Most of the long-distance telephone wires, fully two million miles, can be used for telegraphic purposes; and a third of the Western Union wires, five hundred thousand miles, may with a few changes be used for talking.
The Western Union is paying rent for twenty-two thousand, five hundred offices, all of which helps to make telegraphy a luxury of the few.

It is employing as large a force of messenger-boys as the army that marched with General Sherman from Atlanta to the sea.

Both of these items of expense will dwindle when a Bell wire and a Morse wire can be brought to a common terminal; and when a telegram can be received or delivered by telephone.

There will also be a gain, perhaps the largest of all, in removing the trudging little messenger-boy from the streets and sending him either to school or to learn some useful trade.
The fact is that the United States is the first country that has succeeded in putting both telephone and telegraph upon the proper basis.
Elsewhere either the two are widely apart, or the telephone is a mere adjunct of a telegraphic department.

According to the new American plan, the two are not competitive, but complementary.