Turner Counsel Inventors Improvements 1850

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COUNSEL{:'; 4 ~ f

TO

INVENTORS OF IMPROVEMENTS

IN

THE USEFUL ARTS.

BY

THOMAS TURNER,OF TH E MIDDLE TEMPLE.

"'- ,

" . LONDON:F. E L S W O R T ~ ,19, CHANCERY LANE.

! . It-

1850.


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L O N D O N ;

PRINTED BY C. ROWORTH AND SONS, DELL YARD,

TEMPLE DAR.

PREFACE.

THIS little volume is addressed to those whobelong to or are connected with a class at oncedenoted and reproached by t.he term Projector;a class to whom (though curiously slighted byalmost all the political authors from Adaxh

Smith to John Mill) we owe no small portionof our national prosperity; and bu t for whom,as Bentham said, we should now have beenliving on acorns and clothed in raw hides likeour forefathers.

Its aim is-Istly/ To offer some suggestionsas to the cultivation of the fields of usefulInvention, and the settlement of new tracts ofits territory; and, 2ndly, To exhibit the Inventor's legal position in the general featuresof its privileges and conditions, leaving its formsand minutire to be dealt with when the specialcircumstances arrive.

2, P U M P COURT, TEMPLE.


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____ ,_ _ _ __~____~ . il :at ti l .~~

CONTENTS.

-PA aT 1.

PAGE

INvBNTOll.8. 1

Qualifications of perceptive superiority

Inventiveness 2 Classes of 3 Professed 4

5Perseverence and incredulity

Motives of7

10

Fabulous anecdotes of

Study . 11 Practice 12

13Intellectual labour

INVENTIONS.

Value of 13 "ommerciall y ! 14

Consisting in l'epetitlOu and re production of individual things 15,16

Variable art unmarketable 1718 19

Different applications of machinesGener al divisions of machines

Classification 22 23

Province of machinery 24Connection of allied arts 25 Factorie s for 27

Science of 30,31 Books and sources

History of 28

32Failures, use of 33,34Combining experiments


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VI CONTENTS.

INVENTIoNs-contimJ,ed.Limits of, naturalArtificiall1lustrations and analogies of those limitsCalculationExecutionRelative province of execution

REMUNERATION.

Fortunes of inventorsAncient periodMonopoliesHonorary

Patents

Division of JabourJoint associations, and objections to

-PART II.

RIGHTS OF INVENTORS.

Property

Legal right, whether necessaryEffect of secrecy

Power of concealmentLa w of honourPrivacy recognized in lawTrust as to individuals

PATENTS.

CaveatsMode of enteringTitles of patentsModern practiceDisclaimerLocal range ofCost ofAgency

Periods of payment of fees

PAGE

35373941

42-4444

454748

49.505051

52,53

555658

.t. 60616163

646667687071717474

Statistics

REGISTRATION.

CopyrightOrnamental d ~ i g n

Non-ornamentalConflict with patent lawAdvantages of Proper subject for Piracy, imitation Va l ue of useful design

I

SPECIFICATION AND PROCEEDINGS.

The patent a contract Description of invention Claim Passing the patent Patent agents .,

CONCLUSION.

Originality and imitationMachinery and manual labour;

and inventors

~

CONTENTS.

PATENTABLE.

SubjectsApplicationsOmission, simple invention

Principle Research Novelty and utility First in ventor : Previous public use an d knowledgeConfirmation Foreign inventions Wh o may be grantees Obtaining assistance in perfecting invention

vnPAGE.

75767178798081828484858686

87S8899091

91,929394

9495969798

99machine operatives

- - 100


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WORKS REFERRED TO.

Babbage's Economy of Machinery and Manufactures, 6th edit.Baines's History of the Cotton Manufactures.Ure's Philosophy of Manufactures.- Dictionary of Arts, and Supplement.Wheweil. History of Inductive Science.- Phi losophy of Inductive Science.Mill's Logic.

Herschel's Outline of Natural Philosophy.Faraday, Chemical Manipulation.

Young'S Lectures on Natural Philosophy, by Kelland. EdinbUl'gh Review for January, 1849. Fergusson. James, on Architecture.

Wyatt, Report to the Society of Arts OD the Paris Exposition,1849.

Bentham, Letter to Adam Smith. Penny Cyclopredia, (Quadrature) (Symbol). Webster's Law and Practice of Patents.Hindmarch on Patents.Spence on Specifications.

