d with characteristic insight the underlying
principles of the great and comprehensive problem he had started out
to solve, and plodded steadily along the path that he had marked out,
ignoring the almost universal scientific disbelief in his ultimate
success. "Dreamer," "fool," "boaster" were among the appellations
bestowed upon him by unbelieving critics. Ridicule was heaped upon
him in the public prints, and mathematics were called into service
by learned men to settle the point forever that he was attempting the
utterly impossible.

But, presto! no sooner had he accomplished the task and shown concrete
results to the world than he found himself in the anomalous position
of being at once surrounded by the conditions which inevitably confront
every inventor. The path through the trackless forest had been blazed,
and now every one could find the way. At the end of the road was a rich
prize belonging rightfully to the man who had opened a way to it, but
the struggles of others to reach it by more or less honest methods now
began and continued for many years. If, as a former commissioner once
said, "Edison was the man who kept the path to the Patent Office
hot with his footsteps," there were other great inventors abreast or
immediately on his heels, some, to be sure, with legitimate, original
methods and vital improvements representing independent work; while
there were also those who did not trouble to invent, but simply helped
themselves to whatever ideas were available, and coming from any source.

Possibly events might have happened differently had Edison been able to
prevent the announcement of his electric-light inventions until he
was entirely prepared to bring out the system as a whole, ready for
commercial exploitation, but the news of his production of a practical
and successful incandescent lamp became known and spread like wild-fire
to all corners of the globe. It took more than a year after the
evolution of the lamp for Edison to get into position to do actual
business, and during that time his laboratory was the natural Mecca of
every inquiring person. Small wonder, then, that when he was prepared to
market his invention he should find others entering that market, at
home and abroad, at the same time, and with substantially similar
merchandise.

Edison narrates two incidents that may be taken as characteristic of
a good deal that had to be contended with, coming in the shape of
nefarious attack. "In the e