Multiplex Telegraphy and "Phantom" most original feature of the tele graph section of the Paris exhibition of 1878 was the harmonic telegraph of Haskins and Gray, based on principles laid down by Cromwell Varley in 1870. In one application it occupies a place midway between duplex and multiplex telegrapby, namely in the "way duplex," or as it was felicitously termed by the late Mr. Orton, the "phantok circuit." A wire may be occupied by the ordinary business of a series of intermediate offices, while there may be superimposed on that a through traffic (which can be duplexed) between the terminal stations. Thus between Chicago and Dubuque, a wire provides for 17 intermediate stations, working ordinary Morse sounders, while the har monic telegraph (the principle of whose action is vibratory currents sent and received by musical forks tuned in unison) works between the terminals. By an extension of this principle we have the multiplex telegraph, each fork taking off at the receiving end those vibrations corresponding to its own tone.
The Electric Pen.—Amid many endeavors to introduce an autographic telegraph that of Cowper, made public in 1879, is the most successful. It has the drawback of requir ing two wires, but is so beautiful in its action as to deserve notice here. Two series of resistances are ranged like the letter L, one series affected by lateral, the other by the up-and-down motion of the sender's pen. At the other end a siphon recorder moves in accordance with the currents thus sent, giving on a moving slip of paper an exact fac simile of the writing or other marks of the person sending the message.
Statistics.—In Great Britain the first public introduction of telegraphy was made in 1846 by the Electric and International Telegraph co. Subsequently the British and Irish Magnetic co. was established, and afterward the United Kingdom co., the last named being started on the footing of a low uniform rate, but eventually yielding to the oppo sition of the other companies, and adopting a sliding scale of rates. The charges were from ls. to 6s.,. according to distance, for a message of 20 words. Besides these com panies, •there were. the London District co., the Universal Private Telegraph co. (which established a series of public telegraphs, connecting Glasgow with places on the w. coast of Scotland), and a large number of railway companies, carrying messages between their own stations, besides acting as agents to collect business for the other companies. In 1868 and 1869, after some agitation of the question, acts were passed transferring the property of the telegraph companies to the post-office, and giving that department a monopoly in the conduct of telegraph business within the kingdom. The task set before the post-office was to reduce and simplify the charges, to separate entirely the public wires from wires used for railway purposes, to extend ;he telegraph to outlying places and to business parts of towns, and to establish free trade in press telegraphy—the meaning of the latter being that, instead of collecting and supplying news as the com panies had done, the department should only arrange to transmit news, at specified rates, for all comers, leaving the newspapers to make their own arrangements for obtain ing information. The great progress of telegraphy in the hands of the postal telegraphs department is one of social features of the time. Including a large number of new offices prepared for opening on the occasion, the post-office started in 1870 with 1007 telegraph stations, to which about 1900 railway stations receiving ::.2ssages on behalf of the department fall to be added. In 1878 the number of offices belonging to the post office was 3,756, making, when the railway stations are added, a total of 5,311 offices. It appears, however, that the railway offices only take in from the public 7 per cent of the messages sent. The mileage of wire under charge of the postal telegraphs depart ment, and exclusively devoted to public business, in 1878, was 107,353, with 5,980 m. of
private wires, for which rents are paid to the department. The number of messages before 1870 was estimated as reaching 6,000,000 annually, and the following gives the totals for three years since the telegraphs passed into the hands of the post-office: These statistics show that the growth of business had been so large as to raise the weekly average over the whole number of offices, the closing of many small railway sta tions also helping this result. So far as the cost to the public is concerned, it is shown that, while under the regime of the companies the cost per message averaged 2s. ltd., the cost under the post-office reaches an average of under ls. ld. per message. Writing in May, 1872, Mr. Scudamore, under whose direction the transfer and extension of the tele graph system was conducted, says: "If the messages of the current financial year were to be paid for at the old tariff, they would cost the senders at least £400,000 more than they will cost." The revenue for 1877-78 was £1,333,542, including in this private-wire rentals, newspaper special wires, etc. The capital invested in the undertaking amounts to about ten millions sterling. The cost of working in 1877-78 was £1,164,131: the staff con sisting of 406 persons in the central control of the system (secretary's and accounting of fices); 650 in the engineering department (for maintenance and extension of the system); a staff of 1770 in the central office at London; and the services of postmasters, telegraphists, etc., throughout the kingdom, making a total of above 11,400 persons engaged in the service. Of these, 4,981 were messengers engaged in the delivery of messages, the larger portion of whom were supplied with uniform. In addition to electric means of communication, the post-office uses pneumatic tubes in London and other cities to con nect the larger branch offices with the principal station in each case. As those tubes, although forming an interesting branch of the apparatus, are not, strictly speaking, electrical, we must refer to other sources for information as to their construction, mode of working, power used, etc. The result of the transfer from private hands to the con trol of the government may be summed up in saying that for efficiency, comprehensive ness, and public appreciation, the telegraph system in Great Britain is now second to none in the world. The continent of Europe forms one vast net-work of tele graph lines. By means of submarine cables (as afterward noticed), the offices in this country are connected with all the four continents, while recent exten sions have brought the Australian colonies also into connection with the other sections of the globe. While each kingdom fixes its own internal tariffs and regulations, the rules for the interchange and transmission of telegraph messages between the various countries of the world are regulated by telegraph conventions agreed to at Paris, Vienna, Rome, St. Petersburg, and London (the last named being held in 1879); and all official intimations in connection with international telegraphy are issued from a central bureau in Berne, Switzerland. To the mountain republic the world is indebted, not only for the example of an excellent and cheap internal system, but for the suggestion of this central administration, where all international matters are con ducted. In France and Belgium internal telegraph arrangements are complete and cheap; while the United States for many years held a place far in advance of other countries in the ordinary every-day use of its great telegraph organizations. Perhaps the most striking instance of telegraph enterprise is that by which the daily newspapers of San Francisco are enabled to give, by means of a line of telegraph carried over the Rocky mountains (on the line of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific rail roads), not only the news from New York, but the parliamentary news from London, the prices of all the continental exchanges, and quotations from Calcutta and China of the previous day.