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

244 INTERIOR OF THE ENGLISH TELEGRAPH STATIONS.
one or more clerks for the reception of dispatches from the
public. Arrangements are made to give the public an opportunity to prepare their messages in private; no one can overlook
and see what another is writing. Great regard has been given
to this subject. Blanks are furnished, and upon these blanks
are written the message desired to be sent, and all dispatches
offered must be signed by the sender. If messages are brought
into an office on plain paper, the person bringing such is requested to copy the communication upon the printed forms
provided by the company. If it is not copied or written on the
company's forms, it is refused. If the customer cannot write,
one of the company's clerks copies the message, reads it to the
customer, keeps the original, and obtains the signature or mark
of the person, at the foot of the company's paper. The message
is then sent, the company being free from liability.
Printed forms have been used by the telegraph companies
in England from the first established lines. The difference of
cost between ordinary paper and the printed forms is very
small, and the printed headings facilitate the registration; and
the defined position of the address from and to, and of the body
of the message, materially aids the instrument clerk in forwarding the communication. To all good customers small
books of forms are issued. Larger books lie at the places of
general resort (such as the exchanges, reading rooms, &c., &c.);
while casual customers find forms ready at the company's
offices upon counters of a height suited for writing, when standing, and subdivided into spaces, with fluted glass screens between each, to prevent, as before stated, any person seeing
another's message.
As a commercial affair the companies regard the use of the
blank forms as indispensably necessary, so that the stipulations thereon printed shall become the conditions upon which
the company agrees to send the message, and upon which the
sender presents the same for transmission, all duly signed by
him.
When the message is thus presented, every condition contained on the blank forms a contract. Being legally signed
by the sender completes it upon his part. The reception of the
money for its transmission by the company, completes the contract by both parties. They are from that moment bound and
responsible according to the stipulations therein set forth, and
from which neither party can recede without the consent of
the other.
The company's cashier quickly counts the words in the body
of the message (the address not being included, but passing