THE PATENT OFFICE BUILDING.

The present Patent Office was built in accordance with the plan of William Parker Elliot, whose design was accepted by Congress July 4, 1836. Work was started on the main or south front July 12, 1836, and four years were taken to complete this portion of the building. Mr. Elliot was a mechanical draughtsman in the first Patent Office under the superintendency of Dr. William Thornton, resigning in 1829. President Jackson approved the plan but directed that the Patent Office be built on one side of the reservation laid aside for that purpose instead of in the central location assigned for it, because the President, to use the words of the architect, "did not wish to disturb the log cabin of an old squatter on the public land." "I observed," continued the architect, that the plan covered the whole square, and that if his order was carried into effect it would destroy the plan. That rather than this should take place, I would give the old woman a residence as long as she lived. He said his order must be obeyed. The conversation as to the consequences of his order became rather angry. I left him in that mood, and myself disappointed. The construction of the building, however, was left to the judgment of the Commissioner of Patents and Commissioner of Public Buildings, who ordered that it be erected in accordance with the original plans. For once Andrew Jackson's will did not prevail, to the great benefit of symmetry and utility.

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The main building of the Patent Office was occupied in the spring of 1840. Its cost was $422,000 and was provided for from the funds earned by the Office. The growth of the business was so rapid that on Mar. 3, 1849 Congress authorized the construction of the east wing, the one fronting on Seventh St. It was completed and occupied in 1852 and cost $600,000, $250,000 of which was taken from the earnings of the Patent Office.

On Aug. 31, 1852, Congress provided for the erection of the west wing, along Ninth St., which was completed and occupied in 1856, and cost $750,000. The north, or

G Street wing, was begun in 1856, and entirely finished in 1867, and cost $750,000, thus completing the quadrangle.

The completed building occupies two city squares, 403 by 274 feet, with an open court of 264 feet long by about 106 feet in width. The main or south front is built of sandstone and is provided for its whole height with a semicircular projection extending into the court which comprises the housing of a staircase and forms the principal architectural feature of this aspect of the structure. The remaining wings are built of granite and are in harmonious relation with the original wing.

The architecture of the building as given by the architect himself is related by Robert W. Fenwick, Esq., as follows:

"The order of architecture adopted for the exterior was the Grecian Doric of the age of Pericles, when the fine arts in Greece, particularly architecture and sculpture, had reached the highest points of excellence. The details are modeled after the celebrated Parthenon, erected on the Acropolis at Athens, one of the finest specimens of Athenian architecture, and which was in 1827'28, in part still standing, although more than 2,000 years had passed since its erection; and before it, in his early manhood, the architect of the Patent Office stood, and by it had his genius so kindled into a living flame, that he was enabled, on his return to his native land, to reproduce some of its most striking parts in his design for our noble Patent Office structure. At that date the marble of the ancient building had indurated to such a degree from its long exposure to atmospheric influences, as to resist the action of a chisel. The principal front of the Patent Office on F street is graced with a portico of sixteen columns, octastyle arrangement, the columns, and entablature, and pediment being of the size and proportion of the Parthenon, each column being 18 feet in circumference at the base. The whole building is surrounded with bold antae or pilasters let into the external walls, which produce nearly as rich an effect as the isolated frustum of cone columns, and are much stronger and serve also as buttresses to resist the thrust

of the arches. The entablature is continuous and surrounded by a blocking course, which finishes the superstructure. The windows are arranged between pilasters. The north front on G street is the same as the south front on F street, except that the inner columns of the portico are omitted. The east front on Seventh street is graced with a portico of six columns which tends to break the too great monotony of the extended facade. The west front is relieved by a similar portico. This portico, owing to the position of the ground on the west, rests upon a vaulted terrace from which it is approached. The cellar story under this side of the building has, owing to the low grade of Ninth street, a greater height. A horizontal terrace or pavement surrounds the whole structure from the curb line. A handsome ornamental railing with gates encloses almost the entire building.

