“Why,” they ask, “devote this vast sum to the special education of a select few, while thousands of our children can only with difficulty obtain the rudiments of a common education?”
If the endowment in question were intended merely for the present generation, this question would be difficult to answer. In reality, however, the very form and nature of the gift show that it is dedicated not to the individual but to the race; and it is chiefly under the leadership of the scientific specialist that the race advances. It is his work rather than the influence of the common schools that has given to mankind the steam-engine, the telegraph, and the electric light.
Heretofore, however, the development of men like Watt, Morse, Bell, and Edison has been wholly dependent upon chance and their own phenomenal perseverance. Who can say how many more of such men have been lost to the public service through mere want of opportunity? It is this opportunity that Mr. Carnegie’s gift would insure to coming generations.
As our great military school at West Point supplies the nation with men educated for military leadership, so this institution will create and perpetuate a corps of savants, forever at the service of the whole people.
One cannot but feel that with this gift Mr. Carnegie has exercised an even wiser forethought than in his many other generous benefactions.
Wireless Telegraphy
Signor Marconi, by means of his system of wireless telegraphy, has at length succeeded in transmitting the equivalent of the letter “s” from Europe to America. A glance at the work of the young inventor, however, will show that his success is not yet insured.
His system—indeed, we might say all systems—of wireless telegraphy depends upon the properties of luminiferous ether—that mysterious medium that is supposed to exist in every known substance. The discharge of an electric spark produces in this ether a bubble-like wave which radiates in all directions. It is upon the reception and recording, at Newfoundland, of this wave, produced at England, that the success of Marconi’s experiment depends.
Even to the ordinary mind, such a proposition presents innumerable difficulties. One of the most apparent would be the confusion arising from two sets of signals operated in the same locality. But just as we can throw all the rays of a search-light in one direction, Marconi reflects these waves of ether toward his receiving station.
Perhaps one of the real drawbacks of this system would be the expense of maintaining a current of sufficient voltage to signal long distances. Nevertheless, we feel confident that, whether it be from the brain of Marconi or Tesla, or the united efforts of Orling and Armstrong, wireless telegraphy is insured to the future.