and ascertain what the
condition was. In a little while he
received a reply which c~orroborated
everything the East Indian had told
me, and, worst Of all, that when the
cases were opened it was discovered
the parts were missing. That meant
long delay, because the drills were
worthless without the missing parts.
In my dilemma / called the East In
dian to me and said:
"'Can you tell me whether those
missing parts were shipped with the
drills?'
Without hesitation he replied:
Yes; but they have not been
taken from the Ship
Where are they?' l inquired.
They are away down in the hold.
beneath a lot of heavy bales which are
going TO be taken to another port he
said, with perfectly serious face.
Il summoned the telegraph opera.
tor and instructed him to wire ON,
representative in Calcutta what the
East Indian had told me. With that
information l gave instructions that
the bales in the hold should be re.
moved and the missing drill parts got
from beneath them. Within three
hours received a return message
ina my orders had been carried out
ana that HI missing parts had been
round exactly where the East Indian
said they were concealed. In a few
days thereafter the drills reached us
ana were put at work cutting into the
rock IN the heading. After that expert.
ence, and others like it, do you won.
der that l believe in mental telegraphy
as 1t is practiced in India by the edu.
Gated East Indians?"