purpose, but that it was a sufficient invention to support a patent. (L. Rep., 2 Ch. 127; 36 L. J., Ch. 455; 15 W. R. 208; 15 L. T. Rep., Ñ. S. 399.)

(c) WHITE v. TOмs. Ch. [1867]

Ladies' mourning bonnet and hat falls having previously been made with the ornamental folds on the outside only, so that when turned 66 up a wrong side" was exposed to view, the plaintiff introduced and patented an improved mode of making them with the folds on the inner side also, so as to form both sides alike, but there was no novelty in the process of manufacture. Malins, V.-C., held, that this was not a subject for a patent, for "where there is merely an improvement in the mode of manufacture and no invention, that is not a proper subject for a patent." (37 L. J., Ch. 204; 17 L. T. Rep., N. S. 348.)

(d) RUSHTON v. CRAWLEY. Ch. [1870.]

The plaintiff obtained a patent for the use of animal fibre, by preference Russian wool, or wool of a coarse texture, in the manufacture of artificial hair to be made up as ladies' head-dresses, and for upholstery, and other like purposes. Upon bill filed to restrain an infringement of the patent, Vice-Chancellor Sir R. Malins said: "It is a gross violation of the privilege conferred upon inventors for a person to take out a patent for a known article which has been used for years, because he finds he can produce a thing cheaper or better by a new material, or to suppose that directly he uses the new material it can be a subject for a patent. Suppose any one should discover some other well-known material for making these things, such as paper, is he to take out a patent for it? And afterwards someone else should find out they could be made of straw, is he also to have a patent? So far as my opinion goes, and I desire it to be distinctly understood, the use of a new material to produce a known article is not the subject of a patent, but there must be some invention, something really new, something more valuable to the public than the simple use of a new material to produce a known article. I do not think it is necessary to go through the various authorities which were cited. The case of Crane v. Price was a patent for the use of anthracite coal. The patent was established, but it is now generally considered that such a case would not succeed in the present day. The case of Brook v. Aston is conclusive against the plaintiff. That was a patent for simply using some machinery for wool which had been previously used for linen, yarn, or cotton. That, therefore, was using the same thing for a new material; this is using a new material for an old thing, according to the statement of the plaintiff. But it turns out from the evidence that it is not a new material, but a perfectly old material. Assuming, however, that it was new, and that wool had never been used before for making these articles, upon that assumption, in my opinion, the patent would be wholly void." (L. Rep., 10 Eq. 522.)

(e) JOHNSON v. RYLANDS. Exch. Ch. [1873]

A patent for improvements in testing the strength of wire, claimed the passing wire for that purpose over surfaces, one of which is caused to draw it forward at an accelerated rate. A similar apparatus had been previously in use for the purpose of straining and taking the kinks out. Blackburn, J.: "It appears to me that if the plaintiff had made a claim of this sort knowing that the defendant had strained wire and it had been done and used openly and knowingly, and said I claim two drums for straining the wire and taking the kinks out, using the same mode of straining and the same mode for the purpose of ascertaining and testing the strength of the weakest part of the wire,' that would not have been the subject of a patent at all. That would have been applying it to effect an old purpose in a way it had not been done before, and it is not because it happened that nobody had used it before in that way, that that therefore would have made it the subject of a patent." The patent was however held good on the ground that the drums being so arranged that there was uniform expansion of, say, two per cent. in the wire before it was wound on the second drum, the invention was valuable as showing that all the wire was capable of bearing that percentage of expansion. (Griff. 138.)

(ƒ) CROYSDALE v. FISHER. [1884]

The patent was for improvements in the manufacture of manure. Pollock B.: "If an inventor comes forward and does not claim too widely, but claims honestly an invention as an invention, and gives to the public for the first time the result obtained by the admixture of different processes, although these processes had been known before for some purposes, and although the product had been known before, still if the process is new in the sense that some hitherto unknown result is produced by a known process, and that such result is useful and of commercial value, in that case he is entitled to a patent." The test whether the object attained is new or only cognate, is in this case: "Given the desideratum of manufacturing this powder, given the existence of Forrest's machine, given the knowledge which previously existed with regard to what could be effected by the admixture of sulphuric acid in any proportions with shoddy, given all these as data, is there any one who could say that the application of Forrest's machine in the mode in which it was specified for by the plaintiff would produce not only that which he claims but which he proves by his witnesses to have been carried out." (1 O. R. 17 at p. 19.)

