For instance, one dash meant the letter “t,” and so on.  For a time people only laughed at Morse.  But at length Congress gave him enough money to build a line from Baltimore to Washington.  It was opened in 1844, and proved to be a success from the beginning.  Other lines were soon built, and the Morse system, greatly improved, is still in use.  The telegraph made it possible to operate long lines of railroad, as all the trains could be managed from one office so that they would not run into one another.  It also made it possible to communicate with people afar off and get an answer in an hour or so.  For both these reasons the telegraph was very important and with the railroads did much to unite the people of the different portions of the country.

[Illustration:  THE FIRST MCCORMICK REAPER.]

[Sidenote:  Problems of what growing.]

[Sidenote:  The McCormick reaper, 1831. McMaster, 31-372.]

[Sidenote:  Results of this invention.]

322.  The McCormick Reaper.—­Every great staple depends for its production on some particular tool.  For instance, cotton was of slight importance until the invention of the cotton gin (p. 185) made it possible cheaply to separate the seed from the fiber.  The success of wheat growing depended upon the ability quickly to harvest the crop.  Wheat must be allowed to stand until it is fully ripened.  Then it must be quickly reaped and stored away out of the reach of the rain and wet.  For a few weeks in each year there was a great demand for labor on the wheat farms.  And there was little labor to be had.  Cyrus H. McCormick solved this problem for the wheat growers by inventing a horse reaper.  The invention was made in 1831, but it was not until 1845 that the reaper came into general use.  By 1855 the use of the horse reaper was adding every year fifty-five million dollars to the wealth of the country.  Each year its use moved the fringe of civilization fifty miles farther west.  Without harvesting machinery the rapid settlement of the West would have been impossible.  And had not the West been rapidly settled by free whites, the whole history of the country between 1845 and 1865 would have been very different from what it has been.  The influence of the horse reaper on our political history, therefore, is as important as the influence of the steam locomotive or of the cotton gin.

[Illustration:  MODERN HARVESTER.]

QUESTIONS AND TOPICS

CHAPTER 28

Sec.Sec. 293, 294.—­Compare the condition of the United States in 1830 and 1800 as to (1) extent, (2) population, (3) interests and occupation of the people.  Illustrate these changes by maps, diagrams, or tables.

Sec.Sec. 295, 296.—­a.  How had the use of steamboats increased?

b.  Why had this led to the separation of the West and the East?  How was it proposed to overcome this difficulty?