The quantity required and the terms of payment are the inducement to offer it to thee at the exceeding low price here stated, which thou wilt please keep _to thyself undivulged to other person_, etc., etc." As iron tubing would not have answered Morse's purpose, this decorous solicitation was declined with thanks.
During the first few months everything worked smoothly, and the prospect of an early completion of the line was bright.

Morse kept all his accounts in the most businesslike manner, and his monthly accounts to the Secretary of the Treasury were models of accuracy and a conscientious regard for the public interest.
One small cloud appeared above the horizon, so small that the unsuspecting inventor hardly noticed it, and yet it was destined to develop into a storm of portentous dimensions.

On May 17, he wrote to F.O.J.Smith from New York:-- "Yours of the 27th April I have this morning received enclosing the contracts for trenching.

I have examined the contract and I must say I am not exactly pleased with the terms.

If I understood you right, before you left for Boston, you were confident a contract could be made far within the estimates given in to the Government, and I had hoped that something could be saved from that estimate as from the others, so as to present the experiment before the country in as cheap a form as possible.
"I have taken a pride in showing to Government how cheaply the Telegraph could be laid, since the main objection, and the one most likely to defeat our ulterior plans, is its great expense.