Page:Hamel Telegraph history England 1859.pdf/46

42 He begged His Majesty to touch, with it another wire, whilst looking through the door of the tent in the direction of a very far distant mine. A cloud of smoke with earth rose from this exploding mine at the moment the Emperor, with his hands, made the contact. This caused great surprise, and provoked expressions of satisfaction and applause.

In May of the last-mentioned year, 1830, Baron Schilling undertook a journey to China. He had a strong propensity for studying the language, and everything relating to China. His most ardent desire was to be able to visit Pekin, but he was obliged to confine his travels to the borders of the Empire. He collected a great many precious Chinese, Thibetan, Mongolian, and other writings, which are now preserved in the Imperial Academy of Sciences at St. Petersburg.

He had a small electro-magnetic telegraphical apparatus with him, and the astonishment which the experiments, performed with it, excited, assisted him not a little to obtain many of the most interesting works, which he would not have got by simply paying for them.

After his return from the borders of China to St. Petersburg in March, 1832, Baron Schilling occupied himself