Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals Volume II Part 29

"I thought it might interest you to know when and how Professor Morse received the first tidings of the success of the Atlantic Cable. I accompanied him to Europe on the steamer Fulton, which sailed from New York July 24, 1858. We were nearing Southampton when a sail boat was noticed approaching, and soon our vessel was boarded by a young man who sought an interview with Professor Morse, and announced to him that a message from America had just been received, the first that had pa.s.sed along the wire lying upon the bed of the ocean.

"Professor Morse was, of course, greatly delighted, but, turning to me, said: '_This is very gratifying, but it is doubtful whether many more messages will be received_'; and gave as his reason that--'the cable had been so long stored in an improper place that much of the coating had been destroyed, and the cable was in other respects injured.' His prediction proved to be true."

And Mr. Prime adds: "Had he been in the board of direction, had his judgment and experience as electrician been employed, that great calamity, which cost millions of money and eight years of delay in the use of the ocean telegraph, would, in all human probability, have been averted."

But it is idle to speculate on what might have been. His letters show that the action of the directors amazed and hurt him, and that it was with deep regret that he ceased to take an active part in the great enterprise the success of which he had been the first to prophesy.

Many other matters claimed his attention at this time, for, as usual upon returning from a prolonged absence, he found his affairs in more or less confusion, and his time for some months after his return was spent mainly in straightening them out. The winter was spent in New York with his family, but business calling him to Was.h.i.+ngton, he gives utterance, in a letter to his wife of December 16, to sentiments which will appeal to all who have had to do with the powers that be in the Government service:--

"As yet I have not had the least success in getting a proper position for Charles. A more thankless, repulsive business than asking for a situation under Government I cannot conceive. I would myself starve rather than ask such a favor if I were alone concerned. The modes of obtaining even a hearing are such as to drive a man of any sensitiveness to wish himself in the depths of the forest away from the vicinity of men, rather than encounter the airs of those on their temporary thrones of power. I cannot say what I feel. I shall do all I can, but antic.i.p.ate no success.... I called to see Secretary Toucey for the purpose of asking him to put me in the way of finding some place for Charles, but, after sending in my card and waiting in the anteroom for half to three fourths of an hour, he took no notice of my card, just left his room, pa.s.sed by deliberately the open door of the anteroom without speaking to me, and left the building. This may be all explained and I will charitably hope there was no intention of rudeness to me, but, unexplained, a ruder slight could not well be conceived."

The affection of the three Morse brothers for each other was unusually strong, and it is from the unreserved correspondence between Finley and Sidney that some of the most interesting material for this work has been gathered. Both of these brothers possessed a keen sense of humor and delighted in playful banter. The following is written in pencil on an odd sc.r.a.p of paper and has no date:--

"When my brother and I were children my father one day took us each on his knee and said: 'Now I am going to tell you the character of each of you.' He then told us the fable of the Hare and the Tortoise. 'Now,' said he, 'Finley' (that is me), 'you are the Hare and Sidney, your brother, is the Tortoise. See if I am not correct in prophesying your future careers.' So ever since it has been a topic of banter between Sidney and me. Sometimes Sidney seemed to be more prosperous than I; then he would say, 'The old tortoise is ahead.' Then I would take a vigorous run and cry out to him,' The hare is ahead.' For I am naturally quick and impulsive, and he sluggish and phlegmatic. So I am now going to give him the Hare riding the Tortoise as a piece of fun. Sidney will say: 'Ah! you see the Hare is obliged to ride on the Tortoise in order to get to the goal!' But I shall say: 'Yes, but the Tortoise could not get there unless the Hare spurred him up and guided him.'"

Both of these brothers achieved success, but, unfortunately for the moral of the old fable, the hare quite outdistanced the tortoise, without, however, kindling any spark of jealousy in that faithful heart.

