Yes, well, like our olian harp, only a deal louder, an far nicer. An Is often said to myself, Is that the trissity?
Lek, Robin, lek!
Well, yes, lek-trissity. So I thought Id kime up an see, for, you know, papa says the trissitylek, I meanruns along the wires
But papa also says, interrupted Madge, that the sounds you want to know about are made by the vi the vi
Bratin, suggested the invalid.
Yes, vibratin of the wires.
I wonder what vi-bratin means, murmured Robin, turning his lustrous though damaged eyes meditatively on the landscape.
Donno for sure, said Madge, but I think it means tremblin.
It will be seen from the above conversation that Robert Wright and his precocious cousin Marjory were of a decidedly philosophical turn of mind.
Chapter Four.
Extraordinary Result of an Attempt at Amateur Cable-Laying
Time continued to roll additional years off his reel, and rolled out Robin and Madge in length and breadth, though we cannot say much for thickness. Time also developed their minds, and Robin gradually began to understand a little more of the nature of that subtle fluidif we may venture so to call itunder the influence of which he had been born.
Come, Madge, he said one day, throwing on his cap, let us go and play at cables.
Madge, ever ready to play at anything, put on her sun-bonnet and followed her ambitious leader.
Is it to be land-telegraphs to-day, or submarine cables? inquired Madge, with as much gravity and earnestness as if the worlds welfare depended on the decision.
Cables, of course, answered Robin, why, Madge, I have done with land-telegraphs now. Theres nothing more to learn about them. Cousin Sam has put me up to everything, you know. Besides, theres no mystery about land-lines. Why, youve only got to stick up a lot o posts with insulators screwed to em, fix wires to the insulators, clap on an electric battery and a telegraph instrument, and fire away.
Robin, what are insulators? asked Madge, with a puzzled look.
Madge, replied Robin, with a self-satisfied expression on his pert face, this is the three-hundred-thousandth time I have explained that to you.
Explain it the three-hundred-thousand-and-first time, then, dear Robin, and perhaps Ill take it in.
Well, began Robin, with a hypocritical sigh of despair, you must know that everything in nature is more or less a conductor of electricity, but some things conduct it so wellsuch as copper and ironthat they are called conductors, and some thingssuch as glass and earthenwareconduct it so very badly that they scarcely conduct it at all, and are called non-conductors. Dee see?
Oh yes, I see, Robin; so does a bat, but he doesnt see well. However, go on.
Well, if I were to run my wire through the posts that support it, my electricity would escape down these posts into the earth, especially if the posts were wet with rain, for water is a good conductor, and Mister Electricity has an irresistible desire to bolt into the earth, like a mole.
Naughty fellow! murmured Madge.
But, continued Robin impressively, if I fix little lumps of glass with a hole in them to the posts, and fix my wires to these, Electricity cannot bolt, because the glass lumps are non-conductors, and wont let him pass.
How good of them! said Madge.
Yes, isnt it? So, you see, continued Robin, the glass lumps are insulators, for they cut the electricity off from the earth as an island is, or, at all events, appears to be, cut off from it by water; and Mister Electricity must go along the wires and do what I tell him. Of course, you know, I must make my electricity first in a battery, which, as I have often and often told you, is a trough containing a mixture of acid and water, with plates or slices of zinc and copper in it, placed one after the other, but not touching each other. Now, if I fix a piece of wire to my first copper slice or plate, and the other end of it to my last zinc slice or plate, immediately electricity will begin to be made, and will fly from the copper to the zinc, and so round and round until the plates are worn out or the wire broken. Dee see?
No, Robin, I dont see; Im blinder than the blindest mole.
Oh, Madge, what a wonderful mind you must have! said Robin, laughing. It is so simple.
Of course, said Madge, I understand what you mean by troughs and plates and all that, but what I want to know is why that arrangement is necessary. Why would it not do just as well to tempt electricity out of its hiding-hole with plates or slices of cheese and bread, placed one after the other in a trough filled with a mixture of glue and melted butter?
What stuff you do talk, Madge! As well might you ask why it would not do to make a plum-pudding out of nutmegs and coal-tar. There are some things that no fellow can understand, and of course I dont know everything!
The astounding modesty of this latter remark seemed to have furnished Madge with food for reflection, for she did not reply to it. After a few minutes walk the amateur electricians reached the scene of their intended gamea sequestered dell in a plantation, through which brawled a rather turbulent stream. At one part, where a willow overhung the water, there was a deep broad pool. The stream entered the pool with a headlong plunge, and issued from it with a riotous upheaval of wavelets and foam among jagged rocks, as if rejoicing in, and rather boastful about, the previous leap.
The game was extremely simple. The pool was to be the German Ocean, and a piece of stout cord was to serve as a submarine cable.
The boy and girl were well-matched playmates, for Madge was ignorant and receptivein reference to science,Robin learned and communicative, while both were intensely earnest.
Now, this is the battery, said Robin, when he had dug a deep hole close to the pool with a spade brought for the purpose.
Yes, and the muddy water in it will do for the mixture of acid and water, said Madge.
As she spoke, Robins toe caught on a root, and he went headlong into the battery, out of which he emerged scarcely recognisable. It was a severe, though not an electric, shock, and at first Robin seemed inclined to whimper, but his manhood triumphed, and he burst into a compound laugh and yell, to the intense relief of Madge, who thought at first that he had been seriously injured.
Never mind, Madge, said Robin, as he cleansed his muddy head; cousin Sam has often told me that nothing great was ever done except in the face of difficulties and dangers. I wonder whether this should be counted a difficulty or a danger?
At first I thought it a danger, said Madge, with a laugh, but the trouble you now have with the mud in your hair looks like a difficulty, doesnt it?
Why, then, its both, cried Robin. Come, thats a good beginning. Now, Madge, you get away round to the opposite side of the pool, and mind you dont slip in, its rather steep there.
This is England, cried Robin, preparing to throw the line over to his assistant, who stood eager to aid on the other side, and you are standing ononwhats on the other side of the German Ocean?
Im not sure, Robin. Holland, I think, or Denmark.