Chapter XX: Part 20

Children are, of course, more active than grown-ups. They are never still. They are, therefore, almost always burning up or using up their energy. They are also, therefore, almost always in need of food that can be made into energy, and as sugar does this almost more quickly than any other food, nature teaches the children to like candy or sweets.

Why Does Eating Candy Make Some People Fat?

Eating as much as one can of anything at any time will produce fat, provided you do not do sufficient physical work or take enough exercise to counteract the effect of generous eating. When you see a person who eats a great deal and is growing fat, you may know that he or she is not taking sufficient bodily exercise to work off the energy produced by the body from the food that has been eaten. When this happens the energy in the form of fat piles up in various parts of the system. Candy will do this more quickly than any other thing we eat because it contains so much sugar and because sugar is so easily changed by our system into usable energy. You generally find a fat person who eats much candy to be a lazy person.

What Makes Snowflakes White?

A snowflake is, as you are no doubt aware, made of water affected in such a way by the temperature as to change it into a crystal. Water, of course, as you know, is perfectly transparent. In other words, sunlight or other light will pass through water without being reflected. A single snow flake also is partially transparent, i.e., the light will go through it partially, although some of it will be reflected back. When a drop of water is turned into a snowflake crystal, a great many reflecting surfaces are produced, and the whiteness of the snowflake is the result of practically all of the sunlight which strikes it being reflected back, just as a mirror reflects practically all the light or color that is thrown against it. If you turn a green light on the snow, it will reflect the green light in the same way. When the countless snow crystals lie on the ground close together, the ability to reflect the light is increased and so a mass of snow crystals on the ground look even whiter than one single snowflake.

What Makes the White Caps on the Waves White?

In telling why the snowflake is white we have practically already answered this question also. Instead of little crystals formed from the water, the foam produced by the waves of the ocean are tiny bubbles which have the same ability to reflect the light as the snow crystals.

What Good Can Come of a Toothache?

Very few of us realize that an aching tooth is a good thing for us, provided we have it attended to and the ache removed. Any one who has had toothache will hardly agree that there can be a blessing attached to this excruciating pain.

But the good comes from the warning it gives us of the condition of our teeth on the inside of our mouths. The arrangement of the interior of the mouth and the use we make of it in passing things into our systems, favors very much the development and increase of microbes, and when they once get in they are difficult to remove. It is said that the greatest percentage of cases of stomach trouble come from teeth which are in bad condition and that a very large percentage of people who have bad teeth are in grave danger of blood poisoning or other troubles due to the microbes. When these microbes lodge in the mouth, they find conditions favorable to their development when there are bad teeth, and spread through the system.

How Can Microbes Spread Through the Body?

The various parts of the body, including the gums, are connected by a lymphatic tissue, which is practically a series of canals. If the teeth are not properly attended to and kept in good condition, both as to cleanliness and repair, the microbes or germs collect on the gums and teeth, and increase in numbers. Soon the mouth is over-populated with microbes and are pushed off the gums or teeth into the lymphatic canals, where they succeed in developing a disease in your body.

Now the ache in the tooth becomes a blessing very promptly if it begins soon after the tooth begins to decay, because in that event the dentist is visited and the tooth filled or pulled. Therefore, while it hurts terribly, it might be well to remember that a toothache is a timely warning of danger which, if not heeded, will likely develop into something quite serious.

What Causes Toothache?

The ache comes when the tiny nerve at the heart of the tooth is exposed to the air. When the tooth begins to decay, it starts to do so generally from the outside, and after the decaying process has gone far enough, it reaches the nerve in the tooth, which aches when exposed to the air. The ache is the signal which the nerve sends to the brain that there is an exposure and a cry for help.

Of What Use Are Pains and Aches?

All pains and aches are helpful in sounding a warning. A headache may be the result of improper sleep and rest and, therefore, warns us to take the needed rest or sleep. A pain in the stomach is only nature’s way of telling us that we have been unwise in our eating and drinking. As a matter of fact, short though our lives are, they would probably be still shorter, on the average, if it were not for pains and aches, because without these warnings we would never have sense enough to stop doing the things we should not do if we lived normally.

What Causes Earache?

Earache is caused by the nerves in the ear being affected by something either from within or without which produces a swelling of the parts immediately adjacent to the nerves in the ear, and which press against the nerves; as the nerves cannot go any place else they send a warning to the brain that they are being crowded and pressed against. The pain you feel is the nerve in the ear warning the brain that something is wrong in the ear.

What Is Soap Made Of?

Soap is not a very modern product, although we have rarely read of soap in olden times. As long ago as two thousand years, the Germans had an ointment which was made in practically the same way as we now make soap. A soap factory was engaged in making soap in France in 1000 A. D.

