The Washington herald., 1912-05-09

The Interstate Commerce act that pre-
vents telephone companies from issuing
long distance passes caused one wash
Ington man TO pay for his long distance
calls for the first time since the tele-
phone was invented. That man y DR..
Alexander Graham Bell. who did the
inventing. He has TO dig up his tolls
the same as anybody else. And II he
happens to put in a call from q hotel
when he is away from home, he is OBJ
llged to pace the lobby and wait for the
girl TO assign him TO a booth, Just the
same as the humblest ready-made-cloth-
ing drummer. II Is common occur
renee for the girl operator to explain
TO DR.. Bel Just how 10 use the phone
to talk not too loud. with his mouth
about a foot from the transmitter, and
all that He never tells the girl who
he Is on such occasions, lest he cause
her modification.
Dr. Bell has such benign bushy
whiskers and such q kindly tempera-
ment that he has q keen disrelish for
causing any human the slightest en-
barrassment Here is an example:
Shortly after the telephone had come
into general use the inventor, who
was travelling abroad. got so sick
and tired Of hearing the device talked
about that he wished TO isolate himself
in some spot where the telephone had
not yet percolated. He picked out q
little village in Italy and registered at
an obscure Inn. But he had not been
there more than twenty minutes until
he received the card OF the head pro-
moter OF a company just being organ
lied to provide the village with tele-
phone service
This promoter, strange to say. was a
GfRla1N eraak1v arad
at finding himself in the presence Of an
international celebrity. DR.. Bell tried TO
put him at his ease. but in vain. A day
or two later, when DR.. Bell and his party
were at the railway station to continue
their journey, the promoter came along
with a huge bouquet OF rare flowers for
Mrs. Bell. But by mistake he presented
them TO Mrs Bells sister, who was in
the party. Knowing the mans diffidence
and how mortified he would be to think
he had made such an error. DR.. Bell
bade his sister-in-law assume the part OF
Mrs. Bell To do this she had to appear
to get what the promoter said to her only
by noting the movements Of his lips. as
Mrs. Bell Is deaf and the man had been
told so. DR.. Bell walked along several
PAGES behind with the children, to pre-
vent them from tipping OF the truth by
addressing some remark to their 'aunty."
II was q NTSAuk QldTNcT bA al MUIR A0l
the entire party, but when their train
pulled out the promoter was still marvel
ing at the supposed Mrs. Bells wonder
ful facility In lip reading.
When DR.. Bell was working on the
telephone up at Cambridge. and had 1t
nearly perfected. young japanese stu
dent came to him one day and wanted
TO know - the wonderful new instru-
ment would talk Japanese" as well as
English The inventor assured him
that It would carry any language. and
the Jap then asked II he might bring
one of his friends 20 see how their ma
tive tongue would sound over the wire.
They did 50. and were greatly Inn
pressed. A few years later the student
who had asked II the phone would talk
japanese was cent here as japanese
Minister. and he ana DR.. Bell saw much
Of each other in Washington. The
Minister was Baron Komura. who later
represented his country In the negotia-
tions at the treaty OF Portsmouth. at
the close OF the Japanese-Russian war.
Dr. Bell happened to be on an auto
mobile tour through Massachusetts, at
that time and ran over to Portsmouth
one afternoon to see what was going
on.
Just as the Bell auto pulled up. the
Japanese diplomat who had been 50 In
tarssted In the telephone Invention q