Curiosities of Civilization Part 19

Now come the messages following one after the other, and influencing the fate of the marked individuals with all the celerity, certainty, and calmness of the Nemesis of the Greek drama:--

"Paddington, 10.20 A.M.--'Mail train just started. It contains three thieves, named Sparrow, Burrell, and Spurgeon, in the first compartment of the fourth first-cla.s.s carriage.'

"Slough, 10.48 A.M.--'Mail train arrived. _The officers have cautioned the three thieves._'

"Paddington, 10.50 A.M.--'Special train just left. It contained two thieves: one named Oliver Martin, who is dressed in black, _c.r.a.pe on his hat_; the other named Fiddler d.i.c.k, in black trowsers and light blouse. Both in the third compartment of the first second-cla.s.s carriage.'

"Slough, 11.16 A.M.--'Special train arrived. Officers have taken the two thieves into custody, a lady having lost her bag, containing a purse with two sovereigns and some silver in it; one of the sovereigns was sworn to by the lady as having been her property. It was found in Fiddler d.i.c.k's watch-fob.'"

It appears that, on the arrival of the train, a policeman opened the door of the "third compartment of the first second-cla.s.s carriage" and asked the pa.s.sengers if they had missed anything? A search in pockets and bags accordingly ensued, until one lady called out that her purse was gone.

"Fiddler d.i.c.k, you are wanted," was the immediate demand of the police-officer, beckoning to the culprit, who came out of the carriage thunderstruck at the discovery, and gave himself up, together with the booty, with the air of a completely beaten man. The effect of the capture so cleverly brought about is thus spoken of in the telegraph book:--

"Slough, 11.51 A.M.--'Several of the suspected persons who came by the various down-trains are lurking about Slough, uttering bitter invectives against the telegraph. Not one of those cautioned has ventured to proceed to the Montem.'"

Ever after this the lightfingered gentry avoided the railway and the _too_ intelligent companion that ran beside it, and betook themselves again to the road--a retrograde step, to which on all great public occasions they continue to adhere.

The telegraph, even up to this period, was very little known to the great ma.s.s of the public, and might have continued for some time longer in obscurity but for its remarkable agency in causing the arrest of the quaker Tawell. This event, which took place on the afternoon of Friday, January 3rd, 1845, placed it before the world as a prominent instrument in a terrible drama, and at once drew universal attention to its capabilities.

It must not be imagined, however, that Mr. Wheatstone's was the only patent taken out for a telegraph in the year 1837. A number of inquiring minds were simultaneously with the Professor wandering in the tangled wood of doubt, and when he burst his way through, others speedily emerged at different points, one after another. Consequently, the year 1837 was distinguished by a complete crop of telegraphs, any one of which would perhaps have held its ground had it stood alone, but not one of them was practically equal to the first, and they have all long since departed to the tomb, already stored with the abortive results of so many merely ingenious minds.

The rapidity with which the needle instrument transmits messages, the small amount of electricity required to work it, and the simplicity of its construction, are its chief recommendations. Upwards of 200 letters can be forwarded by it within the minute. Its great drawback--a drawback that will appear greater every year--is that it can only be worked by a system of signs, which requires some practice to understand. As long as the public is content to send its messages open to the light of day, this plan will hold its ground, as a practised manipulator can indicate the letters as fast as it is possible to read, much less transcribe them, at the other end of the wire; but immediately that the public come to demand secrecy--to put a seal as of old on its letters--this telegraph will, we predict, fall into _public_ disuse; and the revolving dial telegraph, invented by Mr. Wheatstone, in 1840, or the recording telegraph of Bain or Morse, or, more likely still, the American printing telegraph of House, will come into play.

This latter instrument appears to contain within itself capabilities of very high excellence; for instance, it requires no one to interpret, and then to re-write its messages--this it does itself. In fact it extends the compositor's fingers as far as the wire can be stretched. Messages are thus printed at the rate of fifty letters a minute, say at five hundred miles distance, in common Roman characters, on long slips of paper similar to those used on the recording instrument. Any description of its complicated mechanism would be utterly unintelligible to general readers.

