Statement of the case and opinion of the court.

provement on the Vienna burner, in this, that the gallery was so low as to leave a considerable open space under the dome for the reflected light to pass out in a downward direction, and the dome was supported by slender arms (d), but these arms were attached to the gallery and not to a sleeve fitted on to the wick-tube. It differed, therefore, from Reichmann's in these respects: the chimney was supported on a low gallery instead of the dome itself, and the dome was supported by arms (d) attached to this gallery instead of arms attached to a sleeve on the wick-tube.* Therefore, with these burners before us, all the invention we can discover in Reichmann's burner is the peculiar mode of supporting his dome by slender arms attached to a sleeve fitted on to the wick-tube, and the elevation of the chimney on the outer edge of the dome. The latter peculiarity, as we have seen, is a defect which rendered the burner nearly useless.

The lamp made and sold by the defendants is substantially exhibited (in a sectional view) in Figure 5, which was patented to L. J. Atwood, October 13th, 1863. The dome and chimney are lifted from their place on the cap of the lamp to show the parts.

The allegation of the complainants that the defendant uses Reichmann's invention of peripheral springs (m) around the edge of the dome (h) for steadying his chimney we regard as fallacious. The transformation by a mere trick of words and vague generalities of the arms or supports used by Reichmann to sustain his chimney into peripheral springs may be ingenious, but it cannot stand the test of sober consideration. It is not pretended that Reichmann produced anything more than the arms or supports shown in his original patent, marked k in Figure 1. These were mere slips of

*The Figure 4 shows another form of Stuber's invention. In Figure 3 upright strips of metal embrace the exterior of the chimney so as to make it stand steadily. In Figure 4 an ornamented crown-piece with large openings, reducing the quantity of metal embracing the chimney to not greatly more than what is in the "upright strips of metal," seen in Figure 3, performs the same functions that the last do in the burner illustrated by the said Figure 3. -REP.

Statement of the case and opinion of the court.

metal turned up around the edge of the dome, such as had been in common use for a great period of time. All that Reichmann did new in this regard was to elevate his chimney on the top of the dome. This, in fact, rendered his lamp in the main useless, and the defendant does not copy it, but slips his chimney down around the dome and places it on a platform perforated with holes, which rests upon the cap of the lamp and answers to the bottom or floor of Stuber's gallery. He thus surrounds the flame with the chimney below as well as above the dome and prevents it from being extinguished by drafts of air without obstructing the issue of the light from below the dome. In this respect his lamp is more like Stuber's than Reichmann's. It is true that he keeps his chimney from coming in contact with the dome by surrounding the latter with a fine spiral spring or metallic fringe (m), but this has no resemblance or analogy to the supporting arms appended by Reichmann to his dome.

The question whether the defendant's burner, which is called the Comet, contains the other peculiarity of Reichmann's burner, namely, the supporting of the dome by slender arms attached directly to a sleeve fitted snugly upon the wick-tube, admits of more discussion. The dome was supported by slender arms both in Stuber's and Reichmann's lamps, but in the former the arms were attached to the surrounding gallery on which the chimney rested, and which was slipped over a raised portion of the base (f) to which the wick-tube was affixed and there held in place by a bayonet fastening, whilst in Reichmann's burner the arms were attached to a sleeve, fitted directly upon the wick-tube so snugly as to support the dome and chimney firmly and steadily, as before described. Now, in the Comet burner of the defendant, the arms supporting the dome (k), Figure 5, are attached to the platform before mentioned, which answers the place of the gallery floor in Stuber's burner, and the central portion of which is perforated with an opening or slot (i) so as to pass down over the wick-tube when being placed on the lamp; around this slot or opening the plat form is raised next to the wick-tube in a conical form (g), so

Statement of the case and opinion of the court.

that the top edge of the raised part touches the wick-tube, and thus helps to give steadiness to the dome and chimney. The arms are attached to this raised part. But this raised portion of the platform is very far from being Reichmann's

sleeve, which was a peculiar characteristic in his lamp, and the sleeve arrangement was all that Reichmann pretended to have produced. Its generalization in the reissued patent is simply effected by a dexterous use of words and vague generalities. We are constrained to hold, therefore, that the Comet burner is not an infringement of Reichmanu's original patent or of the invention which is exhibited in his original specification.

It is proper next to inquire as to the bearing of the reissued patent on the question in litigation between the parties. The defences made by the defendant against this reissue are, first, that it was obtained illegally, wrongfully, and by false pretences, and because it seeks to claim things of which Reichmann was not the original and first inventor; secondly, that the original patent itself was void, be

Statement of the case and opinion of the court.

cause the only thing in it which Reichmann had any pretence of inventing was anticipated by a man by the name of Michael Collins, as early as 1843.

The specification of the reissued patent describes the burner of Reichmann substantially as was done in the original patent, being interspersed, however, with observations as to the uses and objects of particular parts, evidently borrowed from subsequent experience and events. The single claim of the original patent is expanded into seven distinct claims. The first three of these claims, taken with the qualifications which they contain, and limited as they must be by the state of the art at the time when the original patent was applied for, amount to precisely the same thing and to no more than the one claim of the original patent. The first is for a combination of only two elements, it is true, the flat wicktube and the dome, which combination is found in both the Vienna and Stuber burners; but a qualification is added, that the combination is to be "under the arrangement substantially as shown and described, so that, while directly con nected with each other, the said parts shall allow light to pass out or be reflected from between them, as set forth." Thus it is made essential to the invention here claimed, not only that the two elements named should be present, but that they should have the arrangement described in the patent, and should have a direct connection with each other, and that the light should be reflected from between them. All these things exist in the Stuber burner except one. In that burner the wick-tube and the dome are not directly connected together. The dome is first connected with the gallery and the gallery with the wick-tube. So that the claim. is reduced to the same thing which was claimed in the original patent. The same may be said of the second and third claims. If they mean anything more than the claim in the original patent they are void. Being identical with that they are needlessly multiplied, and by exhibiting a seeming of claims to which. Reichmann was not entitled they are calculated to confuse and mislead. We think it proper to reiterate our disapprobation of these ingenious attempts to