WATSON'S EXPERIMENTS ON LONG CIRCUITS. 551 



they wanted the discharge to take place. The shock was 

 so severe that some of them demurred to receiving it 

 through their bodies, although they found amusement in 

 the antics of the astonished countrymen whom they per- 

 suaded to join hands with them. 



Successful transmission over a four-mile circuit tl a 

 distance without trial too great to be credited" left 

 Watson wondering how far the commotion would actually 

 manifest itself, and what experiments he should try in 

 order to find out. If he could determine the velocity of 

 electricity, then perhaps he could form some idea of the 

 length of circuit which would serve to test the matter. 

 He attacked that problem very much as Lemon nier had 

 done, by endeavoring to make a comparison between the 

 speed of the commotion and the velocity of sound; but the 

 effort was as unavailing as that of his French rival, and 

 his conclusion the same; that the transmission of elec- 

 tricity u over any of the distances yet experienced is nearly 

 instantaneous." 



None the less, however, had Watson invented and used 

 the circuit of wire and earth which, in later years, proved 

 of such great value in long telegraph lines. But no in- 

 telligence was sent electrically over Watson's wire. The 

 shock of the jar made the observers jump and that was 

 all. No one thought of transmitting shocks at varying 

 intervals so as to signal intelligence by them. There was 

 not the slightest notion of telegraphic communication 

 present in Watson's mind. He was merely seeking to 

 discover how far the "commotion" would travel, and in 

 that way to obtain some knowledge of its strength and 

 speed. 



Next to having one's discoveries prematurely made by 

 another, nothing is more disconcerting than to have some- 

 body else bring home the conviction that the fundamental 

 hypothesis upon which one has based a whole series of 

 creditable deductions and experiments is probably wrong. 

 However excellent the last may be in themselves, they 



