on whose faithfulness and unswerving integrity I have ever reposed with
perfect confidence, a confidence which has never been betrayed, and a
friend to whose energy and skill, in the conduct of the agency which I
had confided to him, I owe (under God) the comparative comfort which a
kind Providence has permitted me to enjoy in my advanced age."

In the following year he was called upon to mourn the death of still
another of his good friends, for, on August 24, 1870, George Wood died
very suddenly at Saratoga.

While much of sadness and sorrow clouded the evening of the life of this
truly great man, the sun, ere it sank to rest, tinged the clouds with a
glory seldom vouchsafed to a mortal, for he was to see a statue erected
to him while he was yet living. Of many men it has been said that--
"Wanting bread they receive only a stone, and not even that until long
after they have been starved to death." It was Morse's good fortune not
only to see the child of his brain grow to a sturdy manhood, but to be
honored during his lifetime to a truly remarkable degree.

The project of a memorial of some sort to the Inventor of the Telegraph
was first broached by Robert B. Hoover, manager of the Western Union
Telegraph office, Allegheny City, Pennsylvania. The idea once started
spread with the rapidity of the electric fluid itself, and, under the
able management of James D. Reid, a fund was raised, partly by dollar
subscriptions largely made by telegraph operators all over the country,
including Canada, and it was decided that the testimonial should take the
form of a bronze statue to be erected in Central Park, New York. Byron M.
Pickett was chosen as the sculptor, and the Park Commission readily
granted permission to place the statue in the park.

It was at first hoped that the unveiling might take place on the 27th of
April, 1871, Morse's eightieth birthday; but unavoidable delays arose,
and it was not until the 10th of June that everything was in readiness.
It was a perfect June day and the hundreds of telegraphers from all parts
of the country, with their families, spent the forenoon in a steamboat
excursion around the city. In the afternoon crowds flocked to the park
where, near what is now called the "Inventor's Gate," the statue stood in
the angle between two platforms for the invited guests. Morse himself
refused to attend the ceremonies of the unveiling of his counterfeit
presentment, as being too great a strain on his in