i6 



HARD WICKE'S SCIENCE- G OS SIP. 



per word, the rate to New Zealand. In order to 

 minimise that cost as much as possible, the use of 

 codes, whereby one word is made to do duty for a 

 lengthy phrase, is much resorted to. Of course, those 

 code messages form a series of words having no 

 apparent relation to each other, but occasionally 

 queer sentences result from the chance grouping of 

 code words. Thus a certain tea firm was once 

 astonished to receive from its agent abroad the 

 startling code message — "Unboiled babies de- 

 tested" ! 



Suppose we now follow the adventures of a few 

 cablegrams in their travels over the world. 



A message to India from London by the cable 

 route requires to be transmitted eight times at the 

 following places : — Porthcurno (Cornwall), Lisbon, 

 Gibraltar, Malta, Alexandria, Suez, Aden, Bombay. 



A message to Australia has thirteen stoppages ; 

 the route taken beyond Bombay being via Madras, 

 Penang, Singapore, Banjoewangie and Port Darwin 

 (North Australia) ; or from Banjoewangie to Roebuck 

 Bay (Western Australia). 



To India by the Indo-European land lines, 

 messages go through Emden, Warsaw, Odessa, 

 Kertch, Tiflis, Teheran, Bushire (Persian Gulf), Jask 

 and Kurrachee, but only stop twice between London 

 and Teheran — namely, at Emden and Odessa. 



Messages from London to New York are trans- 

 mitted only twice — at the Irish or Cornwall stations, 

 and at the stations in Canada. Owing to the great 

 competition for the American traffic the service 

 between London, Liverpool, and Glasgow and New 

 York is said to be much superior to that between any 

 two towns in Britain. The cables are extensively 

 used by stockbrokers, and it is a common occurrence 

 for one to send a message and receive a reply within 

 five minutes. 



During breakages in cables messages have some- 

 times to take very circuitous routes. For instance, 

 during the two days, three years ago, that a 

 tremendous storm committed such havoc amongst 

 the telegraph wires around London, cutting ofif all 

 communication with the lines connected with the 

 Channel cables at Dover, Lowestoft, &c., it was 

 of common occurrence for London merchants to 

 communicate with Paris through New York. The 

 cablegram leaving London going north to Holyhead 

 and Ireland, across the Atlantic to New York 

 and back via St. Pierre to Brest and thence on 

 to Paris, a total distance of about seven thousand 

 miles. 



Two years ago, when the great blizzard cut off all 

 communication between New York and Boston, 

 messages were accepted in New York, sent to this 

 country, and thence back to Boston.' 



Some time ago the cables between Madeira and 

 St. Vincent were out of order, cutting off communi- 

 cation by the direct route to Brazil, and a message to 

 reach Rio Janeiro had to pass through Ireland, 



Canada, United States, to Galveston, thence to 

 Vera Cruz, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama, Ecuador, 

 Peru, Chili, ; from Valparaiso across the Andes, 

 through the Argentine Republic to Buenos Ayres, 

 and thence by East Coast cables to Rio Janeiro, the 

 message having traversed a distance of about twelve 

 thousand miles and having passed through twenty- 

 four cables and some very long land lines, instead of 

 passing, had it been possible to have sent it by|the 

 direct route, over one short land line and six cables, 

 in all under six thousand miles. 



Perhaps some of our readers may remember having 

 read in the newspapers of the result of last year's 

 Derby having been sent from Epsom to New York 

 in fifteen seconds, and may be interested to know 

 how it was done. A wire was laid from near the 

 winning-post on the racecourse to the cable 

 company's office in London, and an operator was at 

 the instrument ready to signal the two or three 

 letters previously arranged upon for each horse 

 immediately the winner had passed the post. When 

 the race begun, the cable company suspended work 

 on all the lines from London to New York and kept 

 operators at the Irish and Nova Scotian Stations 

 ready to transmit the letters representing the winning 

 horse immediately, and without having the message 

 written out in the usual way. When the race was 

 finished, the operator at Epsom at once sent the 

 letters representing the winner, and before he had 

 finished the third letter, the operator in London had 

 started the first one to Ireland. The clerk in 

 Ireland immediately on hearing the first signal from 

 London passed it on to Nova Scotia, from whence it 

 was again passed on to New York. The result 

 being that the name of the winner was actually 

 known in New York before the horses had pulled up 

 after passing the judge. It seems almost incredible 

 that such information could be transmitted such a 

 great distance in fifteen seconds, but when we get 

 behind the scenes and see exactly how it is 

 accomplished, and see how the labour and time of 

 signalling can be economised, we can easily realise 

 the fact. 



The humours of telegraphic mistakes have often 

 been described ; we will conclude by giving only 

 one example. A St. Louis merchant had gone to 

 New York on business, and while there received a 

 telegram from the family doctor, which ran — " Your 

 wife has had a child, if we can keep her from having 

 another to-night, all will be well." As the little 

 stranger had not been expected, further enquiry was 

 made and elicited the fact that his wife had simply 

 had a "chill"! This important difference having 

 been caused simply by the omission of a single dot. 



h i 

 h i 



1 = chill 

 d = child 



