'The pretty little Queen of
Greece was delighted with Morse's telegraph. The string which carried the
cannon-ball used for a weight broke, and came near falling on Her
Majesty's toes, but happily missed, and we, perhaps, escaped a prison. My
best respects to Mr. Morse, and say I shall ask Mehemet Ali for a purse,
a beauty from his seraglio, and something else.'" And Morse concludes: "I
will add that, if he will bring me the purse just now, I can dispense
with the beauty and the something else."

Tragedy too often treads on the heels of comedy, and it is sad to have to
relate that Mr. Chamberlain and six other gentlemen were drowned while on
an excursion of pleasure on the Danube in July of 1839.

That all these disappointments, added to the necessity for making money
in some way for his bare subsistence, should have weighed on the
inventor's spirits, is hardly to be wondered at; the wonder is rather
that he did not sink under his manifold trials. Far from this, however,
he only touches on his needs in the following letter to Alfred Vail,
written on November 14, 1839:--

"As to the Telegraph, I have been compelled from necessity to apply
myself to those duties which yield immediate pecuniary relief. I feel the
pressure as well as others, and, having several pupils at the University,
I must attend to them. Nevertheless, I shall hold myself ready in case of
need to go to Washington during the next session with it. The one I was
constructing is completed except the rotary batteries and the pen-and-ink
apparatus, which I shall soon find time to add if required.

"Mr. Smith expects me in Portland, but I have not the means to visit him.
The telegraph of Wheatstone is going ahead in England, even with all its
complications; so, I presume, is the one of Steinheil in Bavaria. Whether
ours is to be adopted depends on the Government or on a company, and the
times are not favorable for the formation of a company. Perhaps it is the
part of wisdom to let the matter rest and watch for an opportunity when
times look better, and which I hope will be soon."

He gives freer vent to his disappointment in a letter to Mr. Smith, of
November 20, 1839:--

"I feel the want of that sum which Congress ought to have appropriated
two years ago to enable me to compete with my European rivals. Wheatstone
and Steinheil have money for their projects; the former by a company, and
the latter by the King of Bavaria. Is there any national feeling with