"Well, Dad, all you'll have to do will be to wait and see. It
isn't going to be easy--I grant that. In fact, I've run up against
more snags, the little way I've gone so far, than I like to admit.
But I'm going to stick at it, and before this year is out I'll
guarantee, Father, that you can be at one end of the telephone
wire, talking to me, at the other, and I'll see you and you'll see
me--if not as plainly as we see each other now, at least plainly
enough to make sure of each other."

Mr. Swift chuckled silently, gradually breaking into a louder
laugh. Instead of being angry, Tom only regarded his father with
an indulgent smile, and continued:

"All right, Dad. Go ahead, laugh!"

"Well, Tom, I'm not exactly laughing at YOU--it's more at the
idea than anything else. The idea of talking over a wire and, at
the same time, having light waves, as well as electrical waves
passing on the same conductor!"

"All right, Dad, go ahead and laugh. I don't mind," said Tom,
good-naturedly. "Folks laughed at Bell, when he said he could send
a human voice over a copper spring; but Bell went ahead and to-day
we can talk over a thousand miles by wire. That was the telephone."

"Folks laughed at Morse when he said he could send a message over
the wire. He let 'em laugh, but we have the telegraph. Folks
laughed at Edison, when he said he could take the human voice--or
any other sound--and fix it on a wax cylinder or a hard-rubber
plate--but he did it, and we have the phonograph. And folks