the knowledge that comes with experience we may expect that speech
will girdle the earth.

It is natural that one should wonder whether the wireless telephone is
destined to displace our present apparatus. This does not seem at all
probable. In the first place, wireless telephony is now, and probably
always will be, very expensive. Where the wire will do it is the more
economical. There are many limitations to the use of the other for
talking purposes, and it cannot be drawn upon too strongly by the man
of science. It will accomplish miracles, but must not be overtaxed.
Millions of messages going in all directions, crossing and
recrossing one another, as is done every day by wire, are probably
an impossibility by wireless telephony. Weird and little-understood
conditions of the ether, static electricity, radio disturbances, make
wireless work uncertain, and such a thing as twenty-four-hour service,
seven days in the week, can probably never be guaranteed. In radio
communication all must use a common medium, and as its use increases,
so also do the difficulties. The privacy of the wire is also lacking
with the wireless telephone.

But because a way was found to couple the wireless telephone with the
wire telephone, the new wonder has great possibilities as a supplement
to our existing system. Before so very long it may be possible for an
American business man sitting in his office to call up and converse
with a friend on a liner crossing the Atlantic. The advantages
of speaking between ship and ship as an improvement over wireless
telegraphy in time of need are obvious. A demonstration of the part
this great national telephone system would play in the country's
defense in case of attack was held in May of 1916. The Navy Department
at Washington was placed in communication with every navy-yard and
post in the United States, so that the executive officers could
instantly talk with those in charge of the posts throughout the
country. The wireless telephone was used in addition to the long
distance, and Secretary of the Navy Daniels, sitting at his desk at
Washington, talked with Captain Chandler, who was at his station on
the bridge of the U.S.S. _New Hampshire_ at Hampton Roads.

Whatever the future limitations of wireless telephony, there is
no doubt as to the place it will take among the scientific
accomplishments of the age. Merely as a scientific discovery or
invention, it ranks among the wonders of civilization. Mu