172 ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL 



in a much more perfect manner than I had done. Indeed, he 

 said that Helmholtz had not only analyzed the vowel sounds 

 into their constitutent musical elements, but had actually 

 performed the synthesis of them. 



He had succeeded in producing, artificially, certain of the 

 vowel sounds by causing tuning forks of different pitch to 

 vibrate simultaneously by means of an electric current. Mr. 

 Ellis was kind enough to grant me an interview for the pur- 

 pose of explaining the apparatus employed by Helmholtz in 

 producing these extraordinary effects, and I spent the greater 

 part of a delightful day with him in investigating the subject. 

 At that time, however, I was too slightly acquainted with the 

 laws of electricity fully to understand the explanations given ; 

 but the interview had the effect of arousing my interest in 

 the subjects of sound and electricity, and I did not rest until 

 I had obtained possession of a copy of Helmholtz's great work 

 'The Theory of Tone," and had attempted, in a crude and 

 imperfect manner, it is true, to reproduce his results. While 

 reflecting upon the possibilities of the production of sound by 

 electrical means, it struck me that the principle of vibrating a 

 tuning fork by the intermittent attraction of an electromag- 

 net might be applied to the electrical production of music. 



I imagined to myself a series of tuning forks of different 

 pitches, arranged to vibrate automatically in the manner 

 shown by Helmholtz — each fork interrupting, at every vibra- 

 tion, a voltaic current — and the thought occurred, why 

 should not the depression of a key like that of a piano direct 

 the interrupted current from any one of these forks, through a 

 telegraph wire, to a series of electromagnets operating the 

 strings of a piano or other instrument, in which case a person 

 might play the tuning fork piano in one place and the music 

 be audible from the electromagnetic piano in a distant city. 



The more I reflected upon this arrangement the more 

 feasible did it seem to me; indeed, I saw no reason why the 

 depression of a number of keys at the tuning fork end of the 

 circuit should not be followed by the audible production of a 

 full chord from the piano in the distant city, each tuning fork 

 affecting at the receiving end that string of the piano with 

 which it was in unison. At this time the interest which I felt 



