THE TELEPHONE 343 



and from there the waves were sent out into the ether and 

 connection made with San Francisco by wireless. It is 

 possible to have this taken up again by a wire telephone. 

 So that the possibilities of the future are that a person living 

 at Chicago, or some other inland city, may telephone di- 

 rectly to a person in Paris. The message will first travel 

 by wire to some wireless station on the Atlantic coast, then 

 by wireless to some coast station in Europe, and then by 

 wire to Paris, without interruption. 



Uses of wireless telephone. The possibilities that are thus 

 suggested sound almost like fairy tales and fairly stagger 

 the imagination. It does not seem probable now that wire- 

 less will take the place of the ordinary short-distance tele- 

 phone, but will rather work with it and make it more effec- 

 tive. The two working together will make a universal 

 telephone. The wireless telephone has certain special 

 fields with which the ordinary telephone cannot compete. 

 Chief among these is telephony from continent to continent 

 across the ocean. Other fields are in telephony from ship 

 to ship and between ship and shore. Battleships of navies 

 and some airplanes are now provided with wireless outfits. 

 In the near future it will doubtless be possible, as one travels 

 on the ocean steamers, to keep in touch by telephone with 

 his friends during the entire journey across. 



Outfits on trains. Already these outfits have been in- 

 stalled on trains, and it is possible for one to telephone from 

 a train while it is traveling at the rate of fifty miles an hour. 

 In this way conversations have been carried on through a 

 distance of fifty-two miles. But this device will be used 

 chiefly for directing the movements of trains, which can 

 by this means receive orders without stopping. 



Advantages of wireless over ordinary telephone. For long 

 distance transmission the wireless telephone has many ad- 

 vantages over the wire telephone. It is much cheaper to 

 install, as there are no poles or wires. It costs less to main- 