Even before soap was manufactured, people knew that ashes of some plants, when mixed with water, gave it a peculiar, smooth, slippery feeling, and added to the cleansing qualities of water. Although they did not know it, this was due to the soda of potash which was in the ashes. Pure soda and potash both have excellent qualities for cleaning, but are likely to injure the skin, and other things coming in contact with them.

Soap is made by boiling together oil or fat and “caustic” soda or potash. Caustic soda is a substance made from sodium carbonate by adding slaked lime to a solution of it. The slaked lime contains calcium in combination with hydrogen and oxygen, and is known in chemistry as calcium hydrate. When calcium hydrate is added to a solution of sodium carbonate, the sodium present combines with the oxygen and hydrogen to form a compound, variously called sodium hydrate, sodium hydroxide, or caustic soda. A similar compound of potassium is formed when the same kind of lime is mixed in a solution of potassium carbonate. In both cases the calcium is converted into calcium carbonate, which is not soluble in water and settles to the bottom; but the caustic soda or potash is dissolved.

The word “caustic” means to burn. Both will burn the skin if allowed to touch the skin for a short time.

The fats used for making soap consist of glycerine, in chemical combination with what are called fatty acids. When these fats are boiled with caustic soda, or caustic potash, the fat is decomposed; the fatty acid combines with the sodium or potassium to form soap and the glycerine is left uncombined.

In modern soap factories the manufacture is carried on in large iron vessels. Some fat and oil are put into the vessel and a little lye, which is really caustic soda or potash, is added and the mixture boiled. The fat and the lye combine very quickly and form a whitish fluid. More lye is now added and the boiling continued. This process is repeated until nearly all the oil or fat has combined with the lye. If yellow laundry soap is being made, some rosin is put in, and this gives the yellow color. If toilet soap is being made, common salt is put in instead of rosin. The addition of the salt has the effect of separating the water and the glycerine from the soap. The soap rises to the surface and is skimmed off. As soon as the separation is complete, and the soap is then cut or pressed into cakes after it has become hard.

Soaps referred to above are the ordinary hard soaps. In making soft soaps no salt is added to separate the soap from the liquid. As the water and glycerine do not separate from the soap, the entire mixture remains of a soft consistency. Soft soap is also made with a lye, that is obtained from wood ashes. The ashes are placed in barrels and water poured upon them. The water drips down through the ashes in the barrel and dissolves the potash contained in them, making lye or caustic potash. This lye is then in liquid form and is mixed and boiled with grease or fat to make soap.

There are many different fats used in soap making. Palm oil is perhaps the most common, but tallow, olive oil, cotton seed oil, and many other fats are used. The hardness of the soap varies with the kind of fat and lye used. Palm oil or tallow soap is very hard, and other oils are sometimes mixed with it to soften it.

These are the main facts connected with the making of soaps. There may appear to be different kinds all of which look and smell differently. The difference in them is largely due to the presence of different perfumes and coloring matters.

The savage Indians found their system of smoke signals quite effective in sending messages from place to place. With a good burning fire before him, and a blanket or shield at hand, the Indian was equipped to send his messages. The code consisted of the varying kinds of smoke clouds produced. These were made large or small by covering the fire at intervals with the blanket or shield, thus making interruptions of various lengths in the rising clouds of smoke. By dropping moss or other things into the fire, he made the smoke clouds either light or dark at will.]

The Story in a Telegram

How Man Learned to Send Messages.

From the time when man had learned to protect himself from the beasts of the forest, and thus was able to move about more freely, and live by himself rather than remain with the tribe, he has found it necessary to send messages.

One of the most interesting of the early methods for sending messages was the Indian way of smoke signalling with the simple equipment of a fire with its rising column of smoke and a blanket or shield. Messages were sent, relayed, received and answered, at points hundreds of miles apart. Among savages still found in remote parts of the earth this and other primitive methods are still in use. In the wilds of Africa to-day at points where the electric telegraph service has not yet penetrated, the natives by the simple method of beating drums, which can be heard from one relay point to another, are able to send the “news of the day” across the country with marvellous rapidity. In some parts of South America, the natives long ago discovered that the ground is a good conductor of sound and send their messages almost at will, making their signals by tapping against poles which they have planted in the ground at various points and which constitute both their sending and receiving instruments.

The Signal Corps in the army uses flags for sending messages, where the telegraph is not available, the flags being of different colors, and the signals are produced by waving the flags in different ways. The army heliograph is also used as a telegraph line--a mirror which reflects the sun’s rays in a manner understood by a prearranged code. These and other similar methods are merely elaborations of devices developed and used by the savages as a solution of the ever present need of sending a message to some other point.

THE GREEK RUNNER.

In this picture we see the Greek Runner on the last leg of his journey and the man to whom he is to deliver the message waiting for him. This method of sending messages was not very fast, although the runners were picked because of their speed and endurance.]

Here we see the fast riders of the Pony Telegraph, which increased the speed of delivering messages quite a good deal, but, of course, there was danger of losing the message to enemies or through accident, so that it might be difficult under such circumstances to send a secret message or to even be certain that it would arrive at destination.]

