The squalid office was infested with rats, and its discipline was lax,
in all save speed and quality of work, and some of his companions were
of a dissipated stamp. To add to his discomforts, the line he worked
was old and defective; but he improved the signals by adjusting three
sets of instruments, and utilising them for three different states of
the line. During nearly two years of drudgery under these depressing
circumstances, Edison's prospects of becoming an inventor seemed further
off than ever. Perhaps he began to fear that stern necessity would
grind him down, and keep him struggling for a livelihood. None of his
improvements had brought him any advantage. His efforts to invent had
been ridiculed and discountenanced. Nobody had recognised his talent,
at least as a thing of value and worthy of encouragement, let alone
support. All his promotion had come from trying to excel in his routine
work. Perhaps he lost faith in himself, or it may be that the glowing
accounts he received of South America induced him to seek his fortune
there. At all events he caught the 'craze' for emigration that swept
the Southern States on the conclusion of the Civil War, and resolved to
emigrate with two companions, Keen and Warren.
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