Mr. Porter said that with the system partially automatic some delay—a matter of seconds—might} be occasioned when a subscriber on the manual system desires to be connected with a subscriber whose telephone is automatic.
The reason is that the operator at] Central recei ordinary way in precisely the same manner as a subscriber fitted with the automatic system. This in itself causes little] delay but, as will readily be seen, occupies a period of time during which four other subscribers may have lifted off their receivers with a view to obtaining a number and, of] course, have to wait while the dialing process is carried out for the first} subscriber before the operator can attend to those who are waiting' with receivers to ear. The varieties, of delay that may thus occur are only too easily imagined.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.