RINGING THE CALL BOX.]

The great Marathon runner was nothing more or less than a telegraph messenger hastening with his written message, from the man who delivered it to him, to its destination, and his work was harder than that of the messenger boy to-day, for he not only had to deliver the message himself to its destination, but had to run fast all the way or lose his job.

The messenger on foot finally gave way to the Pony Telegraph, which not only shortened the time necessary to deliver a message, but marked the beginning of a system.

How Does a Telegram Get There?

The next time your daddy takes you down to the office, ask him to show you the telegraph call box. When you see it, you will perhaps not think that by merely pulling down the little lever you can so start things going that, if you wish, you can cause men who are on the other side of the earth to work for you in a few minutes, and to make little instruments all along the way which, with their other equipment, have cost millions of dollars, click, click, click at your will.

Here we see the messenger calling at the office from which the call box registered a call and receiving the telegram to be taken by him to the central office to be put on the wire.]

Sooner or later during the day your father will be wanting to send a telegram. He steps to the call box, pulls the little lever and goes back to his desk. In a few minutes, sometimes before you realize it, the little blue-coated messenger appears and says “Call?” Father hands him a telegraph blank on which he has written the message, the messenger takes off his cap, puts the message inside and the cap back on his head and away he goes on his bicycle as fast as his legs can pedal, to the central office, to which point you follow him to see what he does with the message.

If you had been at the telegraph office instead of your father’s office, you would have seen one of these boys start off on his wheel to get the message your father wished to send. When the little lever on the call box is pulled down, it is pulled back by a spring which sets some clock work going which sends a signal over the wire on a circuit which runs out from a register at the main office. The register has a paper tape running through it, and the signal from the call box appears as a series of dots on the tape. The clerk knows from the number and spacing of the dots that it was your father that called and not some other business man whose box might be on the same circuit.

We have now followed the telegram to the point where it is to start on its real journey. Here we see the operator preparing to send the message. He first must “get the wire.” By this is meant to get a through connection to the town where the message is to be delivered. Each office along the line has a signal. The other operators can hear the call, but since it is not their signal, they pay no attention. Almost immediately, however, the operator at the delivery point hears the signal. He signals back “I I” and repeats his own office call, which means “I hear you and am ready.” The message is then ticked off, until finished and the operator at the delivery point signals “O. K.,” together with his personal signal, which means he has received the whole message and has it down on paper.]

Here we see the messenger delivering the telegram to the person to whom it is addressed. It may be good news or bad news for the person receiving it, but it is all in the day’s work for the messenger boy. But let us see how many people have to work to deliver the message. We have followed it through from the original call box. First there was the messenger who came for it, then the receiving clerk, the sending operator and the operator who receives it and last of all the messenger boy who delivered it. This does not take into account the men who must look after the many miles of wires, the machinery which supplies the current, or the great army of men who are constantly laying new wires so that you can send a telegram from almost anywhere to any other place.]

The operators you have seen working in these pictures are Morse operators. They send the message by Morse Code in dots and dashes which are sent over the wire as electric impulses. At the other end the message is read by listening to the clicks the sounder makes as it receives these same electric impulses. This is the simplest way of telegraphing.

The number of messages sent between two big cities in a day is tremendous--many more than could be transmitted over one Morse wire. Many wires would be needed. But wire costs money, so ingenious men set to work to find some way to send more than one message over a single wire at the same time. They succeeded. There is now the duplex telegraph, which sends a message each way simultaneously over a single wire, the quadruplex, which sends two messages each way simultaneously over a single wire. Last but not least there is the multiplex, which sends four messages each way simultaneously over a single wire. This seems almost unbelievable, but it is done. In the case of the duplex and quadruplex, the different messages are sent by currents of different strength, and by changing the direction of the current. Receiving instruments are designed so as to separate the messages by being affected only by the currents of certain strength or polarity, as the direction of flow is termed. It can easily be seen that by these ingenious devices, the telegraph company saves many thousands of dollars in the miles and miles of wire, and hundreds of telegraph poles which would be required if all the messages had to be sent over a simple Morse wire, one message only upon the wire at a time.

In this picture we see the interior of a telegraph office along the line of a railroad. The operator has her hand on the “key” or sending instrument. At her left in a stand called the resonator, is the receiving instrument called the “sounder” which clicks off the message. In front of her is an instrument called the “relay.” Current from two of the batteries goes through the key when it is pressed down, through the relay and out on to the wires of the pole line, then through the relay of the receiving operator at the other end, (see picture on opposite page) through his key and through two more batteries to the ground. The earth forms the return wire of an electric circuit when both keys are “closed” or pressed down. You know all electricity has to flow in a closed circuit. The “sounder” has to make good strong clicks to be understood, and the current after it has gone through miles of wire and ground may not be strong enough so the sounder is put on a local circuit of its own, with a special battery. In this circuit is a contact maker which is part of the relay. When the key is pressed down and current flows over the wires on the poles and through the relays, the magnets of the relay pull on a little piece of metal called the “armature,” which makes a contact and closes the local sounder circuit, so current from the single local battery can flow up through the magnets of the sounder and back to the battery. This makes the sounder click. When the key is released, the relay armature is pulled back by a spring and breaks the circuit of sounder, which then emits another click. By the number and duration of the clicks and the time between them, the receiving operator knows the meaning of the signal. The Morse Code, which is used throughout the United States, is shown on next page.]

