Now I should not be surprised if you told me that I could by wireless telegraphy or something of that sort correspond with a person say two or perhaps three thousand miles distant."
The Professor of Physics and the Historian both laughed outright.
“Then it would surprise you, Sir Thomas, if I told you that the first part of our conversation has been heard by several million people throughout the world.”
“You are joking,” gasped Sir Thomas Browne, looking hard at them both and giving a quick glance round the room.
“No I am not,” said the Professor of Physics, rising from his seat. " We are going to telephone now."
"To telephone! " he exclaimed. " Are your wires underground; I have not seen any? "
“We have long dispensed with wires,” he said. " I said ‘telephone’ because the word would most nearly convey to you what I meant. But telegraphy and telephony now are not merely wireless — that, I should have thought was in your time, it is so simple. But now the means of instant communication more nearly approach what we call telepathy, though I assure you there is nothing occult about it, but that our friends have merely learned to control the ethereal vibrations by simpler means, and those at the command of men. Kindly step this way, Sir Thomas, and let me show you first of all the unisophone, one of the most important mediums of communication by which one can speak a long distance without going near it."
He led the way to one end of the room, followed by Sir Thomas and the Historian.
“Here it is,” he said, pointing to a small rectangular box about five inches wide and four inches deep.
“Quite a diminutive affair, you see,” remarked the Historian, casually. Flush with its front face were two circular places about two inches in diameter. The upper one reminded Sir Thomas Browne of a small hopper to an ancient coffee-mill, for it had a receding cone reaching almost to the back of the receptacle.
“This is the receiver or talker,” said the Professor of Physics, touching it with his fingers, " and this is the transmitter," he went on, pointing to a ring of small holes bored in the circumference of the circle beneath the receiver." The little holes all lead inward to a steel tympanum, but the sound-waves are so deflected that they all arive simultaneously on one small point of the diaphragm, or really much amplified or intensified. This sensitive transmitter is a wonderful piece of mechanism," said the Professor of Physics." The most ingenious of the great telephone inventors and electrical experts had worked for years to create a transmitter that could reproduce faint sounds perfectly and divorce it of all cluttering effects. Now throughout the world, in every town of any note, are several large buildings each containing a unisophone. This day people who were unable to see you awaken here, crowded to these places to hear you speak and to see you. Hundreds were unable to obtain admission."
"Did you say to see me ? " reiterated Sir Thomas Browne, slowly.
“Yes,” answered the Professor of Physics, smiling slightly. “Do you observe that small glass case on the top of the unisophone?” He touched a small mirror, and Sir Thomas nodded.
“Well, on every unisophone is this glass to be found, and to-day, if you were to see it in any part of the world you would observe a picture of this room and its occupants. Every movement you made has been seen by millions of people, being magnified by the glass and thrown on a sheet, and every time you spoke it was heard by this vast congregation of people.”
“Marvellous!” ejaculated Sir Thomas Browne. “Marvellous!”
