THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.
Powerful as this extraordinary agent has become, and incalculably useful as its operation is now found to be, it would appear that the principle of the electric telegraph and its modus operandi, almost identically as at present, were known and described upwards of a century ago. On the occasion of a late visit to Robert Baird, Esq., of Auchmeddan, at his residence, Cadder House, near Glasgow, my attention was called by that gentleman to a letter initialed C. M., dated Renfrew, Feb. 15, 1753, and published that year in the Scots Magazine, vol. xv. p. 73., where the writer not only suggests electricity as a medium for conveying messages and signals, but details with singular minuteness the method of opening and maintaining lingual communication between remote points, a method which, with only few improvements, has now been so eminently successful. It is usual to attribute this wonderful discovery to the united labours of Mr. W. F. Cooke and Professor Wheatstone, but has any one acknowledged the contribution of C. M., and can any of the learned correspondents of "N. & Q." inform me who he was?
Inquirendo.
Glasgow.