154 VERY SIMPLE TEL£C&APH. 



V. 



Defcription of a very fimple TeUgraph, conjifiing of the Human 

 Figure adapted to converfe at a Dijiance by means of Signs *. 



Preliminary ob- /\mONG the great advantages of which thofe who do not 

 enjoy fight are deprived, we may reckon telegraphy, which 

 it would be difficult to fupply by another fenfe. Such an art 

 for the ufe of the blind would doubllefs be very iraperfed. On 

 the contrary, the advantages which it affords to thofe who en* 

 joy light, appear to me to be fo important, that it ought to be ren- 

 dered more general, and brought within the reach of all men. 

 For this purpofe I have offered fome notions on the fubjeft. I 

 do not pretend either to be the firft, or the only one who has 

 entertained them: I even believe the contrary; and, in this 

 inftance, they will have that in common with telegraphy in 

 general, which, though new in its execution, was not fo in its 

 invention f . 



* From a fmall pamphlet in French, extrafted from Memoires 

 fur les A'veugleSy Sec. 



t It Is not extraordinary that the fame invention (hould have 

 been thought of by feveral perfons. Thus the notion of telegraphy 

 may be found in the preface to one of the German works of the ce- 

 lebrated Chr. Louis Hoffman, a native of Rheda, and phyfician to 

 the Eleftor of Mentz, which, however, does not leffen the merit of 

 the French inventor. A defcription of the telegraph invented and 

 executed by Citizen Chappe, is found in the interefting work of 

 Mr. Meyer, intituled, Fragmente aus Paris, im. IV ten J^ahr der 

 Franzce/icljen Republik ; Hamburg, 1797. The author, who was in 

 the telegraph office at the Louvre with Cit. Chappe, affirms, that the 

 latter had made his difcovery before the revolution, that he commu- 

 nicated it to the National Affembly in 1792, and that the Conven- 

 tion, on the report of Lakanal, decreed, July 25, 1793, the efta- 

 b'.ifliment of a telegraphic correfpondence, under the dire6lion of 

 Citizen Chappe, as telegraphic engineer. A notion may be formed 

 of the rapidity of the telegraphic correfpondence, by the following 

 example, of which Mr. Meyer was a witnefs. He fays, that 

 during his prefence in the office at the Louvre, and at theappomted 

 hour in the evening, enquiry was made of the office at Lille, by a 

 fingle fignal, if any thing new had happened in the army of the 

 north, and the anfwcr, no, was received in 88 feconds. 



4- Perfuaded 



