our work.

"But I have no desire to criticize him. He seemed to me to have great
opportunities which he did not use. He might have had, I thought, the
register work of the country and secured a large business. But it went
from him to others, and so he left the field."

This eventful year of 1848 closed with the great telegraph suits in full
swing, but with the inventor calm under all his trials. In a letter, of
December 18, to his brother Sidney, who had now returned to America, he
says: "My affairs (Telegraphically) are only under a slight mist, hardly
a cloud; I see through the mist already."

And in another part of this letter he says: "I may see you at the end of
the week. If I can bring Sarah down with me, I will, to spend Christmas,
but the weather may change and prevent. What weather! I am working on the
lawn as if it were spring. You have no idea how lovely this spot is. Not
a day passes that I do not feel it. If I have trouble abroad, I have
peace, and love, and happiness at home. My sweet wife I find, indeed, a
rich treasure. Uniformly cheerful and most affectionate, she makes
sunshine all the day. God's gifts are worthy of the giver."

It was in the early days of 1849 that a gift of another kind was received
by him which could not fail to gratify him. This was a decoration, the
"Nichan Iftikar" or "Order of Glory," presented to him by the Sultan of
Turkey, the first and only decoration which the Sultan of the Ottoman
Empire had conferred upon a citizen of the United States. It was a
beautiful specimen of the jeweller's art, the monogram of the Sultan in
gold, surrounded by 130 diamonds in a graceful design. It was accompanied
by a diploma (or _berait_) in Turkish, which being translated reads:--