e 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,
I went to the telegraph office, got money enough to buy a little solid
food, and secured a pass to Louisville. I had a companion with me who
was also out of a job. I arrived at Louisville on a bitterly cold day,
with ice in the gutters. I was wearing a linen duster and was not much
to look at, but got a position at once, working on a press wire. My
travelling companion was less successful on account of his 'record.'
They had a limit even in those days when the telegraph service was so
demoralized."

Some reminiscences of Mr. Edison are of interest as bearing not only
upon the "demoralized" telegraph service, but the conditions from
which the New South had to emerge while working out its salvation. "The
telegraph was still under military control, not having been turned over
to the original owners, the Southern Telegraph Company. In addition to
the regular force, there was an