"You are the first man in the country," ticked the instrument, "that could ever take me at my fastest, and the only one who could ever sit at the other end of my wire for more than two hours and a half. I'm proud to know you." Edison was once asked with what invention he really began his career as an inventor. "Well," said he, in reply, "my first appearance at the Patent Office was in 1868, when I was twenty-one, with an ingenious contrivance which I called the electrical vote recorder. I had been impressed with the enormous waste of time in Congress and in the State Legislatures by the taking of votes on any motion. More than half an hour was sometimes required to count the 'Ayes' and 'Noes.' So I devised a machine somewhat on the plan of the hotel annunciator that was invented long afterward, only mine was a great deal more complex. In front of each member's desk were to have been two buttons, one for 'Aye,' the other for 'No,' and by the side of the Speaker's desk a frame with two dials, one showing the total of 'Ayes' and the other the total of 'Noes.' When the vote was called for, each member could press the button he wished and the result would appear automatically before the Speaker, who could glance at the dials and announce the result. This contrivance would save several hours of public time every day in the session, and I thought my fortune was made. I interested a moneyed man in the thing and we went together to Washington, where we soon found the right man to get the machine adopted. I set forth its merits. Imagine my feelings when, in a horrified tone, he exclaimed: [Illustration: Vote Recorder--Edison's First Patented Invention.] "'Young man, that won't do at all. That is just what we do not want. Your invention would destroy the only hope the minority have of influencing legislation. It would deliver them over, bound hand and foot, to the majority. The present system gives them time, a weapon which is invaluable, and as the ruling majority always knows that they may some day become a minority, they will be as much averse to any change as their opponents.' I saw the force of these remarks, and the vote recorder got no further than the Patent Office."