476 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. II., No. 35. 



and rarefactions of air or any other medium in 

 which we may find ourselves." And again, on 

 p. 82, " these were the principles wich (sic) 

 gnided me in mj- invention. They were suffi- 

 cient to induce me to try the reproduction of 

 tunes at any distance." And again, on the 

 same page, "The apparatus consists of two 

 separated parts ; one for the singing-station 

 A, and the other for the hearing-station B." 

 Also in the same letter, p. 84, " If a person 

 sing at the station A, in the tube (x) the vi- 

 brations will pass into the box and move the 

 membrane above." Respecting the word 

 ' tunes,' used by Reis, the author remarks, in 

 a foot-note to p. 81, " This word, as the con- 

 text and ending of the paragraph shows, should 

 have been written tones. The letter, written 

 in English by Reis himself, is wonderfully free 

 from inaccuracies of composition ; the slip here 

 noted being a most pardonable one since the 

 plm-al of the Gei'man ton is tonen, the ver}' 

 pronunciation of which would account for the 

 confusion in the mind of one unaccustomed to 

 write in English." The resemblance of tonen 

 to tunes is not so remarkably close that it would 

 be likely to mislead one whose knowledge of 

 English is such as Reis shows himself in this 

 letter to possess. The author does not attempt 

 the explanation of the words ' singing ' and 

 ' sing ' in the same letter. It is surprising 

 that he should have allowed these words to 

 pass unnoticed, for it was vital to his argument 

 to prove that Reis mistook them for ' speaking ' 

 and 'speak.' The resemblance is about as 

 close as in the other case, but in neither is the 

 explanation like]}' to be admitted by the un- 

 prejudiced reader. 



In taking himself back to the time of Reis's 

 telephone, the author has failed to identifj- him- 

 self with the conditions of that time, and to 

 leave behind him the subsequent acquisitions 

 of science. He makes statements and claims 

 which could onlj- find their justification in a 

 world very differently furnished with facts from 

 this one. As an illustration of the mental dis- 

 position resulting from this, the following sen- 

 tence from the author's preface may serve : 

 " The testimony now adduced as to the aim 

 of Philipp Reis's invention, and the measure of 

 success which he himself attained, is such, in 

 the author's opinion, and in the opinion, he 

 trusts, of all right-thinking persons, to place 

 bej'ond cavil the rightfulness of the claim which 

 Reis himself put forward of being the inventor 

 of the Telephone." But did any one ever dis- 

 pute this claim during his life? and has the 

 author forgotten that no possible basis for a 

 rival claim existed until more than two years 



after Reis's death? — unless we except the 

 suggestions of Bourseul, in 1854, which, while 

 they certainlj' did anticipate the general idea 

 of Reis's invention, were never carried to the 

 stage of experiment, and were never set up in 

 opposition to him, unless it has been done 

 recentl}'. The author can hardly have been 

 ignorant of these suggestions ; but, if not, he 

 has carefull}- refrained from mentioning them. 

 Reis never claimed that no new principle could 

 ever be discovered which would enable the 

 ends he sought to be attained in a different waj-, 

 and more perfectly'. His first article upon the 

 subject ends with these words: "There may 

 probably remain much more yet to be done for 

 the utilization of the telephone in practice. 

 For phj'sics, however, it has already' sufficient 

 interest in that it has opened out a new field 

 of labor." And Von Legat closes his report 

 with this remark: "There remains no doubt, 

 that, before expecting a practical utilization 

 with serviceable results, that which has been 

 spoken of will require still considerable im- 

 provement, and, in particular, mechanical sci- 

 ence must complete the apparatus to be used." 

 The chief aim of the book is clearlj* this, — 

 to endeavor, in direct opposition to the facts, to 

 establish the untenable proposition that the 

 Reis transmitter was designedlj' contrived b^- 

 him to vary the contact-resistance bj' pressure, 

 giving it a microphonic action, failure to ac- 

 complish which is fatal to its success in con- 

 vej'ing spoken words. Professor Thompson 

 has not always been of this opinion, and in 

 another place he has given a correct account 

 of the relation of Reis's invention to that of 

 Bell. In his ' Elementary lessons in electricity 

 and magnetism,' published in 1881, we find, on 

 pp. 405 and 406, these words, — "The first 

 attempt to transmit sounds electrical!}- was 

 made in 1852 [misprint for 1862] by Reis, who 

 succeeded in conveying musical tones bj' an 

 imperfect telephone. The transmitting part 

 of Reis's telephone consisted of a battery and 

 a contact-breaker, the latter being formed of a 

 stretched membrane, capable of taking up 

 sonorous vibrations, and having attached to it 

 a thin strip of platinum, which, as it vibrated, 

 beat to and fro against the tip of a platinum 

 wire, so making and breaking contact. . . . 

 Reis also transmitted speech with this instru- 

 ment, but very imperfectlj-, for the tones of 

 speech cannot be transmitted by abrupt inter- 

 ruptions of the current. . . . In 1876 Graham 

 Bell invented the articulating telephone. In 

 this instrument the speaker talks to an elastic 

 disk of thin sheet-iron, which vibrates, and 

 transmits its every movement electrically to a 



