Achilles, who had been pursuing some sandpipers along the rim of the surf and sent them circling into the air, now raced back to his friends with a sharp bark of salutation and Dick bent to pat the shaggy head.
"So really," reflected he, "your brother taught himself wireless."
"Not wholly. He simply laid a foundation," the other boy explained. "He could never have taken a job on what he had picked up because, you see, he knew nothing of sending messages, was ignorant of all the rules an operator has to have at his tongue's end, and had no very thorough knowledge of electricity. It was not like a complete training, by any means. The war gave him that. When it broke out he enlisted in the navy, and because he was partially equipped in radio they sent him off posthaste to a wireless school. At the time he was crazy because his dream was to get across and be in the fighting. To sit at home studying was the last thing he wanted to do. Later, though, when he began to see what a big part wireless was playing in the scrimmage, he commenced to be more resigned to his lot. Besides he got his chance before long, for he worked into being a crackerjack at speed and passed his exams so well that he had no trouble in winning his first-class operator's certificate.
"There are grades of radio men, you know, just as there are grades of everything else. There are the sharks, or first-class chaps, who are able to pass every sort of test on the adjustment of apparatus and how to use it; who can both send and receive messages at the rate of at least twenty words a minute, and who can often go much faster; and who have all the rules governing the exchange of radio messages stowed away in their heads. They are the A1 men and every first-class ship is obliged by law to have aboard it two of them. Then there are the second-class certificate fellows who practically have as much radio but cannot hit such a gait, and can only manage to send between twelve and nineteen words a minute. They can go on first-class ships provided more skilled operators are aboard. Sometimes, even, they substitute for them under supervision. Their chief jobs, however, are on ships that use wireless only for their personal benefit; that is, to talk with their own crews. Often a fishing fleet, for instance, will carry a man of this class to communicate with its other vessels. They can talk, too, with shore stations when it is necessary. But the law does not allow them to take positions where there is a great rush of business and general responsibility. They must have the topnotchers for such work."
"I had no idea there were so many rules about radio," mused Dick.
"There are—strict ones, too," replied his companion. "Moreover, the government keeps tabs on all radio people to see they obey the rules. Every wireless man is examined, classified, and given a license just as an automobile driver is. He has to keep it handy, too, and be ready to trot it out on request. You can't get by with bluffing. If an operator is found to be unfamiliar with the rules, or is discovered breaking any of them, his certificate can be withdrawn. No chap wants to risk that, especially if he is trying to earn his living by wireless. And if a ship, and not its radio operator, is found to be breaking the rules, the coastal stations may be notified not to have anything to do with her. In other words she is boycotted and the land operators told neither to receive her messages nor answer them."
"That would be some boycott!"
"The shipboard radio stations, you see, come under the authority of the commanding officer of the ship. It has to be so, because in case of accident he would be the person responsible for sending out distress calls and answering them. The radio man couldn't just grab the power. There has to be one boss of every job."
"I can see that," nodded Dick. "But why such a network of other rules?"
"There have to be. It all has to be charted in black and white or there would be terrible mix-ups."