Page:A short history of social life in England.djvu/410

 year we have been compelled to acknowledge its irresistible power. The motor force of electricity has persistently compelled attention, and a road speed hitherto undreamt of has been attained. Electric railways, with no smell and no smoke, have replaced the old steam engine, and motors, though still far from perfect, are designed to run at a high speed, though the arguments used against their noise, vibration and smell are precisely the same as those which were used in the days of the early railways. This tremendous acceleration in speed must in course of time effect a redistribution in the population of the overcrowded cities: the working man can make his home in yet purer air, the merchant and professional man can live on the coast, and the desolate land may once more ring with life and bustle. Only within the last few years has the telephone—that union of two great forces, sound and electricity—been making its way in England. In America it is already largely used but the old country moves more slowly in these latter days and leaves the younger nations to go "full steam ahead." As with the telephone, still run by private enterprise, so it is with wireless telegraphy, which is bridging over the