of Duplex Telegraphy, 121 



electrical condition of the lines, as well as the perfection of the 

 instruments and the professional education of the staff, would 

 have fully admitted of the successful introduction of duplex 

 telegraphy at least ten, if not twenty, years ago. 



It is true indeed that the suggestion of using condensers for 

 balancing the charge and discharge of a line has only been made 

 very lately, being one of Stearns's happy ideas ; but this should 

 have been no reason against introducing the system on short 

 and overworked lines, where the charge and discharge is imper- 

 ceptible. If only one telegraph-administration had shown the 

 perfect practicability of the system on a short line, the cloud 

 of prejudice would have been dissipated, and suggestions for 

 overcoming the charge and discharge on long overland lines 

 and submarine cables would have been readily enough given, 

 and thereby large capitals saved. 



To sum up, therefore, we have the following causes which 

 acted persistently against the introduction of duplex telegraphy. 



.First, the invention was in advance of the age. 



Secondly, the telegraph profession, young as it is, is far more 

 conservative than is good for the advance of telegraphy ; and, 

 on the whole, telegraph-administrations and staffs have by no 

 means that professional education which is required to conduct 

 practical experiments with a clear understanding, and thence 

 deduce rational conclusions. Thus prejudice was created, which 

 was increased from year to year by authors of school literature 

 writing most discouragingly on the subject. 



Thirdly, unfortunately during all that time no physicist found 

 it worth his while to investigate the duplex methods with a view 

 to ascertain quantitatively what can be expected of them, and 

 how they actually compare, with respect to safety, with single 

 working. 



Fourthly, duplex working itself could not progress, because 

 it was neither tried nor investigated, and hence no sugges- 

 tions for overcoming the difficulty of charge and discharge 

 were called for. 



Great honour must therefore be given to Mr. Stearns, who 

 brought up the subject again so prominently, and who by his 

 zeal succeeded in introducing it on a large scale, and so elevated 

 the ingenious methods from the questionable position of "inter- 

 esting scientific experiments." 



I think far less of his idea of introducing condensers or 

 lluhmkorfFs coils to balance the charge and discharge of lines, 

 than of his having taken the neglected child up again against 

 the prejudice of his own profession, and shown that it could 

 have a healthy existence even in the backwoods of America. 

 I trust that these remarks will not be considered irrelevant in 



