visiphone n.

On the 201st day of the year 3214 A.D., the professor of history at the University of Terra seated himself in front of the Visaphone and prepared to deliver the daily lecture to his class, the members of which resided in different portions of the earth. The instrument before which he seated himself was very like a great window sash, on account of the fact that there were three or four hundred frosted glass squares visible. In a space at the center, not occupied by any of these glass squares, was a dark oblong area and a ledge holding a piece of chalk. And above this area was a huge brass cylinder toward which the professor directed his subsequent remarks.
In order to assure himself that it was time to press the button which would notify the members of the class in history to approach their local Visaphones, the professor withdrew from his vest pocket a small contrivance which he held to his ear. Upon moving a tiny switch attached to the instrument, a metallic voice, seeming to come from somewhere in space, repeated mechanically: ‘Fifteen o’clock and one minute—fifteen o'clock and one minute—fifteen o’clock and one min——’ Quickly, the professor replaced the instrument in his vest pocket and pressed a button at the side of the Visaphone.
As though in answer to the summons, the frosted glass squares began, one by one, to show the faces and shoulders of a peculiar type of young men; young men with great bulging foreheads, bald, toothless, and wearing immense horn spectacles. One square, however, still remained empty. On noticing this, a look of irritation passed over the professor’s countenance.

Finding my door unlocked I rushed from the room. Presently I blundered into the great deserted room from which the official Martian ether visiphone messages had formerly been sent to Magong. Opening a switch, I found that the power was still on, and signaled the station of my father. My heart gave a leap of joy when his face suddenly appeared in the disc before me.

Then, as she sat upon a bench, recovering her strength, he flipped on the lifeboat’s visiphone projector and shot its invisible beam up into the control room, where he saw space-armored figures furiously busy at the panels.

Calling the Rocket Chief! Report immediately on personal visiphone. Emergency!

Gerry picked up a visiphone and called the space-port.

He stopped, breathless and disheveled, before the administrative building, tore over to his private tube, and, in his office, clamped down fiercely on the Visaphone set to Terrestian Council’s wavelength.

Nelson Harper…was lighting up his pipe when the visiphone signal buzzed and the light flashed on… Mackenzie’s face came in, a face streaked with dirt and perspiration, stark with fear.

Moore turned away from the pay-visiphone, into which he had talked in a confidential murmur while the screen remained blank.

Kerrel’s face appeared on the small screen. There was no need now for the ultra-wave and the ordinary visiphone unit had been cut in.

He inclined his head in as courtly a bow as he could manage over a visiphone. ‘I am deeply honored,’ he said, ‘that Your Majesty has called on me. Is there any way in which I might be of service?’

She had expected to savor her triumph. And the congratulations, from personnel at Armstrong Base, by visiphone from Dad and Mother and the whole family, from the President and her colleagues around the globe, certainly they warmed her to the marrow.

Making an average visiphone call was a process made lengthier by the need for overcoming his revulsion and he made it as brief as he could.

Ariadne listened to the English message on the viziphone: ‘Call Lunar Farside Operator. You have an interstellar message. Dial white-gray-purple, black-red-green.’

Sunday morning, and a lined and elderly face stared out of the visiphone screen trying to look sincere and honest.