Page:Hamel Telegraph history England 1859.pdf/64

60 I cannot leave unnoticed that Grauss, the celebrated astronomer at Göttingen (deceased 1855,) when relating what had been done there in regard to signalising, never mentioned Baron Schilling's telegraph, and that he, in 1837, even expressed in print his surprise, that nobody had, since Oersted's discovery, thought of utilising it. It is hardly possibly that Gauss should not have bad a knowledge of Schilling's labours. Professor Weber had been, in 1835, at Bonn, present at the meeting of the Section of natural philosophy and chemistry, when Baron Schilling exhibited his telegraph.

During the journey which Baron Schilling undertook in 1835, he had made, together with Baron Jacquin and Professor Andreas von Ettingshausen, at Vienna, a series of experiments, with a view to find out the comparative merits of placing the conducting wires over the roofs of houses in the air, and of laying them in the earth. The latter trials were made in the botanical garden of the University, near the Rennweg. The result was like that obtained subsequently by Steinheil, at Munich, namely, that the earth conducted the current from one wire to the other laid at some distance parallel, which was then still supposed necessary for the return of the current.