popular and indispensable of all the agencies that put men in touch with were within talking distance of each other. The THOUSAND-MILE TALK had line was pushed over the plains to Nebraska, enabling the spoken word in Bell telephone secured its first million of capital in 1879; its first arrived, he was escorted over Oriental rugs to a gilded booth, draped each other. bureau. million of earnings in 1882; its first million of dividends in 1884; its Boston to be heard in Omaha. Slowly and with much effort the public were twice as many miles of wire as the Western Union, and in 1905 FIVE TIMES taught to substitute the telephone for travel. A special long-distance By 1892 Boston and New York were talking to Chicago, Milwaukee, actual number of telephones in use. This, too, without a cent of public To describe this growth in a single sentence, we might say that the of talking to other cities. Cabs were sent for customers; and when one installed its first million telephones in 1898. By 1897 it had spun as ceased to be a fairy tale. Several years later the western end of the salon was fitted up in New York City to entice people into the habit Pittsburg, and Washington. One-half of the people of the United States in 1888; had strung its first million miles of wire in 1900; and had money, or the protection of a tariff, or the prestige of a governmental countries combined, not only in the quality of the service but in the many cobwebs of wire as the mighty Western Union itself; by 1900 it had first million of surplus in 1885. It had paid out its first million for as many. Such was the plunging progress of the Bell Companies in this legal expenses by 1886; began first to send a million messages a day period of expansion, that by 1905 they had swept past all European