bitterness preyed upon the money lenders, who continually cursed those who had borrowed foolishly.

The period extending from the building of the stations to the quarrel with the bankers is called the first stage of wireless telegraphy.

* *

At the end of the third year of the wireless company-which was the beginning of the year nineteen hundred and seventeen-the money lenders went to the director who was the company spokesman and said:

"Our hope is growing cold in our hearts and our faith in your promise is as the leaves which wither and die in the frost and fall away. Do not try to deceive us any further, but tell us when we may expect the profits which you told us would be paid from the beginning."

"It is for you, and not me, to judge," he answered, "when you know the facts. When you compelled us to pay you

ST. PAUL'S, LONDON

the interest money, we were forced to make the most of all our resources. We then realized that our electric waves extended as far back over the land as they reached out over the sea. It is upon the land where men think most and speak oftenest. It was from the land that we sought our revenue. We still tell of the ships in distress, but today we inform New York of the weather in California and California of the market for fruit in New York.

"As an individual, I wish your oldstyled telegraph company well. As director of its competitor, I must consider other things. With one station at either side of the continent, conducted by but one set of operators, we can send

A LANDING PLACE

does not, of itself, create messages to be sent." Then he said boldly to the money lenders:

"We have bought the plow and leased the land. We must run the furrow. The people know that we have cheapened the rates on messages across the continent. They are demanding that we do the same in the interior. If we should say to them: 'We cannot do what you ask because it would interfere with the investments of the bankers in telegraph lines,' they would say to us: 'You have formed a trust and the Government will crush you both.' Having said that, the Government would confiscate both properties, for the new law lays such a penalty upon monopoly. Then what would become of your investment ?"

ers lost patience. querulous speech.

They broke forth in

"Have we not told you," they said, "that we have lent money also to the telegraph lines? Do you not see that when you take business and profit from them and add it to your own, you take the profit from us in one place and return it to us from another place? What we ask of you is new business and new profit. Are you so slow-witted you cannot find a new use for a new tool?"

The director resented the criticism, for he knew it was unjust. He said to himself:

"A new method of carrying messages

When the money lenders had heard and understood, they loaned another five million dollars to put up stations which extended from New York to San Francisco to serve the larger cities.

The time between the quarrel with the bankers and the beginning of competition

the end of nineteen hundred and twentysix-there arose another perplexity. In the eighth year, the men who lend money in America went to the director and said:

"To own a hoe does not force one to

dig with it. Because you have built wireless telegraph stations, does not signify that you must solicit business vigorously. If you wish to serve us, you will appoint, as your local managers, men who are lazy. If they fail to take business away from the old telegraph companies, no blame can attach to us or to you. If the Government should come to you inquiring why, you could say that from the revenues arising from low rates, you have not enough money to hire good men. For that reason, all persons are not aware of the saving you can afford them."

The director, who was much pleased

money lenders were angry and cursed him, saying:

"Is your mind barren, that it cannot think of new things? Are there no places on earth outside of American cities where you may get business and thus make back that which we lose on the business in the interior?"

The director spoke the truth when he said:

"We have had, from the beginning, stations which extend around the world. They are in the islands of the Pacific, in Japan, in India, in Africa, and in South America. We could do there the same as we have done here. We could erect more stations at shorter distances from each other, handle more messages, and thus make the profit which you want, but it would demand more capital."

The money lenders thought for many days upon this recommendation. At the

end of their meditations, they went to the director and said:

"We have heard that in all tropical countries the vegetation grows so rank and the floods are so severe as to make the transmission of messages by wires all but impossible. You who can send You who can send messages over the hills and water and into all places where ether penetrates can transmit messages even through the tropical jungles. Establish your stations in South America, in Africa, and in India and send us the expense bill. We have no investment there. You might, in those places, serve the railroads, which must use the telegraph but cannot now depend upon it."

The director was overjoyed because by this commission he would become a world-power in telegraphy. He dreamed of the power he would wield and of the honors which would come to him. In time, he had finished the new stations and went to ask the bankers to send out representatives to inspect the finished work. But, when he reached the door of the bank, he met a deputation from those who lend money in London, in Paris, in Berlin, and in St. Petersburg. They had crossed the ocean quickly in their airships to say to the money lenders of New York:

"Are we not members of one profession, safeguarding the interests of each other? When you were in need of money, have we ever refused it? Why do you reward our kindness as you have just done? We had spent millions of dollars to keep open the telegraph lines in India, Africa, and Brazil. When the floods and rank vegetation carried away our conduits, or broke down our wires, we spent more money for new ones. Now, when we have spent all we can afford and when our venture is about to return its first profit, your wireless telegraphy comes to pick the fruits for which we planted."

The New York bankers were worried by what they heard, for they knew that the men from Europe spoke the truth.

The period from the building of the stations in the interior to the expansion into the foreign countries is called the third era in the history of wireless telegraphy.

* * *

From the beginning of the fifteenth, to the end of the sixteenth year of the history of wireless telegraphy--which was from the end of nineteen hundred and twenty-six to the end of nineteen hundred and twenty-eight--there arose another development. another development. The director of the company, early in the year nineteen hundred and twenty-seven, went to the money lenders to make his report for the preceding year.

"We prospered last year," he said, "more than we had reason to hope. We increased our business with the ships of the sea. We have added the business of the ships of the air. Africa and South America have patronized us increasingly.

"But a new demand has been made upon us that calls for vast sums of money. From our stations, today, a wireless current radiates for thousands of miles in all directions. Any one who chooses may tune his instruments to our wave lengths and steal all of our messages. One newspaper may steal a dispatch intended for its rival. One business man may, in this way, know the business secrets of his competitor. Outlaws of all descriptions traffic in our messages. For this reason, there is a demand for more secrecy.

"This is a reasonable demand, but to satisfy it, we must purchase the new equipment which but recently has been invented. We must send our electrical currents in straight lines instead of permitting them to radiate in a circle. This calls for new apparatus in all plants. We must install delicately-keyed instruments which will give every man secrecy, even though his next-door neighbor be operating upon the same current. This calls for a new style of instrument. To buy this new outfit will take all of the profits of last year and all we expect to earn for some years to come."

The money lenders only smiled at the misgivings of the director and replied to him:

"Men have confronted such situations since the world began. They have solved them all in the same way. They have put the old profits in their pockets; they have borrowed money with which to buy the new thing, and they have charged rates which would make profitable both