sed rapidly, and
by May, 1844, the line was completed. On the twenty-fourth of that month
Morse sat before his instrument in the room of the Supreme Court at
Washington. His friend Miss Ellsworth handed him the message which she
had chosen: "WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT!" Morse flashed it to Vail forty
miles away in Baltimore, and Vail instantly flashed back the same
momentous words, "WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT!"

* The property in the invention was divided into sixteen
shares (the partnership having been formed in 1838) of which
Morse held 9, Francis O. J. Smith 4, Alfred Vail 2, Leonard
D. Gale 2. In patents to be obtained in foreign countries,
Morse was to hold 8 shares, Smith 5, Vail 2, Gale 1. Smith
had been a member of Congress and Chairman of the Committee
on Commerce. He was admitted to the partnership in
consideration of his assisting Morse to arouse the interest
of European Governments.

Two days later the Democratic National Convention met in Baltimore to
nominate a President and Vice-President. The leaders of the Convention
desired to nominate Senator Silas Wright of New York, who was then in
Washington, as running mate to James K. Polk, but they must know first
whether Wright would consent to run as Vice-President. So they posted a
messenger off to Washington but were persuaded at the same time to allow
the new telegraph to try what it could do. The telegraph carried the
offer to Wright and carried back to the Convention Wright's refusal
of the honor. The delegates, however, would not believe the telegraph,
until their own messenger, returning the next day, confirmed its
message.

For a time the telegraph attracted little attention. But Cornell
stretched the lines across the country, connecting city with city, and
Morse and Vail improved the details of the mechanism and perfected the
code. Others came after them and added further improvements. And it is
gratifying to know that both Morse and Vail, as well as Cornell, lived
to reap some return for their labor. Morse lived to see his telegraph
span the continent, and link the New World with the Old, and died in
1872 full of honors.

Prompt communication of the written or spoken message is a demand even
more insistent than prompt transportation of men and goods. By 1859 both
the railroad and the telegraph had reached the old town of St. Joseph on
the Missouri. Two thousand miles beyond, on the other side of plains
and