It was not until several years after the introduction of the electric telegraph in America that it was opened to the people by any European government. Even in France the electric telegraph was established as late as 1851, and its spread throughout the empire was exceedingly slow. The semaphore telegraph, a defective and inefficient system of conveying intelligence by the exhibition of signals,—introduced by Napoleon at the beginning of the present century,—was still in use, and, notwithstanding the manifest advantages of the electric telegraph, as shown by Arago to the House of Deputies, government long refused to employ it, and, when finally adopted, it was for some time used in connection with the old system. THE SHORTCOMINGS OF BRITISH TELEGRAPHS. Mr. Washburne says of the British telegraph:— “In Great Britain, as in the United States, the telegraph was left to private enterprise and competition. Only a few weeks since, after a twenty years’ trial of the system in the hands of private companies, the people of the British islands, with singular unanimity, demanded to have the telegraphic system placed under the control of the postal authorities, and a bill was introduced by the present government for that purpose.” It is complained of Great Britain, which provides one quarter of all the telegraph offices in Europe, that the telegraph companies there have left eighty-eight places in England and Wales having a population of two thousand and upwards, and even whole districts, without an office. Whatever may be true of the meagreness of the provision of telegraphic facilities by English companies, and which these companies vigorously deny, no such complaint can, with justice, be made in the United States, notwithstanding the vast ranges of territory which must be traversed to meet the communities which need and ask for them. Without intending any disrespect to the postal authorities of the United States, it may be said that the post-office system of Great Britain, because of the superior character of the control which long and careful study has enabled it to secure, is far in advance of our own. In fact, there is nothing more apparent to an English visitor than the low _status_ of our postal arrangements, as compared with that of his own country. It is natural, therefore, seeing the postal system so admirably managed, that English merchants, whose tendencies are all toward governmental direction in matters of this character,[5] should desire to see the experiment of a similar control of the telegraph. In fact, it is only this class of citizens who have asked for the change, the memorial having gone solely from the different Chambers of Commerce throughout the kingdom, no appeal on the subject having ever been made to or by the people of Great Britain, and therefore the assertion that the people with singular unanimity demanded it is not sustained by the facts. Footnote 5: