The telegraph manual: a complete history and description of the semaphoric, electric and magnetic telegraphs of Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, ancient and modern.

FOREST-TREES USED AS TELEGRAPH SUPPORTERS. 685
timber, well stripped of the bark, seasoned in the sun, at least
ten inches in diameter at butt, and five inches at top, well set
in the earth, and on a right line to avoid the strain of the wire
on angles.
In the early days of telegraphing, especially on rival routes,
when the lines traversed forests, but little care was taken in
the selection of poles. The great quantity growing in proximity was an excuse for slight in the first building, the impression being "that the poles were readily replaced, in case of
decay, and time should not be wasted on first construction."
The people " ahead," always anxious for the completion of the
telegraph, often had an influence in causing the constructors
of the line to erect poles of inferior wood and size, and to use
any means, however frail, to consummate an electric connection.
On many lines the forest-trees serve for posts, to which
brackets or eleets are fastened, and in or on them insulators
are fitted. These brackets or clects are nailed to the body or
limb of a tree. On one section of a line, embracing about
sixty miles, I noticed that on more than one half of the route
trees were used, and on a section of six miles there was not a
post. The trees were large, from one to five feet in diameter
at base, very high, and with outspread branches, shading the
earth. The sun's rays could not penetrate through their foliage, to warm and vivify the small growth beneath. Weeds
grown there were few, delicate, and frail. Small wood growth
was seldom to be seen. There was nothing to disturb the
wires thus attached to the stately oak. The telegraph wires,
sometimes, in America, traverse gloomy mantled forest regions,
where the foot of man never had trod before. In some of these
mountain ranges, the cliffs or precipices, to ascend or descend,
were difficult. The wagons were taken to pieces, and elevated or let down, as the case required, with ropes, or by strands
of wire.
A few years in the Western States of America, makes a wonderful change in the appearance of the country, as to its settlement. Through many of the dense forests and widespread
prairies, where ten years ago the wire was run for miles,
without passing a habitation, now the rail-trains are hourly
sweeping through villages, and the wire is no longer the solitary evidence of civilization. Farms have sprung up as with
magic. To these railways have been transferred the telegraphs,
and the meanderings from tree to tree are done away with, and
the iron strand is stretched on methodically-set poles of the