at the time the specification was introduced into the world, Mr. Park would have been able to construct the machine with his ordinary skill and knowledge, without the peculiar knowledge he has since obtained upon the subject, from being employed to make the models for Mr. Morgan; because it would not be at all fair to allow your verdict to be influenced by knowledge so acquired. But he says, with his ordinary knowledge and skill he could, without difficulty, construct a wheel so that the paddles should enter the water at any angle. He says, if the diameter of the wheel is given, which it is fair should be given, and the immersion of the float, and that is also fair to be given, he could do it. Those are reasonable data for him to require; and if with his ordinary skill and knowledge, and without that peculiar knowledge which he has obtained in consequence of his connection with the plaintiff and with his cause, he could do it, that would be evidence on which you would be entitled to place reliance. Then he tells you how he could do it. Now, I do think it would have been a vast deal better if the specification had given us the same information, for that is what a specification ought to do.

"The specification ought to contain a full description of the way in which it is to be done. The question really is, whether, upon the whole evidence, you are of opinion that the specification does fairly and fully and properly give to the public that information which the public are entitled to receive, that is to say, whether it tells them, without having recourse to experiments, how to do it, or whether it even tells them what is the course their experiments ought to take-to what point their examinations and experiments should be directed. He says he could do it with the skill he possesses; and he has described the manner in which he proposes to do it. He says, 'I have seen this drawing.' Then

he produces a drawing, and he says, 'This represents my plan of drawing it. An engineer of competent skill would have no difficulty in doing it.' His doing it himself I do not consider so material; but he says any engineer of competent skill would have no difficulty in doing it. That is material.

"Then when that drawing was shown, some of the gentlemen appearing on behalf of the defendants drew an angle upon it as the angle of entering, and asked him how that could be done. No doubt his principle would enable him to work out any angle; but there is a set of angles which would cause the centre of the eccentric to go beyond the wheel itself, which, therefore, it is impossible to carry into effect; but those angles are such as would not be required in ordinary practice by any persons. You should discard on both sides all exaggerated cases, and look to the substance of the thing. . . . It is most important that patentees should be taught that they are bound to set out fully and fairly what their invention is; for, suppose a person were to make an invention, and get a right of making it for fourteen years, to the exclusion of all other persons, it would be a very great hardship upon the public if he were allowed to state his specification in such a way that, at the expiration of his term of his patent, he might laugh at the public, and say, 'I have had the benefit of my patent for fourteen years, but you, the public, shall not now carry my invention into effect, for I have not shown you how it is to be done; I have got my secret, and I will keep it.' . . . Mr. Morgan, in practice, makes his rods of different lengths; and he must necessarily do that in order that the floats may follow at the same angle as the driving float enters the water. If so, he should have said in his specification, 'I make my rods of different lengths, in order that the rest of my floats may enter at the same angle ;

and the way to do that is so and so.' Or he might have said, 'It may be determined so and so.' But the specification is totally silent on the subject. Therefore, a person reading the specification would never dream that the other floats must be governed by rods of unequal length; the least of all could he ascertain what their lengths should be until he had made experiments. Therefore it is contended that the specification does not state, as it should have stated, the proper manner of doing it. He says, 'If they are made of equal lengths, though the governing rod would be vertical at the time of entering, and three would be so when they arrived at the same spot, yet the fourth would not come vertical at the proper point, uor would the fifth, sixth, or seventh.' Then they would not accomplish that advantage which professes to be acquired. The patentee ought to state in his specification the precise way of doing it. If it cannot be completely done by following the specification, then a person will not infringe the patent by doing it. If this were an infringement, it would be an infringement to do that perfectly which, according to the specification, requires something else to be done to make it perfect. If that be correct, you would prevent a man from having a perfect engine. He says, 'Practically speaking, the difference in the length of the rods would not be very material, the difference being small.' But the whole question is small, therefore it ought to have been specified; and if it could not be ascertained, it should have been so stated. . . The true criterion is this: Has the specification substantially complied with that which the public has a right to require? Has the patentee communicated to the public the manner of carrying his invention into effect? If he has, and if he has given to the public all the knowledge he had himself, he has done that which he ought to have

done, and which the public has a right to require from him.

"The question on this part of the case resolves itself into this Do the witnesses on the plaintiff's side satisfy you that the patentee has, in his specification, given to the public the means of making a machine which shall enter and leave the water at any angle that may be ordered; that is, if a man ordered a machine at an angle likely to be required for entering and going out, and to be vertical at the bottom, could an ordinary workman, with competent skill, execute that order by following the directions given in this specification? If you think he could, then the specification would be sufficient. If, on the other hand, you think he would not be able to execute the order unless he sat down and taxed his invention to find out a method of doing that which has not been sufficiently described in the specification, then the specification would be bad."

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CHAPTER VIII.

OPPOSITIONS TO THE GRANT OF PATENTS.

AN inventor's application for a patent may be opposed at two stages of his proceedings, viz. (1) after he has given notice of his intention to proceed with his application under sect. 12 of the Patent Law Amendment Act, 1852, when the hearing will take place before the Law Officer; and (2) after the Law Officer's warrant for sealing the patent has been issued under sect. 15 of the same Act, when the case will be heard by the Lord Chancellor.

Oppositions before the Law Officer. Any person having an interest in the matter and being desirous of opposing an inventor's application for a patent must, within twenty-one days after the inventor's notice to proceed with his application has been published in the London Gazette, lodge, at the Great Seal Patent Office, particulars in writing of his objections to the application. At the expiration of the twenty-one days, the specification and particulars of objection are referred to the Law Officer, and the applicant is then entitled to take out a summons for a hearing of the objections before the Law Officer, who will fix a time within which the opponent must file statutory declarations in support of his objections. The applicant is then allowed time to file declarations in reply, the practice with respect to evidence being much the same as that of the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice. The Law Officer then appoints a day for the hearing, as to which it is the practice to give each party seven days' notice. At