Since the invention of the telephone, attention has been called to the fact that, in 1854, M. Charles Bourseul, a French telegraphist, [Happily still alive (1891).] had conceived a plan for conveying sounds and even speech by electricity. 'Suppose,' he explained, 'that a man speaks near a movable disc sufficiently flexible to lose none of the vibrations of the voice; that this disc alternately makes and breaks the currents from a battery: you may have at a distance another disc which will simultaneously execute the same vibrations.... It is certain that, in a more or less distant future, speech will be transmitted by electricity. I have made experiments in this direction; they are delicate and demand time and patience, but the approximations obtained promise a favourable result.'[See Du Moncel's EXPOSE DES APPLICATIONS, etc.]

Bourseul deserves the credit of being perhaps the first to devise an electric telephone and try to make it; but to Reis belongs the honour of first realising the idea. A writer may plot a story, or a painter invent a theme for a picture; but unless he execute the work, of what benefit is it to the world? True, a suggestion in mechanics may stimulate another to apply it in practice, and in that case the suggester is entitled to some share of the credit, as well as the distinction of being the first to think of the matter. But it is best when the original deviser also carries out the work; and if another should independently hit upon the same idea and bring it into practice, we are bound to honour him in full, though we may also recognise the merit of his predecessor.