Page:Hamel Telegraph history England 1859.pdf/55

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51

Who could, on reading this, have discovered that Mr. Cooke had seen experiments performed with a copy from the electro-magnetic telegraph made by Baron Schilling at St. Petersburg, and brought by him six months before that time, to Bonn, the working of which is here mentioned by Mr. Cooke as "one of the common experiments repeated for half a century;" consequently, even before either electro-magnetism or a voltaic battery had been known?

When, in consequence of unpleasant disputes between Professor Wheatstone and Mr. Cooke, Sir Isambard Brunei and Professor Daniell were, in 1840, appointed arbitrators, they, without taking the trouble to find out what telegraph Mr. Cooke had seen, said, in their award (1841), that, "in March 1836, Mr. Cooke, while engaged at Heidelberg in scientific pursuits, witnessed, for the first time, one of those well known experiments on electricity, considered as a possible means of communicating intelligence, which have been tried and exhibited from time to time, during many years, by various philosophers."[1]

On another occasion, Mr. Cooke intended to give the name of the person whom he saw signalizing with a tele-


  1. Vide Award of Sir Isambard Brunei and Professor Daniell, after p. 73.