"While the arrangements of the telegraph of Morse," said Mr. Justice Woodbury, of America, in giving judgment in a patent case, "can be readily understood by most mechanics and men of science, it requires days, if not weeks with some, thoroughly to comprehend all the parts and movements of the telegraph of House." His system is in use for thousands of miles of the American lines. Bakewell's copying telegraph is naturally suggested by the telegraph of House, from the fact that it reproduces its messages, although in a different manner. The sender of the message may be said to write with a pen long enough to stretch to the most distant correspondent; that is, he not only forwards instantaneously the substance of a message, but it is conveyed in his own handwriting. The principle is similar to that of Davy's chemical recording telegraph. The person sending the message writes it on a piece of tin foil with a pen dipped in varnish or any other non-conducting substance; this message is then placed round a metal cylinder, which is made to revolve at a certain regulated pace. In contact with this cylinder is a blunt steel point, which, by the action of a screw, makes a spiral line from the top to the bottom of the cylinder, thus touching every portion of the written message enveloping it. In connection with the steel point is the conducting wire, and at the end of the wire is a similar steel point working spirally upon a like cylinder.

It will be at once seen that the current will always be transmitted, except at those portions of the tin foil which are covered with the non-conducting varnish, and which, therefore, cut off the flow of electricity, and the handwriting will appear at the other end of the telegraphic wire upon a piece of chemically-prepared paper rolled upon its cylinder, and moving synchronously with it. The transmitted letter appears to be written in white upon a dark ground, the white parts, of course, indicating where the current has been broken, and where, consequently, no decomposition of the chemical paper has taken place.

To return, however, to our subject after this little digression. At the same time that the first working telegraph was being simplified and improved, the system was gradually spreading, and, by the end of the year 1845, lines exceeding 500 miles in extent were in operation in England, working Messrs. Wheatstone and Cook's patents. In the following year, capital, as represented by the powerful Electric Telegraph Company, commenced its operations, and an immediate and rapid development of the new method of carrying intelligence was the result.

"A period of eight years has elapsed," as they say in a certain cla.s.s of drama, and let us now look upon the condition of electric-telegraphy in England. We left it exerting its influence in a disjointed manner over a few railways, and striking out its wires here and there at random, without governing head or organization; and how do we find it?

Jammed in between lofty houses, at the bottom of a narrow court in Lothbury, we see before us a stuccoed wall, ornamented with an electric illuminated clock. Who would think that behind this narrow forehead lay the great brain,--if we may so term it,--of the nervous system of Britain, or that beneath the narrow pavement of the alley lies its spinal chord, composed of hundreds of fibres, which transmit intelligence as unperceived as does the medulla oblongata beneath the skin? Emerging from this narrow channel, the "efferent" wires branch off beneath the different footways, ramify in certain plexuses within the great centre of intelligence itself, and then shoot out along the different lines of railway until the sh.o.r.es of the island would seem to interpose a limit to their further progress.

Not so, however:--beneath the seas, under the heaving waves covered with stately navies, they take their darksome way, until, with the burden of their moving fire, they emerge once more upon the foreign strand, and commence afresh their career over the wide expanse of the Continent.

And now, like a curious physiologist, let us examine the various parts of this ingeniously-constructed sensorium, and endeavour to show our readers how in this high chamber, fashioned by human hands, thoughts circulate, and ideas come and go. The door of the "Central Telegraph Station" leads immediately into the Central Hall, an oblong s.p.a.ce, open quite up to the roof, which presents an appearance something like the Coal Exchange or the Geological Museum, two tiers of galleries being suspended from the bare walls, and affording communication to the different parts of the building.

If we ascend the first gallery, and lean over the bal.u.s.trade, we shall get a very clear bird's-eye view of the method in which messages are received and transmitted. Here, man, like the watchful spider, sits centered within his radiating web, and "lives along the line." Beneath us runs a sweep of counter forming three sides of a quadrangle, divided into compartments of about a square yard by green curtains. A desk and printed forms, to be filled up, are placed in each of these isolated cells, towards which we see individuals immediately make, and then bury themselves, being for the time profoundly intent upon the printed form.

