HEiNRY AND THE TELEGRAPH. 



By Willi a^i B. Taylor. 



"Yet tliough thy purer spirit did not need 

 The vulgar guerdon of a brief renown, 



Some little meed at least — some little meed 



Our age may yield to thy more lasting crown." 



In the impulsive tide of popular applause which follows the consum- 

 matiou of great enterprises, or the material advancement from new con- 

 quests of natural law, the labors and merits of those who patiently laid 

 the deep and broad foundations of these successes, or who with rarest 

 diligence, sagacity, and skill, made such successes practicable, are usu- 

 ally whelmed ; and — save by the scientific student, are mostly forgotten 

 and ignored. And this result is the more assured by reason of the en- 

 tire self-uuconsciousness and devotion with which the higher work of 

 original research is conducted, with no disturbing thought on the part 

 of the investigator, of reaping immediate advantage or reward from the 

 bestowal of the new discovery. 



" For praise is his who builds for his own age ; 

 But he who builds for time, must look to time for wage."* 



That the award of time respecting Henrj-'s true relation to the tele- 

 graph will be discriminating and just, may be confidently anticipated, 

 since the materials and data for an accurate judgment are already matter 

 of enduring record, t In attempting here to briefly review this record, 

 justice will best be done to Henry's fame by rendering fuU justice to 

 Henry's predecessors. 



The Grotcth of the Electric Telegraph. — " The electric telegraph had 

 properly speaking, no inventor. It grew up little by little, each inventor 

 adding his little to advance it toward perfection."! These words of 

 soberness and truth are little apprehended by the multitude; who blind 

 alike to the beginnings and to the growths of great ideas, contemn the 



* Prof. Grant Allen. 



tin the spirit of Kepler (though with less of self-assertion), Heniy, with a modest esti- 

 mate of his own contributions to science, while evincing a remarkable iudittereuce to 

 pcpularity, yet with the quiet contideuce of a clear and impartial judgraeut, declared 

 '' I was coutent that my ])ablished researches should remain as material for the his- 

 tory of science, and be pronounced upon according to their true value by the scientific 

 world." — (Smitliisonian li('i)ort for 1857, p. 87.) 



t The Electric Telegraph. By Eobert Sabine. 8vo. London, 1867, part i, chap, iv, 

 sect. 39, p. 40. 

 2G2 