While Sidney was still in Europe his brother writes to him on December 29, 1857:--

"I don't know what you must think of me for not having written to you since my return. It has not been for want of will but truly from the impossibility of withdrawing myself from an unprecedented pressure of more important duties, on which to _write_ so that you could form any clear idea of them would be impossible. These duties arise from the state of my affairs thrown into confusion by the conduct of parties intent on controlling all my property. But, I am happy to state, my affairs are in a way of adjustment through the active exertions of my faithful agent and friend, Mr. Kendall, so far as his declining strength permits.... I wish you were near me so that we could exchange views on many subjects, particularly on the one which so largely occupies public attention everywhere. I have been collecting works pro and con on the Slavery question with a view of writing upon it. We are in perfect accord, I think, on that subject. I believe that you and I would be considered in New England as rank heretics, for, I confess, the more I study the subject the more I feel compelled to declare myself on the Southern side of the question.

"I care not for the judgment of men, however; I feel on sure ground while standing on Bible doctrine, and I have arrived at the conclusion that a fearful hallucination, not less absurd than that which beclouded some of the most pious and otherwise intelligent minds of the days of Salem witchcraft, has for a time darkened the moral atmosphere of the North."

The event has seemed to prove that it was the Southern sympathizers at the North, those "most pious and otherwise intelligent minds," whose moral atmosphere was darkened by a "fearful hallucination," for no one now claims that slavery is a divine inst.i.tution because the Bible says, "Slaves, obey your masters."

I have stated that one of the purposes of Morse's visit to Europe in 1856 was to seek to persuade the various Governments which were using his telegraph to grant him some pecuniary remuneration. The idea was received favorably at the different courts, and resulted in a concerted movement initiated by the Count Walewski, representing France, and partic.i.p.ated in by ten of the European nations. The sittings of this convention, or congress, were held in Paris from April, 1868, to the latter part of August, and the result is announced in a letter of Count Walewski to Morse of September 1:--

SIR,--It is with lively satisfaction that I have the honor to announce to you that a sum of four hundred thousand francs will be remitted to you, in four annuities, in the name of France, of Austria, of Belgium, of the Netherlands, of Piedmont, of Russia, of the Holy See, of Sweden, of Tuscany and of Turkey, as an honorary gratuity, and as a reward, altogether personal, of your useful labors. Nothing can better mark than this collective act of reward the sentiment of public grat.i.tude which your invention has so justly excited.

The Emperor has already given you a testimonial of his high esteem when he conferred upon you, more than a year ago, the decoration of a Chevalier of his order of the Legion of Honor. You will find a new mark of it in the initiative which his Majesty wished that his government should take in this conjuncture; and the decision that I charge myself to bring to your knowledge is a brilliant proof of the eager and sympathetic adhesion that his proposition has met with from the States I have just enumerated.

I pray you to accept on this occasion, sir, my personal congratulations, as well as the a.s.surance of my sentiments of the most distinguished consideration.

While this letter is dated September 1, the amount of the gratuity agreed upon seems to have been made known soon after the first meeting of the convention, for on April 29, the following letter was written to Morse by M. van den Broek, his agent in all the preliminaries leading up to the convention, and who, by the way, was to receive as his commission one third of the amount of the award, whatever it might be: "I have this morning seen the secretary of the Minister, and from him learned that the sum definitely fixed is 400,000 francs, payable in four years. This does not by any means answer our expectations, and I am afraid you will be much disappointed, yet I used every exertion in my power, but without avail, to procure a grant of a larger sum."

It certainly was a pitiful return for the millions of dollars which Morse's invention had saved or earned for those nations which used it as a government monopoly, and while I find no note of complaint in his own letters, his friends were more outspoken. Mr. Kendall, in a letter of May 18, exclaims: "I know not how to express my contempt of the meanness of the European Governments in the award they propose to make you as _the_ inventor of the Telegraph. I had set the sum at half a million dollars as the least that they could feel to be at all compatible with their dignity. I hope you will acknowledge it more as a tribute to the merits of your invention than as an adequate reward for it."

