TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES, ' 439 



teing "induced" in the telephone wire by the electricity in telegraph wires, and 

 Mr. Preece conceived the idea that as induction takes place sometimes in wires 

 'which are several miles apart, use might be made of this property to dispense 

 with wires in certain cases. The purpose of wires is to carry the electric current 

 but if the current were ready to travel of its own accord without wires the 

 saving in maintaining telegraphic communications would be very great. 



This idea, however, is not a novel one. At the meeting of the British Asso- 

 ciation, held in Aberdeen, in 1859, the late Mr. J. B. Lindsay, of Dundee, read 

 a paper, in which he described experiments almost as extensive and precisely the 

 same in their method as that explained by Mr. Preece at Southampton the other 

 day, In the days when our achievements with electricity are deemed so consid- 

 erable, the humbler efforts of Mr. Lindsay are apt to be forgotten. There is no 

 doubt, however, that he foresaw much that has only been accomplished within 

 the last few years. His inventive faculty was keen, and he possessed the energy 

 and perseverance, though unfortunately not always the resources, to work out his 

 inventions. His studious disposition was remarkable, and if his talents had been 

 developed in a sphere more suitable for them than the banks of the Tay, his 

 name might have become famous in the annals of science. His prescience is ex- 

 hibited in the following paragraph, which is taken from the Dundee Advertiser of 

 August 7, 1835. It describes all the virtues of the electric light with as great 

 completeness as though it had been written of a discovery by Edison or Swan : 



"Mr. Lindsay, a teacher in town, formerly a lecturer to the Watt Institu- 

 tion, succeeded, on the evening of Saturday, the 25th ult., in obtaining a con- 

 stant electric light. It is upward of two years since he turned his attention to 

 the subject, but much of that time has been devoted to other vocations. The 

 light, in beauty, surpasses all others, has no smell, emits no smoke, is incapable 

 of explosion, and not requiring air, can be kept in sealed glass jars. It ignites 

 without the aid of a taper, and seems pecuharly adapted for flax houses, spinning 

 mills, and other places containing combustible materials. It can be sent to any 

 convenient distance, and the apparatus for producing it may be contained in a 

 common chest." 



In 1836, Mr. Lindsay lectured on the electric light, and stateS that as early 

 as 1 83 1 he had turned his attention to the subject. In a letter published by him 

 in 1845 ^6 suggested the possibility of laying an electric cable across the Atlantic, 

 .a dozen years before the project was seriously entertained. Afterward he devel- 

 oped a scheme for telegraphijng across oceans without cables. He lectured at 

 Glasgow, in 1853, on his theory of forming an electric communication between 

 Great Britain and other countries without the employment of submarine wires, 

 and the cost of such communication to America he calculated to be ;^6o,ooo. 

 A patent for his scheme was taken out in 1854, and several experiments were 

 made by him at different places. The following paragraph appeared in the Dun- 

 dee Advertiser of May 20, 1859 : 



" Electric Telegraphing Across the Tay without Wires. — We have 

 received the following note from Mr. J. B. Lindsay, reporting progress with his 