We all know the jocose excuse of the correspondent for having written a long letter--that he had not time to make it shorter. And truly it requires some art to be laconic enough to satisfy the pocket in this establishment. Let us watch, for instance, yonder youth: he seems to have filled his sheet very close--now he gives it in to the receiving-clerk, and something evidently is wrong, for he looks perplexed--it is some hitch about the charge, for his attention is directed to the scale of prices printed at the head of the paper.

"Messages (not exceeding twenty words) can be sent between all the princ.i.p.al towns in Great Britain at a charge of 1_s._ within a circuit of 50 miles, of 2_s._ 6_d._ within a circuit of 100 miles (geographical distance), and of 5_s._ beyond a circuit of 100 miles, with an additional sum of 6_d._ porterage within half a mile of the station."

"Economy," says a French writer, M. de Courcy, "teaches conciseness. The telegraphic style banishes all the forms of politeness. 'May I ask you to do me the favour,' is 6d. for a distance of fifty miles." How many of those fond adjectives, therefore, must our poor fellow relentlessly strike out to bring his billet down to a reasonable charge! What food for speculation each person affords, as he writes his hurried epistle, dictated either by fear, or greed, or more powerful love!--for we have not yet got into the habit of employing the telegraph, like the Americans, on the mere every-day business of life. Every message--and of these there are 350,000 transmitted by this Company yearly for the public, and upwards of 3,500,000 for the Railways--is faithfully copied, and put by in fire-proof safes, those sent by the recording telegraph being wound in tape-like lengths upon a roller, and appearing exactly like discs of sarcenet ribbon. Fancy some future Macaulay rummaging among such a store, and painting therefrom the salient features of the social and commercial life of England in the nineteenth century. If from the Household Book of the Duke of Northumberland, or still later, from the Paston Letters, we can catch such glimpses of the manners of an early age, what might not be gathered some day in the twenty-first century from a record of the correspondence of an entire people?

"Softly, softly," interposes the Secretary of the Company, "we have no such intention of gratifying posterity; for, after a certain brief period all copies of communications are destroyed. No person unconnected with the office is, under any consideration, allowed to have access to them, and the servants of the Company are under a bond not to divulge 'the secrets of the prison-house.'" Very good, as far as the present generation is concerned; nevertheless, it is devoutly to be wished that an odd box or two of these sarcenet ribbons, with their linear language, may escape, for future Rawlinsons to puzzle over and decipher for the instruction of mankind.

Whilst we have been thus speculating, however, a dozen messages for all parts of the kingdom have successively ascended, through the long lift before us, to the instrument-rooms, of which there are two, situated in the attics of the establishment, on either side of the top gallery of the central hall; these, to carry out our anatomical simile, might be called the two hemispheres of the establishment's cerebrum. The instruments of one of these rooms are worked by youths, while those of the other are manipulated by young ladies; and it seems to us as though the directors were pitting them against each other--establishing a kind of industrial tournament--to see which description of labourer is worthiest. As yet, little or no difference can be detected: this, however, is in itself a triumph for the fair s.e.x, as it proves their capacity for a species of employment well calculated for their habits and physical powers, and opens another door for that superabundance of female labour of a superior kind which has. .h.i.therto sought employment in vain.

Click, click, go the needles on every hand as we enter. Here we see the iron tongues of the telegraph wagging, and talking as fast as a tea-table full of old maids. London is holding communication with Manchester.