MORSE TELEGRAPH CODE

Letters Morse
A · --
B -- · · ·
C · · ·
D -- · ·
E ·
F · -- ·
G -- -- ·
H · · · ·
I · ·
J -- · -- ·
K -- · --
L ----
M -- --
N -- ·
O · ·
P · · · · ·
Q · · -- ·
R · · ·
S · · ·
T --
U · · --
V · · · --
W · -- --
X · -- · ·
Y · · · ·
Z · · · ·
& · · · ·

Numerals

Figures Morse
1 · -- -- ·
2 · · -- · ·
3 · · · -- ·
4 · · · · --
5 -- -- --
6 · · · · · ·
7 -- -- ·
8 -- · · · ·
9 -- · · --
0 ----

Punctuations

. Period · · -- -- · ·
: Colon -- · -- · ·
; Semicolon · · · · ·
, Comma · -- · --
? Interrogation -- · · -- ·
! Exclamation -- -- -- ·
- Fraction Line ·
¶ Paragraph -- -- -- --
() Parenthesis · -- ·· --]

The multiplex telegraph is truly a marvellous invention. It has been developed by the engineers of the Western Union Telegraph Co. working with the engineers of the Western Electric Company. The principle on which this instrument works is that if separate instruments are given connection with the wire one after the other during very short intervals of time, the effect is as though the wire were split up, and each instrument works just as if it alone were on the wire. Not only does the multiplex telegraph thus send four messages in one direction and four messages in the opposite direction, simultaneously over a single wire, thus keeping no less than sixteen operators employed on one wire, four sending and four receiving at each end, but each message instead of being sent by the ordinary Morse key, is written upon a typewriter keyboard at one end of the line and appears automatically typewritten at the other end.

If you live in a big city, go into one of the larger branch offices of the Western Union Telegraph Co. and ask to see printing telegraph. Most of the large branch offices communicate with the general operating department in the city by means of what they term “short line printers,” which are instruments on which the message is written upon a typewriter keyboard and appears typewritten at the other end.

Who Invented the Electric Telegraph?

It is hard to say just how the telegraph originated in the mind of men. We have already shown how the savages sent signals over distances by means of the smoke rising from his fire. Every boy and girl has used a little mirror, held in the sun to flash a bright spot here and there. This principle has been used by the army to signal at distances. The sun’s rays are flashed from a small mirror, long and short flashes indicating the dashes and dots of the Morse telegraph code.

Progress towards the perfection of the electric telegraph began with the first researches of scientists into the natural laws which govern that great natural agent, electricity. Clever, painstaking men, studying and experimenting for the love of the work, discovered bit by bit how to control the force. Stephen Gray with his Leyden jars, which stored up a charge of electricity, inspired Sir William Watson to experiment, and he sent current from one jar to another two miles away.

The First Suggestion of the Electric Telegraph.

For a long time no one thought that this opened the way for the making of a useful servant for man. In 1753 this thought occurred to an unknown man in Scotland, who wrote a letter to a newspaper suggesting that messages be sent by electric currents.

One of his schemes was that there should be a light ball at the receiving end of the wire which would strike a bell when it felt the electric impulse come over the wire from the Leyden jar, and by devising a code depending upon the number of strokes of the bell and the time between them, he suggested that messages could be sent and interpreted. Some believe this man to have been a doctor named Charles Morrison of Greenock, Scotland. Whoever he was, he suggested a method which comes very near to being that in use to-day.

The difficulty with proceeding on this suggestion was that the current from the Leyden jar was static electricity, which has not the strength nor can it be controlled as can the current of low potential which is used to-day. Volta discovered this new and more stable form of electricity and many different men labored investigating what could be accomplished with it. The names of Sir Humphry Davy and Michael Faraday are inseparably connected with this advance. It was Oersted’s and Faraday’s discovery of the connection between electricity and magnetism, and how an electric current may be made to magnetize a piece of iron at will, that really opened the way for the invention of the telegraph we know to-day.

The First Real Telegraph.

