The Story of Electricity

long cable, the instruments for sending and receiving the messages are different from those employed on a land line. A cable is virtually a Leyden jar or condenser, and the signal currents in the wire induce opposite currents in the water or earth. As these charges hold each other the signals are retarded in their progress, and altered from sharp sudden jets to lagging undulations or waves, which tend to run together or coalesce. The result is that the separate signal currents which enter a long cable issue from it at the other end in one continuous current, with pulsations at every signal, that is to say, in a lapsing stream, like a jet of water flowing from a constricted spout. The receiving instrument must be sufficiently delicate to manifest every pulsation of the current. Its indicator, in fact, must respond to every rise and fall of the current, as a float rides on the ripples of a stream. Such an instrument is the beautiful "mirror" galvanometer of Lord Kelvin, Ex-President of the Royal Society, which we illustrate in figure 52, where C is a coil of wire with a small magnetic needle suspended in its heart, and D is a steel magnet supported over it. The needle (M figure 53) is made of watch spring cemented to the back of a tiny mirror the size of a half-dime which is hung by a single fibre of floss silk inside an air cell or chamber with a glass lens G in front, and the coil C surrounds it. A ray of light from a lamp L (figure 52) falls on the mirror, and is reflected back to a scale S, on which it makes a bright spot. Now, when the coil C is connected between the end of the cable and the earth, the signal current passing through it causes the tiny magnet to swing from side to side, and the mirror moving with it throws the beam up and down the scale. The operator sitting by watches the spot of light as it flits and flickers like a fire-fly in the darkness, and spells out the mysterious message. A condenser joined in the circuit between the cable and the receiver, or between the receiver and the earth, has the effect of sharpening the waves of the current, and consequently of the signals. The double-current key, which reverses the poles of the battery and allows the signal currents to be of one length, that is to say, all "dots," is employed to send the message. Another receiving instrument employed on most of the longer cables is the siphon recorder of Lord Kelvin, shown in figure 54, which marks or writes the message on a slip of travelling paper. Essentially it is the inverse of the mirror instrument, and consists of a light coil of wire S suspended in the field between the poles of a strong magnet M. The coil is attached to a fine siphon (T5) filled with ink, and sometimes kept in vibration by an induction coil so as to shake the ink in fine drops upon a slip of moving paper. The coil is connected between the cable and the earth, and, as the signal current passes through, it swings to one side or the other, pulling the siphon with it. The ink, therefore, marks a wavy line on the paper, which is in fact a delineation of the rise and fall of the signal current and a record of the message. The dots in this case are represented by the waves above, and the "dashes" by the waves below the middle line, as may be seen in the following alphabet, which is a copy of one actually written by the recorder on a long submarine cable. Owing to induction, the speed of signalling on long cables is much slower than on land lines of the same length, and only reaches from 25 to 45 words a minute on the Atlantic cables, or 30 to 50 words with an automatic sending-key; but this rate is practically doubled by employing the Muirhead duplex system of sending two messages, one from each end, at the same time. The relation of the telegraph to the telephone is analogous to that of the lower animals and man. In a telegraph circuit, with its clicking key at one end and its chattering sounder at the other, we have, in fact, an apish forerunner of the exquisite telephone, with its mysterious microphone and oracular plate. Nevertheless, the telephone descended from the telegraph in a very indirect manner, if at all, and certainly not through the sounder. The first practical suggestion of an electric telephone was made by M. Charles Bourseul, a French telegraphist, in 1854, but to all appearance nothing came of it. In 1860, however, Philipp Reis, a German schoolmaster, constructed a rudimentary telephone, by which music and a few spoken words were sent. Finally, in 1876, Mr. Alexander Graham Bell, a Scotchman, residing in Canada, and subsequently in the United States, exhibited a capable speaking telephone of his invention at the Centennial Exhibition, Philadelphia. Figure 56 represents an outside view and section of the Bell telephone as it is now made, where M is a bar magnet having a small bobbin or coil of fine insulated wire C girdling one pole. In front of this coil there is a circular plate of soft iron capable of vibrating like a diaphragm or the drum of the ear. A cover shaped like a mouthpiece O fixes the diaphragm all round, and the wires W W serve to connect the coil in the circuit. The soft iron diaphragm is, of course, magnetised by the induction of the pole, and would be attracted bodily to the pole were it not fixed by the rim, so that only its middle is free to move. Now, when a person speaks into the mouthpiece the sonorous waves impinge on the diaphragm and make it vibrate in sympathy with them. Being magnetic, the movement of the diaphragm to and from the bobbin excites corresponding waves of electricity in the coil, after the famous experiment of Faraday (page 64). If this undulatory current is passed through the coil of a