Plymouth is listening attentively to a long story, and every now and then intimates by a slight movement that he perfectly comprehends. But there is one speaker whose nimble tongue seems to be saying important things by the stir around him,--that is _the Hague_ whispering under the North Sea the news he has heard, an hour or so ago, from Vienna of a great victory just gained by the Turks. We are witness to a series of conversations carried on with all corners of the island, and between the metropolis of the world and every capital of northern and central Europe, as intimately as though the speakers were bending their heads over the dinner-table, and talking confidentially to the host. And by what agency is this extraordinary conversation carried on? All that the visitor sees is a number of little mahogany cases, very similar to those of American clocks, each having a dial, with two lozenge-shaped needles working by pivots, which hang, when at rest, perpendicularly upon it. Two dependant handles, situated at the base of this instrument, which the operator grasps and moves from side to side at his will, suffice to make and break the currents or reverse them, and consequently to deflect the needles either to the right or left. Two little stops of ivory are placed about half an inch apart, on either side of the needle, to prevent its deflecting too much, and to check all vibration. It is the sound of the iron tongue striking against these stops that makes the clicking, and to which the telegraphists are sensitively alive. In the early days of telegraphy, the operator's attention, at all the stations, was drawn to the instrument by the sudden ringing of an alarum, which was effected by the agency of an electro-magnet; but the horrid din it occasioned became insupportable to persons in constant attendance, and this part of the instrument was speedily given up, the clicking of the needle being found quite sufficient to draw his attention to the arrival or pa.s.sing of a message. We say _or pa.s.sing_ of a message, because, when a communication is made, as for instance, between London and Edinburgh, the needles of all the telegraph-stations on the line are simultaneously deflected, but the attendant has only to take notice of what is going on when a special signal is made to his particular locality, informing him that _he_ is spoken with. A story is told of a certain somnolent station clerk, who, in order to enjoy his nap, trained his terrier to scratch and awaken him at the first sound of the clicking needles.

There are but two kinds of telegraph used by the company, the needle telegraph and a few of the chemical recording telegraph of Bain. The latter instrument strikes the spectator more, perhaps, than the nimble-working needle apparatus, but its action is equally simple. Slits of variable length representing letters, according to the alphabet in the note,[35] are punched out from a long strip of paper called the message-strip, which is placed between a revolving cylinder and a toothed spring. The battery is connected with the cylinder; the wire, which goes from station to station, is joined to the spring. As dry paper is a non-conductor, no electricity pa.s.ses while the unpierced portion of the message-slip interposes between the cylinder and the tooth; but when the tooth drops into a s.p.a.ce, and comes in contact with the cylinder, the current flows. If we now transfer our attention to the station at which the message is received, we find a similar cylinder revolving at a regular rate, and a metal pin, depending from the end of the telegraph wire, pressing upon it; but in this case the paper between the cylinder and the pin has been washed with a solution of prussiate of potash, which electricity has the effect of changing to Prussian blue at the point where the pin touches it. Therefore, as the chemically prepared paper moves under the pin, a blue line is formed of the same length as the slits at the other end, which regulate the duration of the electric current; and thus every letter punched upon the message-strip is faithfully transferred to its distant fellow. Such is the celerity with which the notation is transmitted by this method, that "in an experiment performed by M. Le Verrier and Dr. Lardner, before committees of the Inst.i.tute and the Legislative a.s.sembly at Paris, despatches were sent 1,000 miles at the rate of nearly 20,000 words an hour." In ordinary practice, however, the speed is limited to the rate at which an expert clerk can punch out the holes, which is not much above a hundred per minute. Where the object was to forward long doc.u.ments, such as a speech, a number of persons could be employed simultaneously in punching out different portions of the message, and the message-strips would then be supplied as fast as the machine could work.

This system is used extensively in America. A weaker current of electricity than what is required for deflecting needles or magnetising iron, suffices to effect the requisite chemical decomposition. The conducting power of vapour or rain carries much of the electricity from the wires in certain states of the atmosphere; "and in such cases, where both Morse's and Bain's telegraphs are used by an amalgamated company in the same office, it is found convenient to remove the wires from Morse's instruments, and connect them with Bain's, on which it is practicable to operate when communication by Morse's system is interrupted."--(_Whitworth's Report_, p. 51.)