But before the much greater practical value of Volta’s current was discovered, one man developed a real telegraph which worked with electricity of the static kind, produced by friction. This man was named Sir Francis Ronalds. He worked along the lines laid down by the unknown Scotchman, whom we have supposed to be Charles Morrison. The machine he built and operated in his garden at Hammersmith utilized pith balls, which actuated by the charge of static electricity sent along the wire caused a letter to appear before an opening in the dial. When perfected he offered it to the British Government, who refused it. They were very stupid in their refusal, for they said “telegraphs are wholly unnecessary.” Sir Francis Ronalds’ invention cost him much care, anxiety and money. He lived to see the more practical voltaic current taken up by others and put to successful use. Being unselfish he rejoiced that others should succeed where he had failed.

Two Men who Invented our Telegraph almost Simultaneously.

The telegraph, working on the electro-magnetic principle, as used to-day, was developed almost simultaneously on the two sides of the Atlantic Ocean. In England Sir Charles Wheatstone and Sir William Fothergill Cooke worked out a practical method and instruments, which with few changes, are in use to-day. Cooke was a doctor and had served with the British army in India. Wheatstone was the son of a Gloucester musical instrument maker. The latter was fond of science and experimented continually with electricity and wrote about it and other scientific subjects. As a result of his work he was made a professor at King’s College. There he conducted important researches and tests, among which was one which measured the speed at which electricity travels along a wire. So Cooke, who was a doctor and a good business man, entered into partnership with the scientist Wheatstone, and together they completed their invention. It was first used in 1838 on the London and Blackwall Railway. At first it was expensive and cumbersome, using five lines of wire. Later this number was reduced to two, and in 1845, an instrument was devised which required but one wire. This instrument, with a few minor changes, is the one in use to-day in England.

While these two men were working in England, an American artist, S. F. B. Morse, was studying and experimenting in the United States along his own lines but with the same end in view, namely to produce instruments which would satisfactorily send messages over a wire by electricity.

An American, however, is given the honor of First by Slight Margin.

Morse was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, in 1791. He was gifted as an artist, both in painting and sculpture, and in 1811 went abroad to England to study. While on a voyage from Havre to America in 1832 he met on board ship a Dr. Jackson, who told him of the latest scientific discoveries in regard to the electric current and the electro-magnet. This set Morse to thinking and after three years’ hard work on the problem he produced a telegraph which worked on the principle of the electro-magnet. With the apparatus devised by Morse and his partner Alfred Vail, a message was sent from Washington to Baltimore in 1844.

There has been some question as to whether Morse or Wheatstone first invented a workable telegraph. As will be evident from this history, the telegraph in principle was a gradual development, to which many minds contributed. To Morse, however, the high authority of the Supreme Court of the United States has given the credit of being the first to perfect a practical instrument, saying that the Morse invention “preceded the three European inventions” and that it would be impossible to examine the latter without perceiving at once “the decided superiority of the one invented by Professor Morse.”

Uncle Sam Helped Build the First Telegraph Line.

~FIRST TELEGRAPH LINE FROM BALTIMORE TO WASHINGTON~

At the time Morse’s Recording Telegraph was invented there were, of course, no telegraph lines in any part of the world, with the exception of the short lines of wire put up by investigators for experimental purposes. To remove the obscurity as to the purpose to be served by the telegraph was the first problem which presented itself to Morse and his backers. In 1843 an appropriation was secured of $30,000 from the U. S. Government, with which a line was built from Washington to Baltimore. This was built and operated by the Government for about two years, but the Government refused to purchase the patent rights. So the owners of the patents endeavored to get the general public interested in the telegraph as a commercial undertaking and gradually companies were founded and licensed to use the invention.

By 1851 there were as many as fifty different telegraph companies in operation in different parts of the United States. A few of these used the devices of a man named Alexander Bain, which were afterwards adjudged to infringe the Morse patents, and one or two used an instrument invented by Royal E. House of Vermont, which printed the messages received in plain Roman letters on a ribbon of paper. This at first seemed to have an advantage over that of Morse, which received the message in dots and dashes, in the Morse Code, and these had to be translated and written out by an operator before they could be delivered. However, as time went on, the operators came to read the Morse messages by the sound of the dots and dashes, instead of waiting to read the paper tape having the dots and dashes marked on it, and finally the recording feature was given up and the sounder, or instrument which simply clicks out the message, came into general use.

In the early days, the possibility of the business were little understood and many telegraph companies failed. April 8, 1851, papers were filed in Albany for the incorporation of the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Co. This company, which soon afterwards changed its name to Western Union, was destined to absorb the various companies throughout the country until it, in time, operated the telegraph lines over practically the entire United States, and has its blue sign in nearly every town and hamlet in the country.

OPERATING ROOM.

In large cities like New York and Chicago, the operating rooms are very large. For instance, the main operating department of the Western Union Telegraph Co. in New York City has 1000 operators. This picture shows an operating room. The men and women sit in opposite sides of long tables. On the tables are the keys and sounders by which they send and receive the messages. Each operator has a typewriter, or “mill,” as he calls it, on which he writes off the message as it comes to him over the wire.]

