ice of
gold; but as its quotations changed from instant to instant, it was in
a most literal sense "the cynosure of neighboring eyes." One indicator
looked upon the Gold Room; the other opened toward the street. Within
the exchange the face could easily be seen high up on the west wall of
the room, and the machine was operated by Mr. Mersereau, the official
registrar of the Gold Board.

Doctor Laws, who afterward became President of the State University of
Missouri, was an inventor of unusual ability and attainments. In
his early youth he had earned his livelihood in a tool factory; and,
apparently with his savings, he went to Princeton, where he studied
electricity under no less a teacher than the famous Joseph Henry. At the
outbreak of the war in 1861 he was president of one of the Presbyterian
synodical colleges in the South, whose buildings passed into the hands
of the Government. Going to Europe, he returned to New York in 1863,
and, becoming interested with a relative in financial matters, his
connection with the Gold Exchange soon followed, when it was organized.
The indicating mechanism he now devised was electrical, controlled at
central by two circuit-closing keys, and was a prototype of all the
later and modern step-by-step printing telegraphs, upon which the
distribution of financial news depends. The "fraction" drum of the
indicator could be driven in either direction, known as the advance and
retrograde movements, and was divided and marked in eighths. It geared
into a "unit" drum, just as do speed-indicators and cyclometers. Four
electrical pulsations were required to move the drum the distance
between the fractions. The general operation was simple, and in
normally active times the mechanism and the registrar were equal to all
emergencies. But it is obvious that the record had to be carried away
to the brokers' offices and other places by messengers; and the delay,
confusion, and mistakes soon suggested to Doctor Laws the desirability
of having a number of indicators at such scattered points, operated by a
master transmitter, and dispensing with the regiments of noisy boys.
He secured this privilege of distribution, and, resigning from the
exchange, devoted his exclusive attention to the "Gold Reporting
Telegraph," which he patented, and for which, at the end of 1866, he had
secured fifty subscribers. His indicators were small oblong boxes, in
the front of which was a long slot, allowing the dials as the