This chemical telegraph has also the advantage, in common with all recording instruments, that it leaves an indelible record of every message transmitted, and therefore is very useful when the mistake of a single figure or letter might be of consequence, which we will ill.u.s.trate by a case which happened very lately. A stockbroker in the City received, during a very agitated state of the funds, an order to buy for a client in a distant part of the country, by a certain time of the day, 80,000_l._ of consols. This order being unusually large for the individual, the broker doubted its accuracy, and immediately made inquiries at the office. The message had luckily been sent by the recording instrument, and upon looking at the record it was immediately seen that the order was for 8,000_l._, the transcriber having put in an 0 too much, for which, according to the rules of the company, he was incontinently fined. Now, here the error was immediately traced to the person who made it, and there was no need of telegraphing back to inquire if all were right, two matters of vital importance in such a transaction as this, involving so much personal responsibility; for if the purchase had been made and turned out unfortunate, the loss would indubitably have fallen upon the unhappy sharebroker.[36]

In all ordinary transactions, however, the needle instrument is preferable, because it transmits its messages much more quickly. The speed with which the attendants upon these instruments read off the signals made by the needles is really marvellous: they do not in some cases even wait to spell the words letter by letter, but jump at the sentence before it is concluded; and they have learned by practice, as Sir Francis Head says in "Stokers and Pokers," to recognize immediately who is telegraphing to them, say at York, by the peculiar _expression of the needles_, the long drawn wires thus forming a kind of human antennae by which individual peculiarities of touch are projected to an infinite distance. To catalogue the kind of messages which pa.s.s through the room, either on their way from London or in course of distribution to it, would be to give a history of human affairs. Here, from the sh.o.r.es of this tight island, comes the morning news gathered by watchers, telescopes in hand, on remote headlands, of what ships have just hove in sight, or what craft have foundered or come ash.o.r.e--to this room, swifter beyond comparison than the carrier-dove of old, the wire speeds the name of the winner of the Derby or the Oaks. How the four winds are blowing throughout the island; how stocks rise or fall every hour of the day in all the great towns and in the continental capitals; what corn is at Mark Lane, and what farmer Giles got a quarter of an hour since in a country town in Yorkshire, are equally known in the telegraph room. Intermixed with quotations of tallow and the price of Wall's End coals, now and then comes a love-billet, which excites no more sympathy in the clerk than in the iron that conveys it; or a notice that the sudden dart of death has struck some distant friend, is transmitted and received as unconcernedly as an account of the fall in Russian stock. When business is slack the telegraphists sometimes amuse themselves by an interchange of badinage with their distant friends. Sir Francis Head informs us that an absolute quarrel once took place by telegraph, and the two irritated manipulators were obliged to be separated in consequence.

In addition to this private message department there is, below stairs, an intelligence office, in which news published in the London morning papers is condensed and forwarded to the Exchanges of Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester, Glasgow, &c.[37] A few years since the company opened subscription rooms in all the large towns of the north, in which intelligence of every kind was posted immediately after its arrival in London; but the craving for early intelligence was not sufficient to induce the people to incur the expense, and, with the exception of the room at Hull, the establishments have all been shut up.

On Friday evening especially this department is very busy condensing for the country papers the news which appears in that exciting column headed "By Electric Telegraph, London, 2 A.M." Thus the telegraph rides express through the night for the broadsheets of the entire kingdom, and even steps across from Portpatrick to Donaghadee into the sister country, with its budget of latest intelligence, by which means the extremities of the two islands are kept as well _up_ in the progress of important events as London itself. Upwards of 120 provincial papers each receive in this manner their column of parliamentary news of the night; and the _Daily Mail_, published in Glasgow, gets sometimes as much as three columns of the debates forwarded whilst the House is sitting. A superintendent and four clerks are expressly employed in this department; and early in the day, towards the end of the week, the office presents all the appearance of an editor's room. At seven in the morning the clerks are to be seen deep in the _Times_ and other daily papers, just hot from the press, making extracts, and condensing into short paragraphs all the most important events, which are immediately sent off to the country papers to form "second editions." Neither does the work cease here; for no sooner is a second edition published in town, than its news, if of more than ordinary interest, is transmitted to the provinces. For instance: whilst we were in the company's telegraph room a short time since, the following intelligence was being served out to Liverpool, York, Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, Birmingham, and Hull:--

"EASTERN WAR--BATTLE ON THE DANUBE--FROM EVENING EDITION OF THE 'MORNING CHRONICLE.'

