Stories of American Life and Adventure Part 12

TELEGRAPHS IN THE REVOLUTION.

Our forefathers sometimes used fire to telegraph with in the Revolution. Whenever the British troops started on a raid into New Jersey, the watchmen on the hilltops lighted great beacon fires. Those who saw the fires lighted other fires farther away. These fires let the people know that the enemy was coming, for light can travel much faster than men on horseback.

Have you heard the story of Paul Revere? When the British were about to send troops from Boston to Lexington, Revere and his friends had an understanding with the people in Charlestown. Revere was to let them know when the troops should march. They were to watch a certain church steeple. If one lantern were hung in the steeple, it would mean that the British were marching by land. If two lanterns were seen, the Charlestown people would know that the troops were leaving Boston by water. Revere was sent as a messenger to Lexington. He sent a friend of his to hang up the lanterns in the church steeple.

"Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church, By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the somber rafters, that round him made Ma.s.ses and moving shapes of shade,-- By the trembling ladder, steep and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs of the town, And the moonlight flowing over all."

Long before Paul Revere got across the water in his little boat, the people on the other side had seen the lanterns in the tower. They knew the British were coming, and were all astir when Paul Revere got over.

Revere rode on to Lexington and beyond, to alarm the people.

The lines above are from a poem of Longfellow's about this ride. The poem is very interesting, but it does not tell the story quite correctly.

Paul Revere's lanterns were used at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. There is a story of a different sort of telegraph used when the war was near its end. It is told by a British officer who had not the best means of knowing whether it was true or not. But it shows what kind of telegraphs were used in that day. This is the story:--

[Ill.u.s.tration: Old North Church Steeple.]

A British army held New York. Another British army under Cornwallis was at Yorktown in Virginia. General Was.h.i.+ngton had marched to Yorktown. He was trying to capture the army of General Cornwallis. He was afraid that s.h.i.+ps and soldiers would be sent from New York to help Cornwallis.

But there were men in New York who were secretly on Was.h.i.+ngton's side.

One of these was to let him know when s.h.i.+ps should sail to help Cornwallis.

But Was.h.i.+ngton was six hundred miles away from New York. How could he get the news before the English s.h.i.+ps should get there? There were no telegraphs. The fastest horses ridden one after another could hardly have carried news to him in less than two weeks. But Was.h.i.+ngton had a plan. One of the men who sent news to Was.h.i.+ngton was living in New York. When the s.h.i.+ps set sail, he went up on the top of his house and hoisted a white flag, or something that looked like a white flag.

On the other side of the Hudson River in a little village a man was watching this very house. As soon as he saw the white flag flapping, he took up his gun and fired it. Farther off there was a man waiting to hear this gun. When he heard it, he fired another gun. Farther on there was the crack of another, and then another gun. By the firing of one gun after another the news went southward. Bang, bang! went gun after gun across the whole State of New Jersey. Then guns in Pennsylvania took it up and sent the news onward. Then on across the State of Maryland the news went from one gun to another, till it reached Virginia, where it pa.s.sed on from gun to gun till it got to Yorktown.

In less than two days Was.h.i.+ngton knew that s.h.i.+ps were coming.

When Was.h.i.+ngton knew that British s.h.i.+ps were coming, he pushed the fighting at Yorktown with all his might. When the English s.h.i.+ps got to Chesapeake Bay at last, Cornwallis had already surrendered. The United States was free. The s.h.i.+ps had come too late.

A BOY'S TELEGRAPH.

The best telegraph known before the use of electricity, was invented by two schoolboys in France. They were brothers named Chappe (shap-pay).

They were in different boarding schools some miles apart, and the rules of their schools did not allow them to write letters to each other. But the two schools were in sight of each other. The brothers invented a telegraph. They put up poles with bars of wood on them. These bars would turn on pegs or pins. The bars were turned up or down, or one up and another down, or two down and one up, and so on. Every movement of the bars meant a letter. In this way the two brothers talked to each other, though they were miles apart. When the boys became men, they sold their plan to the French Government. The money they got made their fortune.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Mail Carrier.]

About the time they were selling this plan to the French Government, a boy named Samuel Morse was born in this country. Fifty years later this Samuel Morse set up the first Morse electric telegraph, which is the one we now use.

In the old days before telegraph wires were strung all over the country, it took weeks to carry news to places far away. There were no railroads, and the mails had to travel slowly. A boy on a horse trotted along the road to carry the mail bags to country places. From one large city to another, the mails were carried by stagecoaches.

