ber
having suggested at that time the possibility of using electricity to
convey intelligence. He always insisted that the idea first came to him a
few months later on his return voyage to America, and in 1849 he wrote to
Mr. Cooper saying that he must be mistaken, to which the latter replied,
under date of May 18:--

"For the time I still stick to Paris, so does my wife, so does my eldest
daughter. You did no more than to throw out the general idea, but I feel
quite confident this occurred in Paris. I confess I thought the notion
evidently chimerical, and as such spoke of it in my family. I always set
you down as a sober-minded, common-sense sort of a fellow, and thought it
a high flight for a painter to make to go off on the wings of the
lightning. We may be mistaken, but you will remember that the priority of
the invention was a question early started, and my impressions were the
same much nearer to the time than it is to-day."

That the recollections of his friends were probably clearer than his own
on this point is admitted by Morse in the following letter:--

IRVING HOUSE,
NEW YORK, September 5, 1849.

My Dear Sir,--I was agreeably surprised this morning in conversing with
Professor Renwick to find that he corroborates the fact you have
mentioned in your "Sea Lions" respecting the earlier conception of my
telegraph by me, than the date I had given, and which goes only so far
back in my own recollection as 1832. Professor Renwick insists that
immediately after Professor Dana's lectures at the New York Athenaeum, I
consulted with him on the subject of the velocity of electricity and in
such a way as to indicate to him that I was contriving an electric
telegraph. The consultation I remember, but I did not recollect the time.
He will depose that it was before I went to Europe, after those lectures;
now I went in 1829; this makes it almost certain that the impression you
and Mrs. Cooper and your daughter had that I conversed with you on the
subject in 1831 after my return from Italy is correct.

If you are still persuaded that this is so, your deposition before the
Commission in this city to that fact will render me an incalculable
service. I will cheerfully defray your expenses to and from the city if
you will meet me here this week or beginning of next.

In haste, but with best respects to Mrs. Cooper and family,

I am, dear sir, as ever your friend and servant,
SAML. F. B. MORSE.

J. FENIMORE COOPER, ESQ.