"_Vienna, Sat.u.r.day, April 8th._

"The journal _Fremden Blatt_ announces, under date of Bucharest, 4th April, that a great battle was being fought at Ra.s.sova, about midway between Hirsova and Silistria, in the Dobrudscha. The result was not known. Mustapha Pasha is at the head of 50,000 men."

Arrived at the above-mentioned places, swifter than a rocket could fly the distance, like a rocket it bursts, and is again carried by the diverging wires into a dozen neighbouring towns. The announcement we have quoted comes opportunely to remind us that intelligence thus hastily gathered and transmitted has also its drawbacks, and is not so trustworthy as the news which starts later and travels slower. The "great battle of Ra.s.sova" has not yet been fought, and the general action announced through the telegraph was only a sanguinary skirmish.

The telegraphic organization of London, meagre as it is at present, would form alone a curious paper: "a province covered with houses," it demands a special arrangement, and accordingly we see day by day new branches opened within its precincts, by which means every part of the metropolis is being put in communication with the country and Europe.

The branch stations are, London Docks (main entrance); No. 43, Mincing Lane; General Post Office, St. Martin's-le-Grand; No. 30, Fleet Street; No. 448, West Strand; No. 17_a_, Great George Street, Westminster; No. 89, St. James's Street; No. 1, Park Side, Knightsbridge; No. 6, Edgeware Road; Great Western Railway Station; London and North-Western Railway Station; Great Northern Railway Station; Highbury Railway Station; Eastern Counties' Railway Station; Blackwall Railway Station; London and Brighton and South Coast Railway Station; and the London and South-Western Railway Station; of these only two are open night and day. The central office, strange as it might appear, is closed at half-past 8 o'clock P.M., and its wires are put in connection with those at the Charing Cross Station, which takes upon itself the night work--a singular proof, by the way, that London proper is deserted shortly after the hours of business are over.

The Eastern Counties' office is also open at night, and forms the East End office of the company. These stations communicate with the central office in Lothbury, and form, in fact, direct feeders to it, just as the hundred suckers do to the zoophyte.

We have yet, however, to notice the special telegraphic communication which exists in the metropolis between place and place, either for governmental purposes or for social convenience. The most curious of these lines is the wire between the Octagon Hall in the new Houses of Parliament and the St. James's Street Commercial station. They should name this line from the "whipper-in" of the House, for it is nothing more than a call-wire for members. The company employ reporters during the sitting of Parliament, to make an abstract from the gallery of the business of the two Houses as it proceeds; and this abstract is forwarded, at very short intervals, to the office in St. James's Street, where _it is set up and printed_, additions being made to the sheet issued as the MS. comes in.

This flying sheet is posted half-hourly to the following clubs and establishments:--Arthur's; Carlton; Oxford and Cambridge; Brook's; Conservative; United Service; Athenaeum; Reform; Traveller's; United University; Union; and White's; hourly to Boodle's Club and Prince's Club; and half-hourly to the Royal Italian Opera. The shortest possible abstract is of course supplied--just sufficient, in fact, to enable the after-dinner M.P. so to economize his proceedings as to be able to finish his claret, and yet be in time for the ministerial statement, or to count in the division.

The wire to the Opera is a still more curious example of the social services the new power is destined to perform. An abstract of the proceedings of Parliament, similar to the above, but in _writing_, is posted, during the performance, in the lobby; and Young England has only to lounge out between the acts to know if Disraeli or Lord John Russell is up, and whether he may sit out the piece, or must hasten down to Westminster. The Opera House even communicates with the Strand Office, so that messages may be sent from thence to all parts of the kingdom. The Government wires go from Somerset House to the Admiralty, and thence to Portsmouth and Plymouth by the South-Western and Great Western Railways; and these two establishments are put in communication, by means of subterranean lines, with the naval establishments at Deptford, Woolwich, Chatham, Sheerness, and with the Cinque Ports of Deal and Dover. They are worked quite independently of the Company, and the messages are sent in cipher, the meaning of which is unknown, even to the telegraphic clerks employed in transmitting it. In addition to the wires already spoken of, street branches run from Buckingham Palace and Scotland Yard (the head police-office) to the station at Charing Cross, and thence on to Founder's Court; whilst the Post-office, Lloyd's, Capel Court, and the Corn Exchange communicate directly with the Central Office.

