Heroes of the Telegraph

It was deemed fitting that Morse should unveil the statue of Benjamin Franklin, which had been erected in Printing House Square, New York. When his venerable figure appeared on the platform, and the long white hair was blown about his handsome face by the winter wind, a great cheer went up from the assembled multitude. But the day was bitterly cold, and the exposure cost him his life. Some months later, as he lay on his sick bed, he observed to the doctor, 'The best is yet to come.' In tapping his chest one day, the physician said,' This is the way we doctors telegraph, professor,' and Morse replied with a smile, 'Very good--very good.' These were his last words. He died at New York on April 2, 1872, at the age of eighty-one years, and was buried in the Greenwood Cemetery.