t of the institution said in an injured tone:

"'Mr. Holmes, what is that play toy you have taken the liberty of
putting up out there in the banking room?'

"'Why, that is what they are going to call a telephone,' explained Mr.
Holmes.

"'A telephone! What's a telephone?' inquired the president.

"With enthusiasm the New Yorker carefully sketched in the new invention
and told what could be done with it.

"After he had finished he was greatly astonished to have the head of
the bank reply with scorn:

"'Mr. Holmes, you take that plaything out of my bank and don't ever
take such liberties again.'

"You may be sure the _plaything_ was quickly removed and the Revere
Bank went on record as having the first telephone disconnection in the
country.

"Having exhibited the telephones for a couple of weeks, Mr. Holmes went
to Mr. Hubbard and suggested that he would like to continue to carry on
the exchange but he should like it put on a business basis.

"'Have you any money?' asked Mr. Hubbard.

"'Mighty little,' was the frank answer.

"'Well, that's more than we have got,' Mr. Hubbard responded. 'However,
if you have got enough money to do the business and build the exchange,
we will rent you the telephones.'

"By August, 1877, when Bell's patent was sixteen months' old, Casson's
History tells us there were seven hundred and seventy-eight telephones
in use and the Bell Telephone Association was formed. The organization
was held together by an extremely simple agreement which gave Bell,
Hubbard, and Saunders a three-tenths' interest apiece in the patents
and Watson one-tenth. The business possessed no capital, as there was
none to be had; and these four men at that time had an absolute
monopoly of the telephone business,--and everybody else was quite
willing they should have.

"In addition to these four associates was Charles Williams, who had
from the first been a believer in the venture, and Mr. Holmes who built
the first telephone exchange with his own money, and had about seven
hundred of the seven hundred and seventy-eight instruments on his
wires. Mr. Robert W. Devonshire joined the others in August, 1877, as
bookkeeper and general secretary and has since become an official in
the American Telephone and Telegraph Company.

"Mr. Holmes rented the telephones for ten dollars a year and through
his exchange was the first practical man who had the temerity to offer
telephone service for sale. It was the arrival o