"Well, what is now to be done? I am for taking time by the forelock and placing ourselves above the contingencies of the next expiration of the patent. While keeping our vantage ground with the pirates I wish to meet them in a spirit of compromise and of magnanimity. I hope we may now be able to consolidate on advantageous terms."
It appears that at this time he was advised by many of his friends, including Dr. Gale, to sever his business connection with Mr. Kendall, both on account of the increasing feebleness of that gentleman, and because, while admittedly the soul of honor, Mr. Kendall had kept their joint accounts in a very careless and slipshod manner, thereby causing considerable financial loss to the inventor. But, true to his friends, as he always was, he replies to Dr. Gale on June 30:—
"Let me thank you specially personally for your solicitude for my interests. This I may say without disparagement to Mr. Kendall, that, were the contract with an agent to be made anew, I might desire to have a younger and more healthy man, and better acquainted with regular book-keeping, but I could not desire a more upright and more honorable man. If he has committed errors, (as who has not?) they have been of the head and not of the heart. I have had many years experience of his conduct, think I have seen him under strong temptation to do injustice with prospects of personal benefit, and with little chance of detection, and yet firmly resisting."
Among the calumnies which were spread broadcast, both during the life of the inventor and after his death, even down to the present day, was the accusation of great ingratitude towards those who had helped him in his early struggles, and especially towards Alfred Vail. The more the true history of his connection with his associates is studied, the more baseless do these accusations appear, and in this connection the following extracts from letters to Alfred Vail and to his brother George are most illuminating. The first letter is dated July 15, 1854:—
"The legal title to my Patent for the American Electro-Magnetic Telegraph of June 20th, 1840, is, by the late extension of said patent for seven years from the said date, now vested in me alone; but I have intended that the pecuniary interest which was guaranteed to you in my invention as it existed in 1838, and in my patent of 1840, should still inure to your benefit (yet in a different shape) under the second patent and the late extension of the first.
"For the simplification of my business transactions I prefer to let the Articles of Agreement, which expired on the 20th June, 1854, remain cancelled and not to renew them, retaining in my sole possession the legal title; but I hereby guarantee to you two sixteenths of such sums as may be paid over to me in the sale of patent rights, after the proportionate deductions of such necessary expenses as may be required in the business of the agency for conducting the sales of said patent rights, subject also to the terms of your agreement with Mr. Kendall.
"Mr. Kendall informs me that no assignment of an interest in my second patent (the patent of 1846) was ever made to you. This was news to me. I presumed it was done and that the assignment was duly recorded at the Patent Office. The examination of the records in the progress of obtaining my extension has, doubtless, led to the discovery of the omission."
After going over much the same ground in the letter to George Vail, also of July 15th, he gives as one of the reasons why the new arrangement is better: "The annoyances of Smith are at an end, so far as the necessity of consulting him is concerned."
And then he adds:—
"I presume it can be no matter of regret with Alfred that, by the position he now takes, strengthening our defensive position against the annoyances of Smith, he can receive more pecuniarily than he could before. Please consult with Mr. Kendall on the form of any agreement by which you and Alfred may be properly secured in the pecuniary benefits which you would have were he to stand in the same legal relation to the patent that he did before the expiration of its original term, so as to give me the position in regard to Smith that I must take in self-defense, and I shall cheerfully accede to it.