And in a letter of June 5, answering one of Morse's which must have contained some expressions of grat.i.tude, Mr. Kendall says further: "In reference to the second subject of your letter, I have to say that it is only as a tribute to the superiority of your invention that the European grant can, in my opinion, be considered either 'generous' or 'magnanimous.' As an indemnity it is n.i.g.g.ardly and mean."

It will be in place to record here the testimonials of the different nations of Europe to the Inventor of the Telegraph, manifested in various forms:--

_France._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity, and the decoration of the Legion of Honor.

_Prussia._ The Scientific Gold Medal of Prussia set in the lid of a gold snuff-box.

_Austria._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity, and the Scientific Gold Medal of Austria.

_Russia._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity.

_Spain._ The cross of Knight Commander de Numero of the order of Isabella the Catholic.

_Portugal._ The cross of a Knight of the Tower and Sword.

_Italy._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity, and the cross of a Knight of Saints Lazaro and Mauritio.

_Wurttemberg._ The Scientific Gold Medal of Wurttemberg.

_Turkey._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity, and the decoration in diamonds of the Nishan Iftichar, or Order of Glory.

_Denmark._ The cross of Knight Commander of the Dannebrog.

_Holy See._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity.

_Belgium._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity.

_Holland._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity.

_Sweden._ A contributor to the honorary gratuity.

_Great Britain._ Nationally nothing.

_Switzerland._ Nationally nothing.

_Saxony._ Nationally nothing.

The decorations and medals enumerated above, with the exception of the Danish cross, which had to be returned at the death of the recipient, and one of the medals, which mysteriously disappeared many years ago, are now in the Morse case at the National Museum in Was.h.i.+ngton, having been presented to that inst.i.tution by the children and grandchildren of the inventor. It should be added that, in addition to the honors bestowed on him by foreign governments, he was made a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Sweden, a member of the Inst.i.tute of France and of the princ.i.p.al scientific societies of the United States. It has been already noted in these pages that his _alma mater_, Yale, conferred on him the degree of LL.D.

I have said that I find no note of complaint in Morse's letters. Whatever his feelings of disappointment may have been, he felt it his duty to send the following letter to Count Walewski on September 15, 1858. Perhaps a slight note of irony may be read into the sentence accepting the gratuity, but, if intended, I fear it was too feeble to have reached its mark, and the letter is, as a whole and under the circ.u.mstances, almost too fulsome, conforming, however, to the stilted style of the time:--

On my return to Paris from Switzerland I have this day received, from the Minister of the United States, the most gratifying information which Your Excellency did me the honor to send to me through him, respecting the decision of the congress of the distinguished diplomatic representatives of ten of the August governments of Europe, held in special reference to myself.

You have had the considerate kindness to communicate to me a proceeding which reflects the highest honor upon the Imperial Government and its n.o.ble a.s.sociates, and I am at a loss for language adequately to express to them my feelings of profound grat.i.tude.

But especially, Your Excellency, do I want words to express towards the august head of the Imperial Government, and to Your Excellency, the thankful sentiments of my heart for the part so prominently taken by His Imperial Majesty, and by Your Excellency, in so generously initiating this measure for my honor in inviting the governments of Europe to a conference on the subject, and for so zealously and warmly advocating and perseveringly conducting to a successful termination, the measure in which the Imperial Government so magnanimously took the initiative.

I accept the gratuity thus tendered, on the basis of an honorary testimonial and a personal reward, with tenfold more gratification than could have been produced by a sum of money, however large, offered on the basis of a commercial negotiation.

I beg Your Excellency to receive my thanks, however inadequately expressed, and to believe that I appreciate Your Excellency's kind and generous services performed in the midst of your high official duties, consummating a proceeding so unique, and in a manner so graceful, that personal kindness has been beautifully blended with official dignity.

I will address respectively to the honorable ministers who were Your Excellency's colleagues a letter of thanks for their partic.i.p.ation in this act of high honor to me.

I beg Your Excellency to accept the a.s.surances of my lasting grat.i.tude and highest consideration in subscribing myself

Your Excellency's most obedient humble servant, SAMUEL F.B. MORSE.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII