worked as a mechanic, and who had
invented a machine for laying pipes, was chosen to supervise the running
of the line. The conductor was a five-wire cable laid in pipes; but
after several miles had been run from Baltimore to the house intended
for the relay, the insulation broke down. Cornell, it is stated, injured
his machine to furnish an excuse for the stoppage of the work. The
leaders consulted in secret, for failure was staring them in the face.
Some 23,000 dollars of the Government grant were spent, and Mr. Smith,
who had lost his faith in the undertaking, claimed 4000 of the remaining
7000 dollars under his contract for laying the line. A bitter quarrel
arose between him and Morse, which only ended in the grave. He opposed
an additional grant from Government, and Morse, in his dejection,
proposed to let the patent expire, and if the Government would use his
apparatus and remunerate him, he would reward Alfred Vail, while Smith
would be deprived of his portion. Happily, it was decided to abandon the
subterranean line, and erect the conductor on poles above the ground. A
start was made from the Capitol, Washington, on April 1, 1844, and the
line was carried to the Mount Clare Depot, Baltimore, on May 23, 1843.
Next morning Miss Ellsworth fulfilled her promise by inditing the first
message. She chose the words, 'What hath God wrought?' and they were
transmitted by Morse from the Capitol at 8.45 a.m., and received at
Mount Clare by Alfred Vail.

This was the first message of a public character sent by the electric
telegraph in the Western World, and it is preserved by the Connecticut
Historical Society. The dots and dashes representing the words were not
drawn with pen and ink, but embossed on the paper with a metal stylus.
The machine itself was kept in the National Museum at Washington, and on
removing it, in 1871, to exhibit it at the Morse Memorial Celebration at
New York, a member of the Vail family discovered a folded paper attached
to its base. A corner of the writing was torn away before its importance
was recognised; but it proved to be a signed statement by Alfred Vail,
to the effect that the method of embossing was invented by him in the
sixth storey of the NEW YORK OBSERVER office during 1844, prior to the
erection of the Washington to Baltimore line, without any hint from
Morse. 'I have not asserted publicly my right as first and sole
inventor,' he says, 'because I wished to preserve the peaceful unity