The revulsion of feeling was as complete as he could have desired; and I had not fully expressed my gratitude when Miss Darry appeared. I went with her to bid Miss Merton good-evening, and she stood in the moonlight beside me on the step, as Annie Bray had done a few hours before; but now I also was a changed character.
"I am proud of my pupil, Sandy," she said, with more of her ordinary manner than I had observed during the evening. "If I can place you in better hands than mine, I shall be willing to give you up."
"Give me up? never!" I cried, "Why, Miss Darry, this evening has proved to me that I could not sustain myself in any untried position without some help from you."
She smiled, saying I was ridiculously unconscious of my own ability, and yet looking gratified, I fancied, at the confession.
(To be continued.)
THE PROGRESS OF THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.
In the spring of 1860 an article was published in this magazine with the above title, giving an account of the extension of the telegraph up to that time. Its progress since has been very great in every quarter of the globe. Upon this continent the electric wire extends from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, connecting upwards of six thousand cities and villages; while upon the Eastern Continent unbroken telegraphic communication exists from London to all parts of Europe,—to Tripoli and Algiers, in Africa,—Cairo, in Egypt,—Teheran, in Persia,—Jerusalem, in Syria,—Bagdad and Nineveh, in Asiatic Turkey,—Bombay, Calcutta, and other important cities, in India,—Irkoutsk, the capital of Eastern Siberia,—and to Kiakhta, on the borders of China.
But however rapid the extension of the telegraph has been in the past, it is destined to show still greater advancement in the future. Neither the American nor the European system has yet attained to its ultimate development. Transient wars now delay the establishment of lines in San Juan, Panama, Quito, Lima, Valparaiso, Buenos Ayres, Montevideo, Rio Janeiro, Surinam, Caraccas, and Mexico, and the incorporating of them, with all their local ramifications, into one American telegraph system. The Atlantic cable, although its recent attempted submergence has proved a failure, will yet be successfully laid; while the equally important enterprise of establishing overland telegraphic communication with Europe viâ the Pacific coast and the Amoor River is now being vigorously pushed forward towards its successful completion.