The function, then, of the Central Office is to receive and redistribute communications. Of the manner in which these ends are accomplished nothing can be gained from a glance round the instrument-rooms. You see no wires coming into or emerging from them; you ask for a solution of the mystery, and one of the clerks leads you to the staircase and opens the door of what looks like a long wooden shoot placed perpendicularly against the wall. This is the great spinal cord of the establishment, consisting of a vast bundle of wires, insulated from each other by gutta percha. One set of these conveys the gathered-up streams of intelligence from the remote ends of the continent and the farthest sh.o.r.es of Britain, conducts them through London by the street lines underneath the thronging footsteps of the mult.i.tude, and ascends with its invisible despatches directly to the different instruments. Another set is composed of the wires that descend into the battery-chamber. It is impossible to realize the fact by merely gazing upon this brown and dusty-looking bundle of threads; nevertheless so it is, that they put us in communication with no less than 4,409 miles of telegraph, which is coterminous with the railway system of the island, and forms a complete network over its entire surface, with the exception of the highlands of North Wales. It penetrates already into the wilds of Scotland, as we see the wire is carried on from Aberdeen to Balmoral.

The physiologist, minutely dissecting the star-fish, shows us its nervous system extending to the tip of each limb, and descants upon the beauty of this arrangement, by which the central mouth is informed of the nutriment within its reach. The telegraphic system, already developed in England, has rendered her as sensitive, to the utmost extremities, as the star-fish. Day by day and hour by hour everything that happens of importance is immediately referred to its centre at Lothbury, and this centre returns the service by spreading the information afresh in every direction. Thus, should an enemy appear off our coast, his presence, by the aid of the fibre, is immediately felt at the Admiralty, and an immediate reply sends out the fleet in chase. Should a riot occur in the manufacturing districts, the local authorities communicate with the Home Office, and orders are sent down to put the distant troops in motion. Does a murderer escape, the same wire makes the fact known to Scotland Yard, and from thence word is sent to the distant policemen to intercept him in his flight. The arm is scarcely uplifted quicker to ward off a sudden blow--the eye does not close with more rapidity upon an unexpected flood of light, than, by the aid of the telegraph, actions follow upon impressions conveyed along the length and breadth of the land. But, says our reader, suppose these wires should be severed or damaged, your whole line is paralyzed; and how are you to find out where the fault may be?

Against these eventualities human foresight has provided: by testing from station to station along the line, the office soon knows how far the wires are perfect; and if the breach of continuity should be in the subterranean street wires, there are iron testing-posts at every 500 yards distance, by the aid of which the workman knows where to make his repairs. Whilst all is being made right again, however, a curious contrivance is brought into play, in order to keep the communication open. Every one is acquainted with the action of the railway "switch," by which a train is enabled to leave one line of rails and run on to another. The telegraph has its switch also, and thus a message can be transferred from one line to another, or can be sent right _throuyh_ to any locality, without making a stoppage at the usual resting-place on its way. By this device, then, the "sick wires" can be altogether avoided. Suppose, for instance, that some accident had happened to the direct Bristol line, and it would not work in consequence, then the clerk at the Lothbury station would signal to Birmingham to switch the wire through to Bristol, or, in other words, to put him in communication with that place; this done, the message would fly along the North-Western line, look in at the Birmingham station, and immediately be off down the Midland wire to Bristol, arriving, to all perception, in the same lat.i.tude as quickly as though it had gone direct by the Great Western wire. Every large station is provided with a switching apparatus, and the Lothbury office has several. Here also there is a very curious contrivance called the "testing-box," which enables the manipulator to connect any number of batteries to a wire, in order to give extra power, without going into the battery vault.

