The cost of labor of telegraph employees is obtained by dividing the total amount paid for labor by the number of persons employed of all kinds. The average price per day for operators in the United States is $2.25, and in England 62 cents. With a knowledge of the great difference in the cost of labor and material in Europe and America which the above statistics show, we cannot comprehend the propriety of Mr. Washburne’s assertion that the whole cost of constructing telegraphic lines must be less here than in Belgium or Switzerland. Even our poles are purchased in the Dominion of Canada, and paid for in gold. The cost of transportation from the St. Lawrence to New York cannot be much, if any, more than the cost of their delivery at London, Havre, or Brussels. In the United States, telegraph-poles are of cedar or chestnut,—more generally of the former. In England, the larch is the most common; in Russia, the pine; in France, pine, alder, poplar, and other white woods; and in Germany, spruce and pine.[11] Footnote 11: Telegraph Manual. The cost of a telegraph line depends, like the cost of a house or any other structure, upon how it is built, but Mr. Washburne, or any other intelligent man, ought to know that the price appropriated in his bill for a four-wire line from Washington to New York cannot possibly build it, even should government build such a structure as those which a dozen years ago cursed the enterprise, and made it a reproach and shame. When government builds a line of telegraph on the plea of public necessity, it should require that its structures at least be equal to those of its citizens. It is not strange that, with the crude and cheap ideas formed by Mr. Washburne of telegraph structures, he disparages and undervalues the properties of the existing companies, and ridicules the estimates furnished Congress in their communications. DOUBTS REGARDING THE ESTIMATES OF TELEGRAPH EXPERTS AS TO COST OF CONSTRUCTING LINES. We quote from Mr. Washburne’s paper:— “In February, 1866, when, in view of the establishment of an experimental government line of telegraph, the Postmaster-General was called upon for information ‘in regard to the feasibility and usefulness of establishing, in connection with the Post-Office Department, telegraph lines,’ &c., ‘to be opened to the public at minimum rates of charge, ... and such statistics and exhibits predicated on cost of construction and capacity of transmission as will best illustrate its practicability,’ he sent to Congress lengthy statements, all of them prepared by persons believed to be interested in or officers of existing companies, in which the cost of a telegraphic line with six wires is put down by one writer at $1,400 per mile, by others at $665, exclusive of river cables and lines through cities.