In 1867, at the time the building was being completed, one of the Washington papers rose to the occasion in these words:

"The entire completion of the Patent Office building is now near at hand. Yesterday the portico on the North front was finished, and now there remains but the granite steps on the North front and the pavement on G street to be done, and this building, claimed to be the most handsome in the world, so far as architectural proportions are concerned, will be, when completed, a standing monument to the architectural talent and mechanical ability of the country."

The frontispiece illustrates some of the beautiful and monumental details of the structure and the very 'impressive character of the court sides of the building, and gives a graphic indication of its beauty, symmetry and imposing architecture. While it is not necessary to go so far as to claim the building as the "most handsome in the world," it is generally admitted to be one of the best proportioned, monumental and dignified structures in the national capital, an ornament to the city and a credit to the architect.

W. I. W.

EX PARTE THOMAS.

By ARTHUR W. COWLES, Examiner.

May not the following perhaps reasonable deduction be made from the able papers of Mr. Dodge, Mr. Cox and Mr. Glascock, and certain sections of the Patent Law?

Apparently the Patent Law intends to give a patent in exchange for a patentable addition to the total sum of information possessed by the public, and its manipulative capacity within the art; an addition to the total of known things, and any arrangement of those things within the art. The refusal of a patent is apparently an attempt to protect the public in its possession of such information and manipulation; in its knowledge of such things and such arrangement.

Various sections of the statute state the requirements for the proper preparation and prosecution of an application. Among these is the requirement of sufficient disclosure of the new information involved, Sec. 4888; and the requirement that an applicant "shall make oath that he does verily believe himself to be the original and first inventor" of the matter embodying such information, Sec. 4892.

An apparent deduction from these two requirements is that the law intends that a patent shall be given to the original and first inventor of the matter concerned if he shall properly disclose it to the Office, shall indicate by his petition, his intention to disclose it to the public, and shall fulfill the other statutory requirements. But the original and first inventor may not show evident intention to disclose the matter to the public, or may not show that intention with the due diligence required under certain established interpretation of the law. Therefore apparently the law intends to give a patent to the earliest inventor who with due diligence discloses the invention to the Office in an application for a patent and satisfies the other conditions concerned with an application, including a claim to the invention. The lack of sufficiently early invention, the lack of due diligence in

appearing at the Office, or the lack of a claim to the invention, the lack of presumptive evidence of intention to disclose the invention to the public, as by allowing the application to become forfeited or abandoned; any one of these conditions is sufficient to justify refusal of a patent while the condition exists.

In the case under consideration, an applicant may have satisfied the two formal requirements above as to sufficient disclosure and as to his oath and all other conditions precedent to the granting of a patent, including the avoidance of published art, excepting that the Office may have prima facie unpublished evidence that the claiming applicant is not the original and first inventor. That evidence may be in a forfeited or abandoned application having an earlier filing date than that of the claiming application and disclosing the same or equivalent matter, or disclosing and also claiming it. But a forfeited or abandoned application lacks the presumption that its applicant intends to inform the public of the invention disclosed, or disclosed and claimed.

There may be, however, a pending application which discloses the same or equivalent matter or which both discloses and claims such matter. If the matter is both disclosed and claimed there is consideration of an interference proceeding to determine who is the earlier inventor, the results of such consideration varying according to the specific interference practice existing at the time.

But the pending application may only disclose the invention of the claiming application. It is believed that under some former interference practice it was the custom to suggest to such a disclosing applicant, regardless of his filing date, that he claim the disclosed matter if he wished to contest its ownership; a practice perhaps based on the theory that the disclosing applicant might be in fact the original and first inventor of the matter he merely disclosed, and might have decided to give the information of it to the public without reward; or that if he were not the original and first inventor of it, his knowledge of it might lead him to give the Office published information of it on which the Office could reject the claiming application. Thus the Office believed itself