oscopic lens
used in the camera in such a way that we take a motion picture of the
twinings and twistings of one little thread on the wax cylinder, as it
records the sound waves around the cylinder."

The photographer sniffed with scorn, being familiar with eccentric
uplifters of the "movies," but responded to the command of the manager
to adjust his delicate camera mechanism for the task.

"There is a certain phrase of words on each cylinder which I want
recorded this way. Can all three be taken parallel with each other on
the same film?"

"Sure, easiest thing to do--just a triple exposure. We take it on one
edge of the film, through a little slit just a bit wider than the space
of the thread, cut in a screen. Then we rewind that film, and slide the
slit to the middle of the lens, take your second wax record, and do the
same on the right edge of the film for the third. But what's the idea?"

The camera man began to show interest: he was a skilled mechanician and
he caught the drift of a sensible purpose, at last.

Shirley did not answer. He placed the first record in the phonograph,
running it until the feminine voice could be distinguished asking: "Can
you hear me now?" He marked the beginning and end of this phrase with
his pocket knife. So with the merry masculine and the aged, disagreeable
voice, he located the same order of words: "Can you hear me now?"
The operation seems easy, in the telling, or again perhaps it appears
intensely involved and hardly worth the trouble. A motto of Shirley's
was: "Nothing is too much trouble if it's worth while." So, with this.
To the cynical camera man its general nature was expressed in his
whispered phrase to the manager:

"You better not leave them property butcher knives on that there table,
Mr. Harrison. This gink is nuts: he thinks's he's Mike Angelo or some
other sculpture. He'll start sculpin' the crowd in a minute!"

"You take the picture and keep your opinions to yourself," snapped
Shirley whose hearing was highly trained.

The man lapsed into silence. For two hours they fumed and perspired and
swore, under the intense heat of the low-hung mercury lamps, until at
last a test proved they had the right combination. Shirley greased
the skill of the camera man with a well-directed gratuity, and ordered
speedy development of the film. Before this was done, however, he took
six other records of voices from the folk in the studio, using the same
words: "Can you hear me