Urting's Foreign Patent Law.Jurist, January, 1849.TUl'Iler on COPywright in Design.

Copyright of Design, 1840.Parliamentary Report. Patents, 1829.

[Signet and Privy Seal offices, 1849.

INVENTIONS.

; ; = . ; - -

PART 1.

.?T H E VA L U E O F I N V E N T I O N .

FIRST in order, as a requisite for the production(i)f valuable inventions, comes a taste for experiment, a love of trying. An extensively practised mode of dyeing calicoes is called " resistwork;" the pattern is printed on with some substance which" resists" the dye, rejects it as acabbage leaf repels the water, which runs off'it,

I

when the whole is immersed in the colour, andafterwards washed; the pattern is not dyed in,but negatively obtained by dying all the rest.I t is the converse process to l ithography, whereinthe impression comes from the parts which donot refuse the ink. Mr. Grouse, the inventorof this beautiful process, was a commercial traveller; but he was fond of dabbling in printingby the fireside. Humphrey Davy (the boy) usedto melt scraps of tin (his native county has been

. a tin country from the time of the Phrenicians)B


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in the candle flame. So Arkwright, the barber,was a scientific barber; his hair dye (the best,we are told, in the country,) was a secret recipe,and may have taught him the superiority ofinvention and the value of exclusive knowledge.

The supply of this article, inventiveness, mustbe obtained from any source that will yield it.All classes send more or less to market; someauthors love to dwell on contributions to prac-tical science of working men-Stephenson andArkwright, Radcliffe, Crompton and Hargreave,and less absolutely, Watt; but the list of engi-neers is spangled here and there with titles andcoronets; a scientific instmment renders usfamiliar with the name of Orrery; the Stanhopeprinting press was a decided step ill advance inthe most intellectual of manufacturing arts;the Marquis of Worcester is conspicuous amongthe inventors of the past, and steam owes some-

thing to Lord Dundonald among those of thepresent. The name of Howard, so illustriousin the eyes of the herald, so revered by thephilanthropist, appears on the patent list" and fora very lucrative one; 100,000 has been namedas the profit of the vacuum pan for sugar boil-ing; and Robert Boyle was, according to theprofessor, at once" father of chemistry andbrother of the Ea rl of Cork." Savans occasion-ally issue from their studies to mingle in thetrain, beginning with one Thales, who, Aristotle

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an

tells us, by his acquaintance with lunar changes,having anticipated a fall in the barometer, made

excellent investment (not, like Murphy, inalmanacs), bu t in wheat; Wollaston scraped around sum of gold out of his platinum working;and Wheatstone was a teacher of philosophical

theory before he patented the electric telegraph.Pursuits, apparently remote from commerciallife, send an occasional amateur ; Lee and Cart-wright, for instance, both improvers of textilemachinery, were clergymen, as were in oldertimes St. Dunstan unrivalled in smithery, andWykeham in masonry and architecture.

In this respect, however, it is doubtful whe-ther the pas t be a criterion for the future; he-terogeneous t he class may have been,. but atime, not probably far distant, will see them adefinite and recognized profession. I f they arewell described as t h ~ s ewho make war upon

nature, and fulfil the command to subdue theearth, they must, to push their conquests fur-ther, devote themselves to the pursuit. Regulartroops alone conduct modern warfare ; the daysof individual heroism are gone, and giants onthe earth in these days are few. Nay, evensoldier is a generic term; each weapon has itsown class of employers; and the pistol, therifle, the musquet, the cannon, have their spe-cific regiments. And even now, the amateur'must make great exertions to come up with the

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knowledge of the operative or manufacturer.Th e latter, again, is deficient in th e analyzingand combining power of th e professed inventor;while th e extent of practical knowledge requiredin each subject will probably divide this latterclass into branches, like the portrait, th e historic,th e landscape, th e decorative departments offine art.

