The Assembly room of the United States Supreme Court with one of the Morse Telegraph instruments installed in it. A group of distinguished officers and private individuals, waiting with intense interest to see the invention tested. With perfect calmness the Inventor took his seat at the instrument, laid his hands on the key-board now familiar to us all, and in the Morse code sent the message chosen by Miss Ellsworth. Slowly--steadily, successfully he wrote the chosen words,-- "WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT" The message was instantaneously received in Baltimore by a Mr. Vail who did not know beforehand what message was to be sent. He returned it immediately to Washington, so that within a single moment those inspired words were flashed back and forth through a circuit of eighty miles.--The Telegraph system had begun to work! A great American by inheritance, and by achievement, we do Samuel Finley Breese Morse homage, for his ideals are those for which our forefathers gave their lives. When that first message flashed over the wires to Baltimore and back, the Inventor said humbly and reverently, "The message baptizes the Telegraph with the name of its author,--for that author is God." DAVID FARRAGUT: The Boy Midshipman It was a day in late October, in the year 1812. Down the Delaware River, came slowly sailing the frigate _Essex_, which was one of a fleet being sent to cruise along the Atlantic coast for the protection of American vessels from their English enemies, for 1812 was the year when the war between England and America was declared, and for this reason. England had for a long time been at war with France. Any vessel going to or from a French port was liable to be attacked by an English man-of-war, and the English government even claimed the right to search American vessels to see whether any English sailors were on board. And worse than that, many American sailors were accused, and falsely, of being English deserters and were taken from their own vessels and forced to serve on English ships. All attempts of America to adjust this matter peacefully were refused, and in 1812 America was obliged to declare war against Great Britain, and in consequence a squadron was fitted out to cruise along the Atlantic coast, to protect American vessels from the English. The _Essex_ was in command of Captain Porter, and as she was not ready to start when the rest of the fleet did, she sailed alone down the river through the quiet bay, and out into the ocean, and as she sailed, she bore little resemblance to our war vessels of to-day, so clumsily fashioned was she, being made of wood, with only one covered deck, and the open forecastle and quarter-deck above it, and had but two tiers of guns--the largest frigates carried sixty guns, besides a large pivot gun at the bow, and were noted for their speed, though in comparison to modern warships they were as a tortoise is to a hare.