When Congress met in December, 1842, Morse again appeared in Washington to obtain financial help. Congress was not very enthusiastic over his project, but the House Committee on Commerce finally recommended an appropriation of $30,000, and a bill to that effect was passed in the House of Representatives by the small majority of six votes. The Senate was overcrowded with bills, and Morse’s was continually postponed. In the early evening of the last day of the session there were one hundred and nineteen bills to come to vote before his, and it seemed impossible that it should be taken up. Morse, who had been sitting in the gallery all day, concluded that further waiting was useless, and went back to his hotel, planning to leave for New York early the next morning. He found that after paying his hotel bill he would have less than half a dollar in the world. But as he came down to breakfast the following morning he was met by Miss Ellsworth, the daughter of his friend, the Commissioner of Patents. She held out her hand, saying, “I have come to congratulate you.” “Congratulate me! Upon what?” asked Morse. “On the passage of your bill,” she answered. “Impossible! It couldn’t come up last evening. You must be mistaken,” said the inventor. “No,” said Miss Ellsworth, “father sent me to tell you that your bill was passed. He remained until the session closed, and yours was the last bill but one acted upon, and it was passed just five minutes before the adjournment.” In return for this news Morse promised that Miss Ellsworth should send the first message when his telegraph line was opened. That same day he wrote to Alfred Vail that the bill “was reached a few minutes before midnight and passed. This was the turning point in the history of the telegraph. My personal funds were reduced to the fraction of a dollar, and, had the passage of the bill failed from any cause, there would have been little prospect of another attempt on my part to introduce to the world my new invention.” It had been decided to construct an underground line between Washington and Baltimore, the conductor being a five-wire cable laid in pipes, but after several miles had been laid from Baltimore the insulation broke down. A very large part of the government grant had been spent, and the situation looked very dubious. But after some discussion it was determined to carry the wire by poles, as this could be done much more rapidly and at smaller expense.