looked at it as a whole without examining it in detail, for which I
was thankful. Then he jabbed it back on the hook, and I knew I was all
right. He walked over to me, and said: 'Young man, I want you to work
the Louisville wire nights; your salary will be $125.' Thus I got from
the plug classification to that of a 'first-class man.'"

But no sooner was this promotion secured than he started again on his
wanderings southward, while his friend Adams went North, neither
having any difficulty in making the trip. "The boys in those days
had extraordinary facilities for travel. As a usual thing it was only
necessary for them to board a train and tell the conductor they were
operators. Then they would go as far as they liked. The number of
operators was small, and they were in demand everywhere." It was in this
way Edison made his way south as far as Memphis, Tennessee, where the
telegraph service at that time was under military law, although the
operators received $125 a month. Here again Edison began to invent and
improve on existing apparatus, with the result of having once more to
"move on." The story may be told in his own terse language: "I was not
the inventor of the auto repeater, but while in Memphis I worked on
one. Learning that the chief operator, who was a protege of the
superintendent, was trying in some way to put New York and New Orleans
together for the first time since the close of the war, I redoubled my
efforts, and at 2 o'clock one morning I had them speaking to each other.
The office of the Memphis Avalanche was in the same building. The paper
got wind of it and sent messages. A column came out in the morning about
it; but when I went to the office in the afternoon to report for duty I
was discharged with out explanation. The superintendent would not even
give me a pass to Nashville, so I had to pay my fare. I had so little
money left that I nearly starved at Decatur, Alabama, and had to stay
three days before going on north to Nashville. Arrived in that city,