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The Young Heart
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had taken from his pocket," this is a sending key."
"A sending key!" I exclaimed. " You mean — you mean you are a Ham?"
"No, my boy, I am not a Ham, but before I get through with radio, I will need that key. I am learning the code now. Yes, never too old to learn, as I told Jack the other day. Jack is the boy next door, a bright young chap. We are learning the code together. We are practising now with a buzzer. As we get it down a bit better, I am going to rig up a bulb on the buzzer set and we will learn to read the code by the blinkers.
"Oh, yes, I'm going to have plenty of use for that key, if I live. I wonder if you will understand?" He peered into my eyes, searching
life on their own, and then one day my wife passed on. There was then nothing left, apparently, for me to live for.
"Time hung heavily on my hands. I found myself waiting for the end. Life held little of interest, until one day the radio bug bit me.
" I needn't tell you how it came about. Perhaps you will recall how it was in your own case. I soon became a most enthusiastic fan. I began to build sets. For years, without realizing it, I had stifled a hunger to build something, to play with tools, to tinker, to experiment. I was too busy. •
"At my age, many men go to seed. They turn their faces toward the sunset and hasten the setting of the sun by dwelling upon the approaching end. Not so with me. Radio
'WE ARE LEARNING THE CODE TOGETHER
for the answer to his question. "The fact is, my boy, I am way behind in my play. It's only a little while ago that I learned how to play. Did you ever stop to think how far behind a busy man gets? I am years and years behind in my play. As a boy I started to work at a very early age. Most boys in my day had to work. Some of the well-to-do lads, there were a few in those days, had time to make home-made telegraph sets, and bladderskin telephones, but not I.
" I had to work and work hard. I never learned how to play. As time passed I married, brought up my family and that kept me busy, so busy I had no time to play. I had one big aim, to see my children well started. Years passed, my children left one by one to begin
has opened a fascinating realm of study. I am reading up on the principles of electricity, the construction and action of storage batteries, the science of sound, the chemistry of light, Everything of a scientific nature is interesting to me now.
"And then there is the code. If any one tells you a man is too old to learn, tell him for me it is not so. Stir up the stagnant brain cells with something of absorbing interest and you can learn.
"The days are too short. I begrudge the hours I spend in sleep. I am so far behind in my play. Now I have so much in common with the boys of the neighborhood. Perhaps you think it more seemly that I should sit quietly on my porch in carpet slippers and skull