Professor Henry realized, in common with Morse and others, that if the current were to be conducted over long wires for considerable distances it would become so weak that it would not operate a receiver. Henry avoided this difficulty by the invention of what is known as the relay. At a distance where the current has become weak because of the resistance of the wire and losses due to faulty insulation, it will still operate a delicate electro-magnet with a very light armature so arranged as to open and close a local circuit provided with suitable batteries. Thus the recording instrument may be placed on the local circuit and as the local circuit an opened and closed in unison with the main circuit, the receiver can be operated. It was the relay which made it possible to extend telegraph lines to a considerable distance. It is not altogether clear whether Morse adopted Henry's relay or devised it for himself. It is believed, however, that Professor Henry explained the relay to Professor Gale, who in turn placed it before his partner, Morse.
By 1837 Morse had completed a model, had improved his apparatus, had secured stronger batteries and longer wires, and mastered the use of the relay. It was in this year that the House of Representatives ordered the Secretary of the Treasury to investigate the feasibility of establishing a system of telegraphs. This action urged Morse to complete his apparatus and place it before the Government. He was still handicapped by lack of money, lack of scientific knowledge, and the difficulty of securing necessary materials and devices. To-day the experimenter may buy wire, springs, insulators, batteries, and almost anything that might be useful. Morse, with scanty funds and limited time, had to search for his materials and puzzle out the way to make each part for himself with such crude tools as he had available. Need we wonder that his progress was slow? Instead we should wonder that, despite all discouragements and handicaps, he clung to his great idea and labored on.
But assistance was to come to him in this same eventful year of 1837, and that quite unexpectedly. On a Saturday in September a young man named Alfred Vail wandered into Professor Gale's laboratory. Morse was there engaged in exhibiting his model to an English professor then visiting in New York. The youth was deeply impressed with what he saw. He realized that here were possibilities of an instrument that would be of untold service to mankind. Asking Professor Morse whether he intended to experiment with a longer line, he was informed that such was his intention as soon as he could secure the means. Young Vail replied that he thought he could secure the money if Morse would admit him as a partner. To this Morse assented.
Vail plunged into the enterprise with all the enthusiasm of youth. That very evening he studied over the commercial possibilities, and before he retired had marked out on the maps in his atlas the routes for the most needed lines of communication. The young man applied to his father for support. The senior Vail was the head of the Speedwell Iron Works at Morristown, New Jersey, and was a man of unusual enterprise and ability. He determined to back his son in the enterprise, and Morse was invited to come and exhibit his model. Two thousand dollars was needed to make the necessary instruments and secure the patents. On September 23, 1837, the agreement was drawn up by the terms of which Alfred Vail was, at his own expense, to construct apparatus suitable for exhibition to Congress and to secure a patent. In return he was to receive a one-fourth interest. Very shortly afterward they filed a caveat in the Patent Office, which is a notice serving to protect an impending invention.
Alfred Vail immediately set to work on the apparatus, his only helper being a fifteen-year-old apprentice boy named William Baxter. The two worked early and late for many months in a secret room in the iron-works, being forced to fashion every part for themselves. The first machine was a copy of Morse's model, but Vail's native ability as a mechanic and his own ingenuity enabled him to make many improvements. The pencil fastened to the armature which had marked zigzag lines on the moving paper was replaced by a fountain-pen which inscribed long and short lines, and thus the dashes and dots of the Morse code were put into their present form. Morse had worked out an elaborate telegraphic code or dictionary, but a simpler code by which combinations of dots and dashes were used to represent letters instead of numbers in a code was now devised. Vail recognized the importance of having the simplest combinations of dots and dashes stand for the most used letters, as this would increase the speed of sending. He began to figure out for himself the frequency with which the various letters occur in the English language. Then he thought of the combination of types in a type-case, and, going to a local newspaper office, found the result all worked out for him. In each case of type such common letters as e and t have many more types than little used letters such as q and z. By observing the number of types of each letter provided, Vail was enabled to arrange them in the order of their importance in assigning them symbols in the code. Thus the Morse code was arranged as it stands to-day. Alfred Vail played a very important part in the arrangement of the code as well as in the construction of the apparatus, and there are many who believe that the code should have been called the Vail code instead of the Morse code.
[Illustration: MORSE'S FIRST TELEGRAPH INSTRUMENT
A pen was attached to the pendulum and drawn across the strip of paper by the action of the electro-magnet. The lead type shown in the lower right-hand corner was used in making electrical contact when sending a message. The modern instrument shown in the lower left-hand corner is the one that sent a message around the world in 1896.]
Morse came down to Speedwell when he could to assist Vail with the work, and yet it progressed slowly. But at last, early in January of 1838 they had the telegraph at work, and William Baxter, the apprentice boy, was sent to call the senior Vail. Within a few moments he was in the work-room studying the apparatus. Alfred Vail was at the sending key, and Morse was at the receiver. The father wrote on a piece of paper these words: "A patient waiter is no loser." Handing it to his son, he stated that if he could transmit the message to Morse by the telegraph he would be convinced. The message was sent and recorded and instantly read by Morse. The first test had been completed successfully.