THE TELEPHONE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 3, Issue 735, 5 April 1881, Page 3

THE TELEPHONE.

•It,appeal's (observos the St. James Budget of December 17th) from tho fol- :...•• lowing letter,.addressed to the managers of her Majesty's Theatre Academy of •' MusiOj New York, that the problem of utilising the telephone for tho benefit of • amateurs who wish to hear the music of '■'■•■' publio performances without leaving their own homes has been actually solved:— t Colonel J. H. Maploson, 88 Union Sparc ■ November 18th—Dear Sir,—l thank you for your courtesy in permitting the erection of a telephone in the Academy of Music, by which the experiment could bo made of transmitting tho sounds of operatio performances to mo in my sick room —and to let you know the entirely successful, wonderful, astounding result. Placing the instrument against my oar, and closing my eyes, I am instantly, and without effort of imagination, transformed into a blind'auditor upon or very near to the stage of the Academy; and I hear the operatic performance—as I did that of "II Pnritani" last evening—almost or t quite as well as any one of the audience f bodily present. In the transmission of vocal music, except that which is at once very loud and very high, this telephone works with a fidelity wluch is simply marvellous, Tho quantity, quality, and ' pitch of eveiy voice—soprano,' contralto, tenor nnd bass; the notes, whether in solo ■ or concerted music, from pianissimo to forte, and from andante to presto; tho i words enunciated by the singers; and the ■ sentiment, whether of placid joy, ecstacy, sorrow, grief, despair, animating tho siugers and coloringtlioirutterances; nnd ' all this is as distinctly, as perfectly, and as truthfully conveyed by the telephone wire to me as by the atmosphere in the Academy from the singers to their nearest auditor there. Tho drawbacks in tho perfect working of thisitelephone are few and slight, and possibly remediable. The chief one is a confused, jangling, blurred . . sound, like the rattling of a large sheet of brass, which accompanies and envelops the very loud and high tones in the chorusses and finales. The other defect is the non-conveyance of the full quantity and exact quality of certain instalments, notably the violincellos, oboes, double-basses, trombones, tubas, kettledrums, side-drams, bass-drums, cymbals, and bassoons. The tones of the violins, violas, and flutes, whether played forte or piano, are conveyed with absolute perfection, as to quantity, pilch and quality. Tho tones of clarionets, trumpets and homs, are generally well transmitted, but not perfectly. But the defects of the instrument, as evinced in this first attempt to convey by it an operatic performance are few and very small, as contrasted with its very many and transcendent merits, Before the experiment was made, I had not dared to hope for it such a splendid ■ success, which stamps this telephone as one of the highest achievements in scientific invention and discovery of the century.—Yours, &c, Edward P. Fry-