Like all others who were in quest of a better telegraph instrument, Gray had glimmerings of the possibility of sending speech by wire, and by one of the strangest of coincidences he filed a caveat on the subject on the SAME DAY that Bell filed the application for a patent.

Bell had arrived first.

As the record book shows, the fifth entry on that day was: "A.

G.Bell, $15"; and the thirty-ninth entry was "E.

Gray, $10." There was a vast difference between Gray's caveat and Bell's application.