similar telephone at the far end of the line, it will, by a reverse action, set the diaphragm in vibration and reproduce the original sonorous waves. The result is, that when another person listens at the mouthpiece of the receiving telephone, he will hear a faithful imitation of the original speech. The Bell telephone is virtually a small magneto-electric generator of electricity, and when two are joined in circuit we have a system for the transmission of energy. As the voice is the motive power, its talk, though distinct, is comparatively feeble, and further improvements were made before the telephone became as serviceable as it is now. Edison, in 1877, was the first to invent a working telephone, which, instead of generating the current, merely controlled the strength of it, as the sluice of a mill-dam regulates the flow of water in the lead. Du Moncel had observed that powder of carbon altered in electrical resistance under pressure, and Edison found that lamp-black was so sensitive as to change in resistance under the impact of the sonorous waves. His transmitter consisted of a button or wafer of lamp-black behind a diaphragm, and connected in the circuit. On speaking to the diaphragm the sonorous waves pressed it against the button, and so varied the strength of the current in a sympathetic manner. The receiver of Edison was equally ingenious, and consisted of a cylinder of prepared chalk kept in rotation and a brass stylus rubbing on it. When the undulatory current passed from the stylus to the chalk, the stylus slipped on the surface, and, being connected to a diaphragm, made it vibrate and repeat the original sounds. This "electro- motograph" receiver was, however, given up, and a combination of the Edison transmitter and the Bell receiver came into use. At the end of 1877 Professor D. E. Hughes, a distinguished Welshman, inventor of the printing telegraph, discovered that any loose contact between two conductors had the property of transmitting sounds by varying the strength of an electric current passing through it. Two pieces of metal—for instance, two nails or ends of wire—when brought into a loose or crazy contact under a slight pressure, and traversed by a current, will transmit speech. Two pieces of hard carbon are still better than metals, and if properly adjusted will make the tread of a fly quite audible in a telephone connected with them. Such is the famous "microphone," by which a faint sound can be magnified to the ear. Figure 57 represents what is known as the "pencil" microphone, in which M is a pointed rod of hard carbon, delicately poised between two brackets of carbon, which are connected in circuit with a battery B and a Bell telephone T. The joints of rod and bracket are so sensitive that the current flowing across them is affected in strength by the slightest vibration, even the walking of an insect. If, therefore, we speak near this microphone, the sonorous waves, causing the pencil to vibrate, will so vary the current in accordance with them as to reproduce the sounds of the voice in the telephone. The true nature of the microphone is not yet known, but it is evident that the air or ether between the surfaces in contact plays an important part in varying the resistance, and, therefore, the current. In fact, a small "voltaic arc," not luminous, but dark, seems to be formed between the points, and the vibrations probably alter its length, and, consequently, its resistance. The fact that a microphone is reversible and can act as a receiver, though a poor one, tends to confirm this theory. Moreover, it is not unlikely that the slipping of the stylus in the electromotograph is due to a similar cause. Be this as it may, there can be no doubt that carbon powder and the lamp-black of the Edison button are essentially a cluster of microphones. Many varieties of the Hughes microphone under different names are now employed as transmitters in connection with the Bell telephone. Figure 58 represents a simple micro-telephone circuit, where M is the Hughes microphone transmitter, T the Bell telephone receiver, JB the battery, and E E the earth-plates; but sometimes a return wire is used in place of the "earth." The line wire is usually of copper and its alloys, which are more suitable than iron, especially for long distances. Just as the signal currents in a submarine cable induce corresponding currents in the sea water which retard them, so the currents in a land wire induce corresponding currents in the earth, but in aerial lines the earth is generally so far away that the consequent retardation is negligible except in fast working on long lines. The Bell telephone, however, is extremely sensitive, and this induction affects it so much that a conversation through one wire can be overheard on a neighbouring wire. Moreover, there is such a thing as "self-induction" in a wire—that is to say, a current in a wire tends to induce an opposite current in the same wire, which is practically equivalent to an increase of resistance in the wire. It is particularly observed at the starting and stopping of a current, and gives rise to what is called the "extra-spark" seen in breaking the circuit of an induction coil. It is also active in the vibratory currents of the telephone, and, like ordinary induction, tends to retard their passage. Copper being less susceptible of self-induction than iron, is preferred for trunk lines. The disturbing effect of ordinary induction is avoided by using a return wire or loop circuit, and crossing the going and coming wires so as to make them exchange places at intervals. Moreover, it is found that an induction coil in the telephone circuit, like a condenser in the cable circuit, improves the working, and hence