136 Telephone Systems of the Continent of Europe 



VIII. FRANCE 



HISTORY AND PRESENT POSITION 



UNLIKE some other countries, France was prompt, on the ap- 

 pearance of the telephone, to determine how to treat the intruder. 

 By the law of 1837, confirmed by that of 1851, the monopoly of 

 telegraphic communication rested with the State, and the French 

 authorities had little difficulty in pronouncing the telephone a 

 telegraph. But it was a new-fangled one, nevertheless ; and who- 

 was to be at the trouble, risk, and expense of proving its suitability 

 for the sphere claimed for it by its introducers, and of sampling 

 the public taste and estimate of the commercial and social value 

 of the innovation ? Soon the Government decided that that was 

 eminently the function of the sponsors themselves, so as early as 

 1879 three five-year concessions, comprising between them the 

 whole of Paris, were granted. But the town council naturally 

 took exception to the arrangement, and brought pressure to bear 

 on the concessionaries to force a fusion, so that Paris might be 

 worked as a whole, and not split into, possibly hostile, camps. 

 Thereupon the concessionaries, very wisely, determined to join 

 hands, a resolution which led to the formation on December i o, 

 1880, of the afterwards powerful association, the Societe Generate 

 des Telephones. The Societe found that it had to a certain 

 extent to dance in fetters, since the State claimed a royalty of 10 

 per cent, on the gross receipts, and stipulated that the Department 

 of the Posts and Telegraphs should construct and maintain the 

 company's system, so far as the outside wiring was concerned, at 

 prices which might appear fair and reasonable to that depart- 

 ment. Moreover, the State claimed a general control, including 



