“While the secretary of the Old Timers, John Brant, is reading felicitous telegrams at the Cleveland meeting from terrestrial friends, I hope it will not be amiss for us to extend our congratulations to that honorable body and I suggest that a committee of the Cleveland Old Timers now here assembled be appointed to draft a suitable and loving message for our friends to be read on the occasion of the 1917 reunion.” Thus spoke E. P. Wright, and cheer after cheer greeted his suggestion and Gen. Anson Stager, Jeptha H. Wade, Frank G. Beach and Thomas Callahan were appointed such committee, which showed the democratic spirit of the assemblage. “I believe that I will send a private wireless message to my old friend, Allen A. Briggs, and tell him what a nice place it is up here,” said Hank Stager, and many others fell into line to do the same stunt. Presidents Garfield and McKinley, both members of the Ohio Society, stopped to read the bulletins and to shake hands with Nelson Buell, whom the late presidents remembered particularly well for his ever-gentle courtesy when they met in the telegraph office. “We will watch with keen interest the occurrences at the next Old Timers’ meeting, and while not regretting being present, we will extend our hearty congratulations to our worthy brothers in session.” This seemed to be the consensus of opinion, heartily expressed, which was handed to Mr. Moxon, with the remark, “More to come.” And so it appears that the doings of our earthly brothers are being solicitously watched over by those engaged in the same line of business and who have gone before us, and we are never for a moment left alone, even to our innermost thoughts and desires. The railroad superintendents of telegraph as well as the commercial superintendents are forming an association on the planet Mars and a report of the meeting and the names of those present will be the topic of a future chapter in the Pleiades Club series. CHAPTER XII. PLANET MARS ENTERTAINS RAILROAD TELEGRAPH SUPERINTENDENTS There was a large number of sailing craft on the Hesperian canal, on the planet Mars, all headed in the same direction and all evidently bound on the same mission. There were also some small steamers which kept up a fusillade of whistles extending “73” in Morse signals to the other craft. On board these vessels there was a lively lot of men, with a fair sprinkling of ladies, all beaming with smiles and good nature. This gay crowd was en route to attend the gathering of the railroad and commercial superintendents of telegraph which was booked to occur April 22. The meeting was to take place in the Telegraphers’ Tabernacle and everybody was asked to join, for as I mentioned before, there is no class distinction on the planet Mars. There was a long list of names and a long array of forms and faces very familiar to the denizens of Earth.