railroad, is it not as necessary to make the telegraph lines which carry important and profitable business as perfect in their construction?

The telegraph line of the future will comprise substantial poles carrying a few copper wires worked to their full capacity for transmitting electric signals. The cost of maintenance of such a line when once constructed will be little more than for an or dinary iron wire now used, while its carrying capacity for intelligence at 3,000 words per minute simplex will be about equal to 160 wires used for hand transmission simplex. By duplexing the line, the carrying capacity is doubled and becomes 6,000 words per minute, which is about equal to 160 wires worked duplex, or to 80 wires worked by hand quadruplex.

It is thought that the influence which the inauguration of a telegraph letter system would have upon the existing telegraph and telephone business would be to increase rather than diminish it. Each of these services has its own special field of usefulness but little affected by the others. A new field would be occupied. rather than an old field supplanted. The present telegraph and telephone would still have their natural field of operation, even though the best hopes for a telegraph letter service are realized.

A single line capable of sending 6,000 words per minute between New York and Chicago, becomes a different kind of investment from a long distance telephone line where the number of words per minute with the fastest rate a speaker can talk is very slow in comparison, and the charge is $9 for five minutes' use of this line.

The application under government control of a rapid system of correspondence transmission such as has been outlined, operating in conjunction with the present postal system, by supplementing and relieving their service could hardly fail to prove of benefit to the people of the United States. This comes within the proper duty of the Post Office Department, and would be under the direct control of the Postmaster-General. The simplification in operation and expense which would result from uniting directly with the general post offices of large cities the telegraph letter service would soon be realized by the people and a better service insured.

As a practical means toward ultimately assuming the direct responsibility of this new service, it would probably be easy to secure private companies which would be willing to contract with the Post Office Department to transmit telegraph letters at a

Journal 7.

fixed rate for a term of years. In this manner the Department could gradually absorb this branch of its business and be relieved of any sudden new responsibility and radical reorganization.

It is not thought that the development of a rapid intelligence transmission service to the extent suggested could be accomplished before many years, nor indeed that the manner or means of this development should closely follow the lines indicated, but that something analogous to this development seems among the possibilities if not the probabilities of the near future.

The persistent efforts of Mr. Delany and the great system which he has developed are well known, and the ideas which he has advanced in regard to the applications of rapid systems are in the main in accordance with those stated herein.

HISTORY OF THE SEA-COAST FORTIFICATIONS

OF THE UNITED STATES.

III. NARRAGANSET BAY.

Roger Williams, the great and good man who initiated the Christian Colony of Rhode Island in 1636, was so just in all his dealings with the native Indian Tribes, that peace and good will reigned for many years within its borders. But, after the beheading of Charles I., the government of England being in a very unsettled condition and much discord existing among the people of the colony, it was ordered, in 1650, that all of its arms should be thoroughly repaired and that each town of the colony should. be required to build a magazine.

When a new war broke out between the Narraganset and Long Island Indians, the people of Providence became alarmed by some hostile demonstrations, and, therefore, in 1656 erected a fort on Stamper's Hill. It was so called because, soon after the settlement of Providence, when a body of Indians approached the town in a threatening manner, the inhabitants, by running and stamping on this hill, made the hostiles believe that they were greatly outnumbered. The ruse had its desired effect, the Indians quickly retiring. This fort was probably the first ever erected by the colonists in Rhode Island.

The war of 1664, between England and Holland, during which the Dutch settlements in America were captured by the British aided by the colónists, showed the necessity of sea-coast protection against armed cruisers; hence, in 1666, Rhode Island petitioned the home government to erect fortifications for the defense of Narraganset Bay. The report that a Dutch fleet was on its way, in 1667, to recover New York, produced great alarm in the colonies. Hence the general assembly of Rhode Island took every precautionary measure for defense, and recommended that Newport should mount great guns for its protection; but no permanent fortifications appear to have been then erected.

During King Philip's war of 1675-76, inland stockades and earthworks were constructed, but no sea-coast fortifications.

In 1690, the year in which James II, was defeated at the battle of the Boyne in Ireland, a French fleet having made its appearance off our coast, some of the seaports were put in a state of defense by temporary batteries. No permanent works, however,

could have been erected in Rhode Island, for, in answer to the rebuke of the mother country that the colony had not supplied her quota of men and money in aid of the King," the assembly, in 1696, stated that the exposed condition of Rhode Island, with forty miles of coast line and three great inlets from the sea undefended, had demanded all her strength for self-protection."

The treaty of Ryswick having restored peace to all Europe, October 30, 1697, there seemed to be no pressing necessity for fortifications in Narraganset Bay. This general pacification, however, was of short duration, hence it was deemed prudent to provide for the defense of Newport harbor by erecting an earthwork on Goat Island.*

The Earl of Bellomont, a man of singular ability and strength of character, had been appointed by King William III., March 16, 1697, "to be Governor of the Provinces of New York, Massachusetts Bay, and New Hampshire, and to be Captain-General, during the war, of all of His Majesty's forces, both there and in Connecticut and Rhode Island." The latter colony he visited in 1699, and January 10, 1700, the Lords of Trade made a report to the King on the forts in the plantations, in which they say "Rhode Island being the most important place on the southwest side of Cape Codd, is so situated as to be a very convenient harbor for shipping and security to that part of the Country in case it were put in a state of defense, which it has never yet been, by the mean condition and refractoryness of the inhabitants," and "recommend an appropriation of £150 for fortifications for Rhode Island and Providence Plantations."

Doubtless, in consequence of this report, 'Colonel William Wolfgang Romar, "His Majesty's Chief Ingineer," was sent to examine Narraganset Bay; for June 22, 1700, the Earl of Bellomont says to the Lords of Trade: I send your Lordships Coll. Romar's memorial (marked H), which I have turned into English,

Cachanaquoat, a Chief Sachem of the Narraganset Indians, sold to Governor Benedict Arnold and James Greene, May 22, 1658, three small islands in the Bay, Nuntee-Sinunk alias Goat Island, Weenat-Shasitt alias Coaster's Harbor Island, and Dyer's Island, for six pounds and ten shillings. Greene, May 27, 1672, transferred to Arnold his entire claim to enable the latter to pass over his right in ve sayd two islands (Goat and Coaster's Harbor) unto ye Town of Newport if they will pay him ten pounds in current pay for the six pounds and ten shillings which he disbursed yeares agone on ye acompt." The Town of Newport, May 1, 1673, made the purchase of these islands from Arnold.

The middle part of Goat Island was reserved for the fortifications, and the two ends, containing about ten acres, were laid out in forty-three building lots. After the Revolution (1794) the State of Rhode Island transferred to the United States the existing fortifications and the land occupied by them; and, April 16, 1799, the Town of Newport sold to the United States, for $1,500, the remainder of the island, no payment, up to that time, having been received from the purchasers of the lots on the two ends.

The Breakwater and Lighthouse pier, running from the north end of Goat Island, was built by Captain (now General) Cullum, in 1836-38, and a part of the superstructure and Lighthouse were completed by Lieutenant James L. Mason, of the United States Corps of Engineers. On Henry Jackson's Historical Map in the Redwood Library, Newport, R. I.. it is stated that they were constructed by Alex. M. McGregor, who was only the master

mason.