These switches, testing, and battery boxes are of great service in certain conditions of the atmosphere. For instance, a thunderstorm, or more often a fog, will now and then so affect the conducting power of a wire, working through a long distance, that it is found impossible to send a message along it, in which case the clerk "dodges" the pa.s.sing storm or fog by switching the dispatch round the country through a fine-weather wire. If however the foggy weather should continue, the manipulator has only to go to the battery box and couple on one or more batteries, just as fresh engines are put on a train going up an incline when the rails are "greasy." By thus increasing the power of the electric current the message is driven through the worst weather. Sometimes as many as six or eight 24-plate batteries are necessary to speed a signal to Glasgow. The more general way in such cases, however, is to transmit the dispatch to some intermediate station, where the message is repeated.

Let us now descend into the battery vaults--two long narrow chambers, situated in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the building. Who would think that in this quiet place, night and day, a power was being generated that exerted its influence to the very margin of this seagirt isle, nay, invaded the territories of Holland, Belgium, and France? Who would think that those long dusty boxes on the shelves were making scores of iron tongues wag hundreds of miles off? There are upwards of sixty Daniel's batteries in full employment in these vaults. They are ranked as sixes, twelves, and twenty-fours, according to the number of their elements or plates; and just like guns, the higher they rank the further they carry. The powerful twenty-fours work the long ranges of wire, and the smaller batteries the shorter circuits. Of course some of these batteries have harder work to do than others, and the "twenty-fours" working the North-Western line have much the busiest time of it. Considering the work done by them, their maintenance is not very costly. A twenty-four, when in full work, does not consume its zinc plates under three months, and a gill of sulphuric acid, diluted, is its strong but rather moderate allowance of liquid per month.

Other batteries of the same force are satisfied with 1 lb. of sulphate of copper per month, with a little sulphate of zinc, and salt and water. The entire amount of electric power employed by the Company throughout the country is produced by 8000 12-plate batteries, or 96,000 cells, which are lined with 1,500,000 square inches of copper, and about the same of zinc.

To work these batteries six tons of acid is yearly consumed, and fifty-five tons of sand; the princ.i.p.al use of the latter is to prevent the chemicals from slopping about, and the metal plates from getting oxidised too rapidly. The language of the "wire," with respect to the working of the telegraph, is very curious. For instance, when a distant station-clerk finds that a battery is not up to its work, by the weak action of the needles, he sends word that it requires "refreshment," and it is accordingly served with its gill of aquafortis, and, totally opposed to the doctrines of temperance, a "long-lived battery" owes its vitality to the strongest drink.

We have followed the wires down to one pole of their respective batteries, and now we have to pursue them out of the opposite pole until they take to "earth." No electricity will flow from the positive pole Z of the battery (Fig. 2) unless the wire D K A B is connected, either by being itself unbroken, or by the interposition of some other conductor where a gap occurs, to the negative pole C. In the earlier telegraphs it was usual to have a return-wire to effect this purpose. But, strange as it may sound, it was discovered that the earth itself would convey the current back to the negative pole, and thus an entire length of wire was saved.

Accordingly the earth completes the two hundred and odd different circuits, which pa.s.s their loops, as it were, through the central office.

In order to get a "good earth" a hole was dug deep in the foundations, until some moist ground was found, _dry_ soil being a very bad conductor, and into this a cylinder of copper, four inches in diameter and 40 lbs. in weight, was sunken, surrounded by a ma.s.s of sulphate of copper in crystals. All the earth wires of the establishment were then put in connection with this ma.s.s of metal, or earth plate.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 6]

The non-scientific reader will perhaps require a figure to explain to him our meaning, when we say that the earth is capable of completing the "circuit." In the accompanying diagram (No. 6) we have a battery, U V, in the central office in London, deflecting a needle N, say in Liverpool. The fluid pa.s.ses from the positive pole of the battery U, traverses the wire of the North-Western Railway, and after working the telegraph in Liverpool, descends into the earth by the wire B, which has a metal or earth-plate attached to it. From this point the electric fluid starts homewards, through the solid ground, and finding out the earth-plate[38]

under the foundations at Lothbury, ascends along the wire A, into the negative pole of the battery V. By reversing the current, it flows first through the earth from V A to B, and returns by the wire to the opposite pole U.