(9) LISTER v. NORTON. [1886]

The glossiness and softness of silk, and the resiliency of mohair were well known and the two had been used together in making glacé goods, but held that the use of the two together in a specified manner so as to attain a more perfect imitation of sealskin involved sufficient invention to support a patent. (3 0. R. 199.)

(h) EDISON AND SWAN ELECTRIC LIGHT COMPANY v. WOODHOUSE. (No. 2.) C. A. [1887]

The patent claimed, secondly, a material for the manufacture of illuminating conductors produced by electrically heating carbon in a carbon gas, and was attacked on the ground of the prior production of a similar material by Despretz experimentally. The Court came to the conclusion that for all useful and practical purposes the processes and the products were different, and expressed no opinion whether, in case they had been in all respects the same, the patent would have been bad, although it showed how to apply to a useful purpose, carbon which neither Despretz nor any one else was aware had the special useful qualities discovered by the patentee. (Griff., p. 94; 3 Q. R. 183; 4 O. R. 99.)

(h*) EHRLICH v. IHLEE. C. A. [1888]

The plaintiff's patent was for improvements in musical instruments, in which the notes are produced by the passage of a perforated sheet across levers operating valves, and the invention consisted substantially in employing a perforated disk instead of a band. A disk had already been applied in looms to operate on levers instead of a band, but in that case the motion was discontinuous, whereas here it was continuous :— Held, that the application of the disk to a musical instrument was new, and was good subject-matter. (5 0. R. 437.)

(¿1) DowLING v. BILLINGTON. [1890]

A new method of using existing machinery for the weaving of wire mattresses, so as to produce a new and useful result, viz., the more even distribution of strength :-Held, to be good subjectmatter. (7 0. R. 191.) O.

Application of a known Machine, Process or Material to an Analogous Purpose.

(i) LOSH v. HAGUE. N. P. [1838]

The application of a well-known thing to an operation analogous to that for which it has already been used is not the subject of a patent. (1 Web. P. C. 208.)

(j) KAY v. MARSHALL. [1839-1848]

Patent for "a new and improved machinery for preparing and spinning flax, hemp, and other fibrous substances, by power." The first part of the invention claimed, consisting of machinery for macerating flax, &c., was held to be new, and a proper subject for a patent. The second part of the invention consisted in placing the drawing rollers only two and a half inches from the retaining rollers. It was proved that before the date of the patent flax and other fibrous substances were spun with machines by which the reach was varied according to the staple or fibre of the article to be spun, and that that had been a fundamental principle of dry spinning. Cotton had also been spun at a short reach. The use

of moisture in spinning flax had been adopted under a prior patent, though in a manner different from that proposed by the plaintiff. The question before the Court therefore was, whether the application of the short reach to the spinning of flax, when in a state of maceration, was a proper subject for a patent. Tindal, C.J., held, that it was not, being merely "the application of a piece of machinery already known and in use, to the new macerated state of the flax. . . . . Suppose a patent to have been first obtained for some entirely new method, either chemical or mechanical, of reducing the fibres of flax to a short staple, we think that a second patent could not be taken out for an improved mode of machinery in spinning flax, which consisted of nothing more than the spinning of the short staple of flax by a spinning machine with a reach of a given length, not less than that already in use for the spinning of cotton; the effect of which would be, to prevent the first patentee from working his invention with the old machine at the proper reach. If a patent taken out for that object separately would be invalid, so also a patent taken out for an invention consisting of two distinct parts, one of which is that precise object, would be void also." (5 Bing. N. C. 492; 7 Scott, 548; 8 L. J., C. P. 261; 2 Web. P. C. 71. Judgment affirmed in the House of Lords, 8 C. & F. 245; West, 682; 5 Jur. 1028; 2 Web. P. C. 79.)

