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acquainted with the steam-engines previously in use, to construct one with this improvement.3

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Lawrence J. "Two objections have been made to this patent: first, that it is not for any formed or organized machine or manufacture, but for mere principles; secondly, that the specification is bad. By looking at the patent and the recital in the act of Parliament, it appears that Watt obtained a patent for an engine or mechanical contrivance for lessening the consumption of steam in steam-engines. It is clear, that the legislature understood that the patent was for an engine or some mechanical contrivance, and the form of the patent and the specification does not contradict this. Engine and method mean the same thing, and may be the subject of a patent. Method, properly speaking, is only placing several things, and performing several operations in the most convenient order; but it may signify a contrivance or device; so may an engine, and therefore, I think it may answer

34 An act of Parliament was passed to extend the patentee's term, which, after reciting that the patent was " for making and vending certain engines, by him invented, for lessening the consumption of steam and fuel in fire-engines," granted to him the sole right of" constructing and selling such engines for twentyfive years; it was, however, provided, that this grant should be subject to "every objection in law competent against the said patent."

the word method. So principle may mean a mere elementary truth, but it may also mean constituent parts."

"Then, taking this to be a patent for an engine, it is objected that the specification is bad. The patent must be supported as granted for an improvement and addition to old engines, known and in use, and I think that the patent is good in this point of view. For Watt claims no right to the construction of engines for any determinate object, except that of lessening the consumption of steam and fuel in fire engines. His patent supposes the existence of such engines, and his contrivance, method, or engine, is for lessening the consumption of fuel in such pre-existing engines, and for nothing else. Some of the difficulties in the case have arisen from considering the word engine in its popular sense, namely, some mechanical contrivance to effect that to which human strength, without such assistance, is unequal; but it may also signify device ; and that Watt meant to use it in that sense, and that the legislature so understood it, is evident from the words engine and method being used as convertible terms. Now there is no doubt but that for such a contrivance a patent may be granted, as well as for a more complicated machine; it equally falls within the description of a "manufacture ;" and unless such de

vices did fall within that description, no addition or improvement could be the subject of a patent."

Wheeler's patent for a preparation for coloring beer was adjudged bad, on account of the inaccuracy of the description in the title, and the insufficiency of the specification. It was for " a new and improved method of drying and preparing malt." In the specification it was stated that the "invention consisted in the heating of malt to 400 degrees and upwards, of Fahrenheit's thermometer, according to a process or processes hereafter described." Abbott C. J. "This is a patent for the invention of a method, that is, of an engine, instrument or organ, to be used for the accomplishment of some purpose; or at least of a process to be so used. The patentee does not profess to be the inventor of any engine, instrument, or organ; he says, that a coffee-roaster, or a kiln, or any thing by which the grains may be kept in motion during their exposure to the requisite degree of heat, may be used. Neither has he described any certain or precise process, which, admitting that there may be a patent for a process only, ought unquestionably to be done. He does not mention the state in which the malt is to be taken, for the purpose of undergoing the process, whether in a moist or dry state, as was before noticed; he does not say, what heat beyond 400 degrees of

Fahrenheit may be used; he does not furnish the operator with any means of knowing when he has this degree of heat; he does not say, during what length of time the process is to be continued, but contents himself with saying, that "the proper degree of heat and time of exposure will be easily learned by experience, the color of the internal part of the prepared grain affording the best criterion;" not even mentioning what the color is, which is to be the criterion. A specification which casts upon the public the expense and labor of experiment and trial, is undoubtedly bad. If it be said that all these matters will be well or easily known to a person of competent skill (and to such only the patentee may be allowed to address himself), then the inventor will not in reality have given any useful or valuable information to the public; so that in either way of viewing the case, there is either no certain and clear process described, or the process described is such as might be practised without the assistance of the patentee." The patent was adjudged to be void.

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It has been suggested, that this decision is an illustration of an illiberal application of the rules on the

35 King v. Wheeler, 2 Barn. & Ald. 345.

36 Westminster Review, No. 44.

subject of specifications. Whether it be so or not will evidently depend, in a great degree, upon what may be supposed to be known to persons practised in the manufacture of malt, and in the art of brewing. The writer just alluded to, supposes that a person conversant with these manufactures would very readily learn to make and use the new invented malt by the directions given in the specification. However this may have been in the particular case, the doctrines and principles of the decision are no doubt correct, and the precedent is equally good, whether the court applied these doctrines to the actual case before them, or to one supposed by them through mistake.

Sec. VII.-WHAT IS CLAIMED AS NEW Must be disTINGUISHED FROM WHAT IS OLD. IT MUST APPEAR WHAT IS CLAIMED AS NEW. THE INVENTOR MUST

NOT CLAIM TOO MUCH.

It is a general rule that the patentee must not claim, in his specification, any more than he has invented, and that by claiming too much his patent is void. And if the specification contains a description of what is old and known as well as what is new, what is claimed as new must be distinguished." The form of

" Dixon v. Mayor, Coxe's Dig. 533; and see cases below.

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