The picture shows a main switchboard in a large operating room. To this come the ends of the wires from other cities, and to it are connected the wires from the instruments in front of the operators. By putting plugs, attached to each end of a wire, into the sockets in the board, any wire can be connected with any operating position, or several local circuits can be connected up with a main line from the outside.]

A SECTION OF THE REPEATER ROOM.

When a wire runs to a distant point from the main operating department of the telegraph company in a large city, the same electric current which runs through the key of the operator as he sits at his place, busily sending messages, does not go out over the wire to that distant point. It simply goes to the repeater room and operates a repeater, which sends out another current over the long wire which leads to the destination of the message. This is necessary because the condition of the weather affects the lines and the current strength has to be changed to suit the changing line conditions. The operators haven’t time to make these adjustments, and so all the repeaters are grouped together in the repeater room where they are under the watchful eyes of experts. Here also are the delicate instruments which separate the messages coming over duplex and quadruplex wires, by responding to impulses of various strengths. These messages which have been separated are then transmitted by the duplex or quadruplex repeaters to different operators in the operating room, who hear their sounders tick out the message just the same as if it came over a simple Morse wire.]

You may not but your father will remember the time when in large cities there were tall telegraph poles with hundreds of wires on them running along the main streets, so that the town seemed to be bound with great spiders’ web. That is all changed now, and the telegraph wires are run through ducts, placed underground. For this purpose they are made up in cables, and in the picture you see a number of cables entering a central office.]

WHEATSTONE SENDING INSTRUMENT.

These two photographs show the most modern form of the instruments which, as we are told on another page, were invented in England by Wheatstone and Cooke. In sending a paper tape is punched in what is called a perforator, which has a keyboard like a typewriter. A certain combination of holes means a certain letter. This tape is then automatically fed through the sending instrument, which sends impulses over the wire. The tape with the holes punched through it can be seen in the picture.

On the right is the Wheatstone receiving instrument. It prints the signals received in dots and dashes on a tape, which is translated by the operator who typewrites the translation on a message blank for delivery.]

On this page we see some of the first telegraph instruments, in fact, the very instruments which Professor Morse used in the early demonstrations of his invention. These instruments may be seen in the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, D. C. The key is known as the Vail key, because it is supposed to have been constructed by Alfred Vail, who worked with Morse in his experiments with the telegraph. As can be seen it is very simple. One wire was connected to the spring piece and the other to the post beneath it. When the key was pressed down, the contact was made and an impulse sent over the wire, either a dot, if the key was pressed down and immediately released, or a dash if it were held down for just the fraction of a second before releasing.

From the very first it was found that relays were necessary, because the current after coming a long way over the wire often was not strong enough to operate the recording instrument. Therefore, this weak current was made to go though the electro-magnets of the relay, magnetizing these and pulling to the left the upright arm which can be seen in the photograph with a little block of iron attached to it. This arm, when pulled by the magnets, made a contact at the top and allowed a strong current from a battery to flow through the magnets of the recording instrument.

The first practical recording telegraph instrument devised by Morse is shown. It looks like a clumsy affair compared to the instruments of to-day, but it worked so effectively as to convince people of the possibilities of the great invention. In the wooden box, attached to the frame at the right, is clockwork which pulled a paper tape at an even rate of speed over a pulley just beneath a needle point. This needle point is attached to a light framework having a piece of iron fastened in it. Below this iron are the electro-magnets, and when they received an impulse of current from the battery, through the relay, they pulled down the frame so that the point made a mark upon the paper tape which moved under it. Thus in the tape appeared a series of dots and dashes, which the operator, knowing the Morse Code, could easily translate into English.

ONE OF THE FIRST KEYS FOR SENDING TELEGRAMS.]

A LATER KEY.]

Here we see some early telegraph instruments which have been improved somewhat from the crude devices illustrated on the preceding page. The key answers the same purpose as before, but has been improved by pivoting the lever arm, and having a coil spring, adjustable by means of a screw, so that the weight necessary to press it down can be varied to suit the likings of the operator who uses it. The play of the key or the distance it must be pressed down before it makes an electric contact, can be adjusted by another screw.

The recording instrument here shown is a much neater affair than the cumbersome device which Professor Morse first built. The cumbersome wooden box has been replaced with a neat brass frame containing the clockwork for drawing the paper tape beneath the marking point, which is attached to a piece of iron, or armature, placed just above the magnet.

Below we see the most modern types of Morse instruments. In the center is the key, which is not much changed except that it is built to be low down to a table, so that the operator may rest his forearm on the table top in front of it, and operate the key with his wrist, with less fatigue. The relay at the left is interesting. It shows how little this instrument has changed, except for refinement in its appearance, from the first relay built by Professor Morse. At the right is the Morse sounder, which has replaced the old Morse tape recording instrument. When current goes through the magnets they attract a piece of iron attached to the metal arm and pull it down to strike the brass frame. This makes a click, and when the current is intercepted, the magnets release the arm and a spring pulls it back, making another click. The operator reads the message by listening to the clicks. If the up click comes right after the down click it represents a dot. If there is a pause between them, a dash is represented.]

