60 USE OF THE TELEGRAPHS BY THE PUBLIC. 



overhead line between Berlin and Potsdam and on 

 the underground line between Berlin arid Grossbeeren 

 - performances with which those of the old semaphores 

 were not to be compared - contributed however in 

 no small degree to produce an opinion more favourable 

 to the public interest. The report of the astonishingly 

 favourable results of these experiments went the round 

 of the higher circles in Berlin, arid brought me a 

 command from the Princess of Prussia to give a lecture 



o 



in Potsdam on electric telegraphy to her son. after- 

 wards Crown Prince Frederick William and Emperor 

 Frederick. This lecture, accompanied by experiments 

 on the Berlin -Potsdam line, and a memoir connected 

 therewith, in which I enlarged upon the great future 

 in store for telegraphy, supposing it to be made the 

 common property of the people, no doubt considerably 

 assisted in gaining over the higher circles. 



At my instigation the commission instituted a public 

 competition for March 1848, and settled the conditions 

 to be satisfied in regard to the telegraphic communi- 

 cations and apparatus. Prizes were assigned to the 

 conquerors, who were also to have the reversion of 

 consequent orders. I had a pretty safe expectation 

 of obtaining the victory with my own proposals at this 

 competition, which opened on the 15 th of March 1848, 

 when on the 18 th the competition as well as the 

 commission itself came to an abrupt end. 



Plunged in my own interesting labours I had 

 found little time to give heed to the wild commotion, 

 which since the February revolution in Paris was 



