It seems, then, that some scientific men agree that variation of pressure is required to produce action in a microphone, and some of them admit that a microphone with loose contacts will transmit articulate speech, while others deny it, and some admit that a jolting or shaking motion of the parts of the microphone does not interfere with articulate speech, while others say such motion would break the circuit, and cannot be relied on.

I will now describe two microphones in which there is a shaking or jolting motion, and loose contacts, and no variation of pressure of the carbons against one another, and both of these microphones when used with an induction coil and battery give most excellent articulation.  One of these microphones is made as follows:  Two flat plates of carbon are secured to a block of cork, insulated from each other; into a hole of each carbon a pin of carbon fits loosely, projecting above the carbons; another flat piece of carbon, having two holes in it, bridges over the two lower carbons, being kept in its place by the pins of carbon which fit loosely in the holes in it, the bottom carbons being connected with the battery; a block of cork has a flat side of it cut out so as when secured to the lower cork the carbons will not come in contact with it, yet be close enough to it to keep the carbons from falling apart.  The cork covering the carbons forms a dome.

Any good telephone receiver when used in connection with this microphone, reproduces articulate speech with remarkable distinctness, especially hissing sounds, and with a loud and full tone.

A description of this microphone was published in La Lumiere Electrique, of 15th April, 1882, and a drawing thereof on 29th April of same year.

Another form of microphone is made as follows:  Two blocks of gas carbon, C, B, each about one and a half inches long and one inch square, having each a circular hole one and a quarter inches deep and half inch in diameter; these two blocks are embedded in a block of cork, C, about one-quarter of an inch apart, these holes facing each other, each block forming a terminal of the battery and induction coil; a pencil of carbon, C, P, about three-eighths of an inch in diameter, and two inches long, having a ring of ebonite, V, fixed around its center, is placed in the holes of the two fixed blocks; the ebonite ring fitting loosely in between the two blocks so as to prevent the pencil from touching the bottom of the holes in the blocks.  The space between the blocks is closed with wax, W, to exclude the air, but not to touch the ring on the pencil.  A block of cork fitting close to the carbon blocks on all sides is then firmly secured to the other block of cork.  The microphone should lie horizontally or at a slight angle.

This microphone produces in any good telephone perfect articulation in a loud and full tone.  In these microphones there is certainly “looseness and delicacy of contact,” and there is a “jolting or shaking motion,” and it does not seem possible that there can be any “pressure of one carbon against another.”