Relay

Key

Sounder

MODERN MORSE INSTRUMENTS]

_Light Intermediate_

_Heavy Intermediate_

_Main Cable_

_Rock Cable_

_Heavy Shore End_

_Rock Cable_

_Heavy Shore End_

_Heavy Intermediate_

_Light Intermediate_

_Deep Sea_

_Bay Cable_

FIG. 1.--CABLES ON VANCOUVER-FANNING ISLAND SECTION.

Full size.

Core, 600/340.]

Yarn Serving & Compound

16 No. 13 (·095) Galvanized Wires

Jute Serving

Gutta Percha

Copper Conductor

FIG. 2.--CABLES USED ON FIJI-NORFOLK ISLAND-QUEENSLAND AND NEW ZEALAND SECTIONS. Full size. Core 130/130.

This picture shows cross-sections of a cable which runs from Vancouver, B. C., to Australia and New Zealand. A cable is not laid with a uniform cross-section. On the floor of the ocean, perhaps miles below the surface, the cable rests quietly and is not moved by storms which generate great waves on the surface of the water. As the cable approaches the shore, the movement of the water goes deeper and the cable must be made heavier to prevent it from being worn by movement on the bed of the ocean. Where the cable passes over a rocky bottom, it is made much larger in diameter and is heavily armored.]

The Story in an Ocean Cable

What is a Cable Made of?

A submarine telegraph cable as usually made consists of a core in the center of which is a strand of copper wire which varies in weight from seventy to four hundred pounds to the mile. Strands of copper wire instead of one thick wire of copper are used, because the former is more flexible. The copper conductor is covered with several coatings of rubber of equal weight to the copper wires. After this comes a coating of jute serving, then a layer of galvanized iron wires and finally a layer of yarn and compound which forms the outer covering of the cable. In addition to this where the cable lays among rocks that might injure it, chains are securely wrapped around it, so as to prevent wear and tear as much as possible.

You may not have known it, but the cable which lies on the bottom where the water is deepest is never so large as nearer the shore or in shallow water. Little by little the men who lay and look after cables have found that it is best to have a specially constructed outer covering for different depths and character of bottoms so as to provide the least possible danger of damage through the action of the water on the bottom.

How is a Cable Laid?

When the cable of sufficient length is completed, it is carried to a specially equipped vessel which has a great tank for holding the cable and the necessary machinery for lowering it over the end of the ship into the water. The cable is carefully coiled in the tank, the different coils being prevented from adhering by a coat of whitewash. First then, a sufficient length of cable is paid out to reach the cable house or shore. Here it is finally tested to see that the entire length of cable is in working order. If satisfactorily tested, the vessel steams slowly away on the course outlined, paying out the cable as she goes.

Here we see a cable coiled round and round in the tank which holds it on board the cable ship.]

The paying-out machine. The cable makes a couple of turns around the big drum, which is connected to the dial, so that the dial indicates the length of cable which has been paid out into the sea.]

Here we see the cable on the lead, as it is called, passing over the big bow sheave from which it dives into the depths of the sea.]

The vessel must pay out more than a mile of cable for every mile she travels because there must be enough slack allowed at the same time to provide for the unevenness of the bottom of the sea. For this purpose the amount of cable paid out must be measured. This is done by the paying-out machine, which is shown in one of the pictures. The difference between the speed of the ship and the amount of cable paid out gives the amount of slack. Too much slack would also be bad, so that it is a very pretty problem to pay out just enough and both the speed of the vessel and the rate of paying out the cable must be watched carefully.

One of the greatest wonders accomplished by the ingenuity of man is the ocean telegraph, by which we flash messages back and forth under the sea between the continents and completely around the world.

Hardly had the telegraph become an established fact, before Professor Morse, who made the telegraph practical, expressed the belief that a telegraph line to Europe by means of a wire laid on the bottom of the ocean was easily possible at some future time. Mr. Cyrus W. Field, the first to lay an ocean cable successfully, heard him and in his own mind said “Why not now?” The idea fixed itself so thoroughly in his resolute mind that he soon said to himself “It shall be done,” and went to work, and labored incessantly through twelve years of failure and discouragement before he accomplished his task, which was a great compliment to this giant of American stick-to-it-iveness.

While many doubted the feasibility of the project and others thought it the dream of a disordered brain, Mr. Field found many who believed in him and his idea and who loaned him their financial support for the undertaking.

Landing the shore end of a cable. The cable is supported on several boats and this picture shows the inshore boat with the end of the cable reaching the beach with the seas breaking over her.]

THE PIONEERS OF THE FIRST OCEAN CABLE.]

