By the French patent law at the time one who obtained a patent was obliged to put into operation his invention within two years from the issue of his patent, under the penalty of forfeiture if he does not comply with the law.

In pursuance of this requisition of the law I negotiated with the president (Turneysen) of the Saint-Germain Railroad Company to construct a line of my Telegraph on their road from Paris to Saint-Germain, a distance of about seven English miles.

The company was favorably disposed toward the project, but, upon application (as was necessary) to the Government for permission to have the Telegraph on their road, they received for answer that telegraphs were a government monopoly, and could not, therefore, be used for private purposes.

I thus found myself crushed between the conflicting forces of two opposing laws." This was, indeed, a crushing blow, and ended all hope of accomplishing anything in France, unless the Government should, in the short time still left to him, decide to take it up.

The letters home, during the remainder of his stay in Europe, are voluminous, but as they are, in the main, a repetition of experiences similar to those already recorded, it will not be necessary to give them in full.