(i) CALVERT v. Ashburn.

The application of caustic alkalies for the purpose of dissolving the gluten contained in flour, employed in the manufacture of size, is not good subject-matter, inasmuch as they had been previously employed for the purpose of dissolving gluten in the manufacture of starch. (John. 84.)

(j) HYDE v. TRENT.

The principal part of an invention for separating the fibres of cocoa-nut husks consisted in passing the split husks between crushing rollers such as had previously been employed in treating hemp:-Held, that their application to crushing cocoa-nut fibre was not good subject-matter. (John. 79.)

(k) HORTON v. MABON. [1862]

The plaintiff in his patent claimed the application of doubleangle iron to the construction of the troughs of the hydraulic joints of telescope gasholders. Before the date of the patent these troughs were constructed of two long pieces of single-angle iron, which were attached to a sheet of iron of equal length by means of a double row of rivets. The jury found, first, that a trough of double-angle iron had not been applied to the purpose of gasholders before the date of the patent. Secondly, that doubleangle iron was a known article of commerce, of a variety of sizes, and applied to a variety of purposes in the form in which the plaintiff claimed to use it. Willes, J.: "I do not deny that a new combination of old materials producing a new effect may be the

subject of a patent, but there must be some invention. Here all that was done was the application of an old idea to the subject of telescopic gasholders. That is no invention at all. The invention consists in the idea, and the mode in which the idea is made of practical utility. But the merit of that invention belongs to the person who first moulded iron in one piece into the form of doubleangle iron, and applied it to such purposes as this." (31 L. J., C. P. 225; 12 Com. B., N. S. 437; 10 W. R. 582; 6 L. T. Rep., N. S. 289; affirmed on appeal, 16 Com. B., N. S. 141; 12 W. R. 491; 9 L. T. Rep., N. S. 815.)

(1) ORMSON v. CLARKE. [1862]

The patent was for an improvement in the manufacture of cast tubular boilers for the heating of horticultural buildings. Boilers of the same form had been made previously to the plaintiff's patent, the several parts being cast separately and afterwards fixed together. The plaintiff's improvement consisted in casting the boiler in one piece; there was no claim as to the mode of casting. The Court held, upon the authority of Harwood v. The Great Northern Railway Company, and Horton v. Mabon, that this was not the subject of a patent, being a mere application of the well-known process of casting to an article previously wellknown. (32 L. J., C. P. 8; 13 Com. B., N. S. 337; 9 Jur., N. S. 749; 11 W. R. 118; 7 L. T. Rep., N. S. 361; affirmed in the Exchequer Chamber, where, however, it was stated that if the patent had been taken out for an improved mode of casting tubular boilers in one piece, probably it might have been supported; 32 L. J., C. P. 291; 14 Com. B., N. Š. 475; 10 Jur., N. S. 128; 11 W. R. 787.)

(m) WILLIS v. DAVISON. [1863]

The pneumatic lever (a kind of bellows) was used in organs before 1851; the compensating valve was used in the pedal bellows of organs before 1851, for the purpose of easing their working, but had never been applied to the pneumatic lever: the plaintiff, in 1851, took out a patent for the application of the compensating valve to the pneumatic lever, for the purpose of easing the working of the latter:-Held, that plaintiff's contrivance was not such a new invention as was capable of becoming the subject of a patent. (1 N. R. 234.)

(n) HARWOOD v. THE GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY COMPANY. [18601865]

The plaintiffs were the executors of Wild, to whom a patent had been granted for "improvements in fishes and fish-joints for connecting the rails of railways," which consisted in forming a recess or groove in one or both sides of each fish, so as to reduce the quantity of metal at that part, and to be adapted to receive the square heads of the bolts. (The facts are more fully set out at p. 238 (r.) In the House of Lords, in answer to the Lord Chancellor, Blackburn, J., delivering the opinion of Mr. Justice Shee and himself,