sequent to 1839 A surprising discovery made in America by Mr Page in 1837 and afterwards investigated by MM Wertheim De la Rive and others must also have led up to it for it was observed that a magnetic bar could emit sounds when rapidly magnetised and demagnetised and these sounds corresponded with the number of currents which produced them Again the electric vibrators devised by MM Macaulay Wagner Neef etc and adapted to produce musical sounds between 1847–1852 by MM Froment and Pétrina showed that the problem of transmitting sounds to a distance was not insoluble Yet up to 1854 no one had ventured to admit the possibility of transmitting speech by electricity and when M Charles Bourseul published in that year a paper on the electric transmission of speech the idea was regarded as a fanciful dream I confess that I myself thought it incredible and when I produced the paper in the first edition of my account of the applications of electricity published in 1854 I felt bound to add that the scheme seemed more than doubtful Yet as the paper was thoughtfully written I had no hesitation in publishing it affixing the signature of CH B Events justified this daring idea and although it did not include the only principle which could lead to the reproduction of articulate sounds yet it was the germ of the fertile invention which has made the names of Graham Bell and Elisha Gray famous For this reason I will again quote M Charles Bourseuls paper ‘After the telegraphic marvels which can r