plied for the same purpose as the plaintiff applies them. Without doubt, he supposed

that he was the first inventor, but that was his mistake, and will not help the case.—The objection is therefore fatal.

I wish it to be understood in this opinion, that though several distinct improvements in one machine may be united in one patent, it does not follow that several improvements in two different machines, having distinct and independent operations, can be so included, much less that the same patent may be for a combination of different machines, and for distinct improvements in each.

The plaintiff upon this intimation agreed to take a verdict against him, declaring his patent void, that he might obtain a new patent, Verdict for the Defendants.

An invention, to be a proper subject for a patent, must be "not known or used before the application." In Great Britain it has been thought necessary that every operation, connected with the invention for which a patent is proposed, should be kept a profound secret, till after the letters patent are obtained. It appears to have been generally supposed, in that country, that if an invention or

discovery ceased to be a secret, the inventor lost his right to a patent, for the thing invented or discovered. In consequence of this supposition, experiments for testing the practicability of running carriages by steam, &c. have been made in the night. And in the case of Wood and others vs. Zimmer and others,* it was stated by Gibbs, C. J. that to entitle a man to a patent, the invention must be new to the world. The public sale of that which is afterwards made the subject of a patent, though sold by the inventor only, makes the patent void. In England the patent is void, if the invention is used before granting the patent. In the United States the patent is void if the thing for which it is granted is in use before the supposed inven

tion.

The patentee must not only be the inventor, but the sole and first inventor of the thing which is the subject of his patent. This will appear from the following report of Tenant's

case.

Mr. Tenant brought his action for an infringement of his patent for a bleaching liquor; several witnesses were called in sup

*Davies? Law of Patents, 429.

port of the patent, who proved the great utility of the invention, and the general ignorance of the bleacher with respect to such bleaching liquor, until after the date of Mr. Tenant's patent. On the other side, a bleacher near Nottingham deposed that he had used the same means for preparing his liquor for five or six years anterior to the date of the patent. He also stated that he had kept his method a secret from all but his two partners, and two servants concerned in prepar ing it. A chymist at Glasgow deposed, that having had frequent conversations with Mr. Tenant on the means of improving bleaching liquor, he had, in one of them, suggested to Mr. Tenant that he would probably attain his end by keeping the lime-water constantly agitated. Mr. Tenant afterwards informed the witness that this method had succeeded. These conversations took place in 1796, and Mr. Tenant obtained his patent in 1798. Lord Ellenborough declared this to be a scandalous patent, equally unfounded in law and justice. The plaintiff was nonsuited on two grounds, first that the process had been used five or six years prior to the date of the patent, and therefore was not a new invention; and secondly, that the chymist had suggested to Mr. Tenant the agitation of the lime water, which was indispensable in the process,

and therefore it was not the invention of the patentee.

This invention being known before the patent to five different persons, it might perhaps also have been considered as both hurtful to trade and mischievous to the state; hurtful to trade, as confining the use of an article to one person for fourteen years, which was before known to five who might, during that time, have disseminated it to the various persons engaged in that trade, if not prevented by the patent; and injurious to the state, as by granting the exclusive benefit of a thing already used by, or known to the public, the patentee would not pay for his privilege in the coin required by the patent, namely, a disclosure of a new invention, having nothing to give as a consideration for his monopoly.

The United States Statute of Feb. 21st, 1793 next points out the mode of proceedidg necessary to be adopted by the patentee, in order to obtain a patent. The inventor of any new and useful art, &c. "Shall present a

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petition to the Secretary of State, signifying "a desire of obtaining an exclusive property “in the same, and praying that a patent may "be granted therefor," and, "it shall and may

"be lawful for the said Secretary of State to "cause letters patent to be made out in the

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name of the United States, bearing test by "the President of the United States, reciting "the allegations and suggestions of the said petition, and giving a short description of "the said invention or discovery, and thereupon granting to such petitioner, or petition66 ers, his, her, or their heirs, administrators, or assigns, for a term not exceeding fourteen "years, the full and exclusive right and liber"ty of making, constructing, using, and vend

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ing to others to be used, the said invention "or discovery, which letters patent shall be "delivered to the Attorney General of the "United States, to be examined, who, within "fifteen days after such delivery, if he finds "the same conformable to this act, shall cer

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tify accordingly, at the foot thereof, and re"turn the same to the Secretary of State, "who shall present the letters patent, thus "certified, to be signed, and shall cause the "seal of the United States to be thereto af"fixed; and the same shall be good and avail"able to the grantee or grantees, by force of "this act; and shall be recorded in a book, to "be kept for that purpose, in the office of the Secretary of State, and delivered to the "patentee, or his order."

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