the gods, beckoning to victory. When the phosphorescent light, which the sailors still call St. Elmo's fire, hovered on the masts and spars of the Roman ship, it was Castor and Pollux, twin gods of the sea, guiding the mariner to port, or the beacon of an avenging god luring him to death.

When we consider the startling forms in which this element presents itself, it is not surprising that so many centuries elapsed before man dared to confront and question its awful mystery. And it was fitting that here, in this new, free world, the first answer came, revealing to our Franklin the great truth, that the lightning of the sky and the electricity of the laboratory are one, that in the simple electric toy are embodied all the mysteries of the thunderbolt.

Until near the beginning of the present century, the only known method of producing electricity was by friction. But the discoveries of Galvani in 1789, and of Volta in 1800, resulted in the production of electricity by the chemical action of acids upon metals, and gave to the world the galvanic battery, the voltaic pile, and the electric current. This was the first step in that path of modern discovery which led to the telegraph. But further discoveries were necessary to make the telegraph possible. The next great step was taken by Oersted, the Swedish Professor, who, in 1819-20, made the discovery that the needle, when placed near the galvanic battery, was deflected at right angles to the electric current. In the four modest pages in which Oersted announced this discovery to the world, the science of electro-magnetism was founded. As Franklin had exhibited the relation between lightning and the electric fluid, so Oersted exhibited the relation between magnetism and electricity. From 1820 to 1825 his discovery was further developed by Davy and Sturgeon of England, and Arago and Ampère of France. They found that, by sending a current of electricity through a wire coiled around a piece of soft iron, the iron became a magnet while the current was passing, and ceased to be a magnet when the current was broken. This gave an intermittent power, a power to grapple and to let go, at the will of the electrician. Ampère suggested that a telegraph was possible by applying this power to a needle. In 1825 Barlow of England made experiments to verify this suggestion of the telegraph, and pronounced it impracticable on the ground that the batteries then used would not send the fluid

through even two hundred feet of wire without a sensible diminution of its force. In 1831 Joseph Henry, now Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, then a Professor at Albany, New York, as the result of numerous experiments, discovered a method by which he produced a battery of such intensity as to overcome the difficulty spoken of by Barlow in 1825. By means of this discovery, he magnetized soft iron at a great distance from the battery, pointed out the fact that a telegraph was possible, and actually rang a bell by means of the electromagnet acting on a long wire. This was the last step in the series of great discoveries which preceded the invention of the telegraph.

When these discoveries ended, the work of the inventor began. It was in 1832, the year that succeded the last of these great discoveries, when Professor Morse first turned his thoughts to that work whose triumph is the triumph of his race. He had devoted twenty-two years of his manhood to the study and practice of art. He had sat at the feet of the great masters of Europe, and had already, by his own works of art, achieved a noble name; and he now turned to the grander work of interpreting to the world that subtle and mysterious element with which the thinkers of the human race had so long been occupied.

I cannot here recount the story of that long struggle through which he passed to the accomplishment of his great result; how he struggled with poverty, with the vast difficulties of the subject itself, with the unfaith, the indifference, and the contempt which almost everywhere confronted him; how, at the very moment of his triumph, he was on the verge of despair, when in this very Capitol his project met the jeers of almost a majority of the national legislature. But when has despair yielded to such a triumph? When has such a morning risen on such a night? To all cavillers and doubters this instrument and its language are a triumphant answer. That chainless spirit which fills the immensity of space with its invisible presence, which dwells in the blaze of the sun, follows the path of the farthest star, and courses the depths of earth and sea, that mighty spirit has at last yielded to the human will. It has entered a body prepared for its dwelling. It has found a voice through which it speaks to the human ear. It has taken its place as the humble servant of man; and through all coming

time its work will be associated with the name and fame of Samuel F. B. Morse.

Were there no other proof of the present value of his work, these alone would suffice, that throughout the world, whatever the language or the dialect of those who use it, the telegraph speaks a language whose first element is the alphabet of Morse; and in 1869, of the sixteen thousand telegraphic instruments used on the lines of Europe, thirteen thousand were of the pattern invented by him. The future of this great achievement can be measured by no known standards. Morse gave us the instrument and the alphabet. The world is only beginning to spell out the lesson, whose meaning the future will read.

THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1872.

SPEECH DELIVERED AT WARREN, OHIO.

JULY 31, 1872.

TOWARDS the close of President Grant's first administration, a considerable disaffection appeared in the Republican party. This culminated in the nomination for the Presidency, at Cincinnati, in June, 1872, of Horace Greeley, by a so-called Liberal-Republican Convention, and also by the National Democratic Convention at Baltimore in July following. The Republicans renominated President Grant. The following is the speech in which Mr. Garfield opened the campaign, delivered before the Convention of the Nineteenth Congressional District, which had just nominated him for the sixth time to the House of Representatives.

G

ENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION AND FELLOW-CITIZENS, I should do injustice to myself if I did not in the strongest terms express my gratitude and my gratification for this renewed proof of your confidence and approval in unanimously nominating me to represent this district in the Forty-third Congress. Ten years ago, while I was with the army in the field, you first chose me as your Representative in Congress. The period. which has elapsed since then has been filled with events of the most important and startling character. The problems which have confronted the national legislature have been of more than ordinary difficulty; but through them all I have enjoyed the benefit of your counsels and have felt the strength of your constant support. You have never asked me to be the mere echo of the party voice, or the unquestioning follower of party policy. Few Congressional districts have a nobler record than this. With no city in its limits large enough to attract those elements which corrupt and poison the fountains of political power; with a population equally removed from distressing poverty and from

that excess of wealth which sometimes brings with it a disregard of the rights and interests of others; with a high average of intelligence, and habits of reading and independently judging of public affairs, - the people of this district, for more than half a century, have held and expressed bold and independent opinions on all public questions. During that whole period they have supported and defended their representative in maintaining an independent position in the national legislature, and whenever he has acted with honest and intelligent courage in the interests of truth, they have generously sustained him, even when he has differed from them in minor matters of opinion and policy. Another circumstance is also worthy of notice. There is in this district no one great interest which overshadows all others, and compels its representative to become the special advocate of one interest to the neglect of all others. This is a national constituency. That course of legislation and administration which will best subserve the interests of the whole country will also best subserve the interests of the people of this district.

You can hardly realize what confidence and strength it gives a representative to know that he has such a district behind him. It enables him to aid in maintaining for the national legislature that position of independent judgment which holds undisturbed the balance of power between the co-ordinate branches of the government. It is not in accordance with the spirit of our government that representatives should be chosen on the merits or demerits of the President, or of any party leader, nor should an Executive be chosen to share his powers with members of Congress. It was the anxious care of the founders of this republic that the co-ordinate branches of the government should each, as far as possible, be independent in its own sphere. The independence of the legislature depends upon the independent action of its members, and that in turn upon the independent character and spirit of the people who choose them. The discussion of this topic leads me to consider a subject which at the present moment occupies the front rank in national questions, and on which much will be said on both sides during the coming campaign; I allude to the reform in our civil service.

No man whose vision is not utterly blinded by partisan feeling will deny that our civil service has fallen far below the high place which the founders intended it should occupy; and it is