When the people had voted for President, it was weeks before the news of the election could be gathered in. Then it took other weeks to let the people in distant villages know the name of the new President.

Nowadays a great event is known in almost every part of the country on the very day it happens.

A BOY'S FOOLISH ADVENTURE.

The Natural Bridge has long been thought one of the great curiosities of our country. It is in Virginia, and the county in which it is situated is called Rockbridge County.

The traveler is riding in a stage on a wild road in the mountains. The road grows narrow. Soon it is a mere lane, with high board fences and small trees on each side. But the traveler sees nothing to show him that he is on the wonderful Natural Bridge.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Natural Bridge.]

The bridge that he is driving over is about forty feet thick, and of solid rock. If he should go to the other side of the board fence, he could look down into a ravine more than two hundred feet deep.

When the traveler goes down into the ravine, he looks up at the beautiful curve of this great bridge of rock. The bridge is nearly one hundred and seventy-five feet above his head.

Many years ago, when the writer of this book was a boy, he stood in the dark chasm underneath this bridge and looked up at the great bridge of rock above. He took a stone, as all other visitors do, and tried to throw it so as to hit the arch of the bridge above. But the stone stopped before it got halfway up, and fell back, resounding on the rocks below. Then he was told the old story, that n.o.body had ever thrown to the arch except George Was.h.i.+ngton, who had thrown a silver dollar clear to the center of the bridge.

There were names scribbled all over the rocks. People are always trying to write their own names in such strange places as this. Above all the other names were two rows of mere scratches. If they had ever been names, they were too much dimmed to be read by a person standing on the rocks below. The lower of these two high names, the people said, was the name of Was.h.i.+ngton. It was said that when he was a young man, he climbed higher than any one else to scratch his name on the rock. And the name above his, they said, was the name of a young man who had had a strange adventure in trying to write his name above that of the father of his country.

The story of this young man's climbing up the rocks used to appear in the old schoolbooks. It was told with so many romantic additions, that it was hard to believe.

The writer afterwards learned that the main fact of the story was true, and, that the hero of the story was still living in Virginia.

This foolhardy boy, whose name was Pepper, climbed up the rock to write his name above the rest. Pepper climbed up by holding to little broken places in the rocks till he had got above the names of all the other climbers. He ventured to climb till he had pa.s.sed the marks which people say are part of Was.h.i.+ngton's name. Here Pepper held fast with one hand, while he scratched his name in the rock.

His companions were far below him. He could not get down again. The rock face was too smooth. He could not stoop to put his hands down into the cracks where his feet were. If he had tried to, he would have lost his hold, and been dashed to pieces on the rocks below.

There was nothing to do now but to climb out from under the bridge, and so up the face of the rock to the top of the gorge. He must do this or die.

Painfully clinging to the rock with his toes and his fingers, he worked his way up. Sometimes a crevice in the rock helped him. Sometimes he had to dig a place with his knife in order to get a hold. It seemed that each step would be his last.

The few people living in the neighborhood heard of his situation, and gathered below and above to look at him. They watched him with breathless anxiety. His friends expected to see him dashed to pieces at any moment.

As the time wore on, he worked his way up. He also got farther out from under the bridge. He held on like a cat. He hooked his fingers into every crack he could find. He dug holes with his dull knife. When he could find a little bush in the rocks, he thought himself lucky.

Men let down ropes to him, but the ropes did not reach him. They tied one rope to another so as to reach farther down, but he was too far under the bridge. The people hardly dared to speak or to breathe.

At last he began to get out at the side of the bridge where he could be seen from above. His strength was almost gone. His knife was too much worn to be of any use. He could not cling to the rock much longer.

A rope with a noose in it was swung close to him. He let go his grip on the rock, and threw his arms and body into the noose. In a moment he swung clear of the rock, and dangled in the air. The rope drew tight about his body and held him. Young Pepper knew no more. He was drawn up over the rocks to the summit quite unconscious.

Years afterward he became a man of distinction in his State. But when any of his friends asked Colonel Pepper about his climbing out from under the Natural Bridge, he would say, "Yes; I did that when I was a foolish boy, but I don't like to think about it."

A FOOT RACE FOR LIFE.

In 1803 that part of our country which lies west of the Mississippi was almost unknown to the white men. In that year the President sent Captain Lewis and Captain Clark to see what the country was like. They went up the Missouri River and across the Rocky Mountains. Then they went down the Columbia River to the Pacific Ocean. It took them more than two years to make the trip there and back.