American genius had not at that time asserted its supremacy in mechanics and so the first cable had to be made in England; so Mr. Field ordered one long enough to stretch from the west coast of Ireland to the eastern point of Newfoundland. English capitalists subscribed the money and the United States provided the vessel in which to store and from which to drop the cable into the ocean.

Upon the first attempt to lay the cable, every thing went along nicely for six days, and then suddenly the cable broke when three hundred and thirty-five miles had been laid, and many said it could not be done. Mr. Field, however, full of American pluck and determination, said “We will try again.” A second attempt was made with two ships, the U. S. S. “Niagara” and H. M. S. S. “Agamemnon.” Each ship carried half the cable and they traveled in company to the middle of the ocean. There the two pieces of the cable were spliced together and the ships started for the shores in opposite directions. Again, however, when only a little of the cable had been paid out--a little more than one hundred miles in fact--the cable broke and both ships were forced to return to England.

In his third attempt the cable was finally laid clear across the ocean and fastened at both ends. When tried it was found to work successfully and Queen Victoria and President Buchanan were able to exchange greetings upon the achievement of a wonderful work. The people celebrated the event on both sides of the ocean, but in the midst of the festivities, while a message was being flashed, something happened to the cable--what, we have never been able to learn--and the cable was silent, forever.

Nothing daunted, however, Mr. Field by his great courage induced his backers to buy him another cable and the “Great Eastern” sailed upon what was to be a most successful mission. Starting from the American side with the greatest steamship then known in charge of the previous cable, the other end was successfully landed at Hearts Content, Ireland, on July 27, 1866, in perfect working order, and the question of the ocean telegraph was solved.

Here is a buoy which is anchored to the cable. The cable ship will pick it up and haul up the cable to the surface for inspection and perhaps it will have to be repaired.]

Here are the powerful engines which are used for picking up a cable which has to be raised from the bottom of the sea for inspection or repair.]

ARMORING MACHINE

Here is one of the machines used for armoring the cable. By armoring is meant winding steel wires around and around the cable to protect it from being cut by sharp rocks on the bottom or by deep sea animals like the teredo, which might attack it.]

CONTINENTAL MORSE CODE SIGNALS USED IN CABLE WORKING]

Making repairs to a cable where it comes out of the sea on to a bold rocky shore. Note how the cable is wound with chain to protect it from the rocks.

Same Signals as They Appear in Actual Working

Here are two photographs showing the continental Morse code signals used in cable working and the signals as they are received by the siphon recording instrument at the receiving station. This siphon recorder is in practical use in the cable world. The dots and dashes sent into the wire on one side of the ocean according to the Morse code, cause the siphon recorder through the means of electrified ink to make a waving line on a tape. The signals are readily reducible again if necessary to the dots and dashes of the Morse code because dots make deflections to one side of the center of the tape and dashes to the other. The operator who receives the message can therefore readily read it.

ALPHABET:

A · --
B -- · · ·
C -- · -- ·
D -- · ·
E ·
F · · -- ·
G -- -- ·
H · · · ·
I · ·
J · -- -- --
K -- · --
L · -- · ·
M -- --
N -- ·
O -- -- --
P · -- -- ·
Q -- -- · --
R · -- ·
S · · ·
T --
U · · --
V · · · --
W · -- --
X -- · · --
Y -- · -- --
Z -- -- · ·

FIGURES:

1 · -- -- -- --
2 · · -- -- --
3 · · · -- --
4 · · · · --
5 · · · · ·
6 -- · · · ·
7 -- -- · · ·
8 -- -- -- · ·
9 -- -- -- -- ·
0 -- -- -- -- --
OR --]

MAP No. 1

WESTERN UNION
TRANS-ATLANTIC CABLES
AND CONNECTIONS]

THE STORY IN A RAILWAY LOCOMOTIVE

The wonder of our railroad systems to-day is the growth of the locomotive. The necessity for economy in hauling long freight trains has led to the development of this type of engine. Some idea of its size can be had from the second picture, which shows the boiler and firebox of the locomotive shown in the first picture. The firebox is so large that an ordinary narrow-gauge locomotive of the old style can be comfortably stored in it.

LOADED WEIGHTS

On driving wheels 475,000 lbs.
On truck wheels 30,000 lbs.
On trailing wheels 35,000 lbs.
Total of engine 540,000 lbs.
Total of tender 212,000 lbs.

WHEEL BASE

Driving, rigid 15 ft. 6 ins.
Total of engine 57 ft. 4 ins.
Total of engine and tender 91 ft. 5³⁄₁₆ ins.

CYLINDERS

Diameter H.P. 28 ins., L. P. 44 ins.
Stroke of piston 32 ins.

WHEELS

Diameter of driving wheels, outside 56 ins.
Diameter of truck wheels 30 ins.
Diameter of trailing wheels 30 ins.
Diameter of tender wheels 33 ins.]

LOW PRESSURE CYLINDERS OF ARTICULATED COMPOUND LOCOMOTIVE.