Two moral qualities essential to success inother studies are eminently so in this; and theirpredominance in the Anglo-Saxon cha racter hasha d lUuch share in giving that race so high arank as productive artists. Courage is one,perseverance the other; both perhaps are elements of wba t is termed energy, or, in th e vernacular tongue, "pluck." Newton said hemade his discoveries by " always think ing abou tthem." " I f we do but go on," said a lover ofmountain scenery, "some unseen path will openamong th e hills." And Lord Eldon assured astudent that if he did justice to his profession,his profession would do justice to him. Wattstaked his all on his idea of a steam-engine,and might well quake at times; even Smeatoncould not see the value of the project, an d counselled him against following it. An d a letter ofhis describes his" bad health as resulting fromthe operations of an anxious mind, th e naturalconseq uence of staking everything on th e castof a die, for in that light I look upon every pa -

TH E V.A.LUE OF INVENTION.

tent that has no t received th e sanction of repeated success." While he trembled, however,he did not waver; and we know - an menknow-the result. John Hunter's devotion tohis science had to supply, it is said, th e defidency of slender, or at least moderate capacity,

an d did supply i t; because on sea or land, at th e quiet bed-side, or th e glowing battle-field, in th e closet, th e library, th e lecture theatre, he was always th e surgeon, on th e watch to increase a1isImowledge of the human frame, or employ i ~ l i nth e exercise of his profession. Every objectthat occurs must be cross-examined, to learn something from i t suited to th e purpose in hand,every stone turned that may have knowledgeunder it. Glauber 's rule, it is said, was to examine what everyone else threw away; and it isobvious that th e inventor must sllcceed by seeing deeper into, 01' farther off, o r more widely,

or from a new point of view, th e same objectsthat are visible to all. Sir J. Herschel prettilydescribes th e various parts which iron plays inth e thoughts of different men. With th e vulgaran incombustible. The chemist not only burnsit rapidly, but. esteems it, from its affinity tooxygen, a decidedly inflammable element. I tis th e poet's emblem of rigidity, th e engineer'Smost plastic material; the gaoler values 'it asan obstruction, th e electrician as th e freest ofcommunicators. He might have added, the


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physician, who knows it as a means of invigoration, and the warrior Whonl it enables to devastate and destroy, while the astronomer wouldfind its highest interest in its presence in themeteoric stone, to him a sample of the mineralogy of distant worlds and systems. So Cromp

ton witnessed a process of rolling iron; he sawin it a mode of spinning cotton filaments. SirR. Seppings observed the framework of a Swissbridge; lle adopted the principle of it into thedockyard. and revolutionized shipbuilding byhis diagonal framing, the substitution, viz. ofsystems of triangles, the strongest rectilinearcombination, for the square, which, at everystrain of the ship, I'ad:ed itself to pieces.

More than this, the inventor must not onlysee himself, but teach others to see. Arkwrightcompleted his machine, but all his Herculeanstrength of mind was needful to ge t it adopted.

Harvey saw the Use of the mechanism of thearteries, but the medical world, for years after,could not see it. Stephenson, in our own days,brought his railroads into disrepute by theten miles an hour which he promised theHouse of Commons; even his supporters hungback, feeling that a speed of eight miles an hourwas suffiCiently incredible. And as to persevel'ance, we will merely point to the Eddystonelighthouse, thl'ee times completely erected fromits foundation; and the third attempt required to

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vault the arch at Pont y Pridd . The spider'swebb, recorded in the history of Robert Bruce,was reconstructed thrice three times.

We see inventive genius, in some cases, pur'suing its course in mere exuberance of activity, in

wanton self-gratification; in others, harnessed tothe will, blinkered by the judgment, and limitedto the straight monotonous path that conductsto utility and advantage. The disciples of thes'chools of beauty and harmony are ever readyt'(l)point to the superiority of the former. "N o_lay fine work of art," according to Fllseli,, ~ was ever produced but for its own sake." Themercenary reward may follow without defiling;poet and painter may sell their produce, bu tmust not produce to sell. The order is notaltogether dissimilar in the useful arts. Thedesire of fame and fortune canno t wholly createthe power of surpasffing the previous state ofthe art; but it can, and. more so probably thanin ornamental matters, nourish and direct it.The invention of Radcliffe, who holds an hohourable place in the ranks of textile machinists,resulted from a desperate effort to avert a fearful calamity, which his imagination beheld impending over the empire. Cotton spinning hadarrived at a high technical perfection and commercial success, but the sister art of weavinglagged behind, and this he feared, crippling themanufacture, would deprive England of her


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preeminence in useful art. " O n the 2nd ofFebruary, 1802," says Mr. Baines, "he ' shuthimself up in his mill" with an assortment ofworkmen-weavers, joiners and turners, someto make the 100m, some to use it. One ofthem, known among his workillates as " t h econjuror," was a man whose dissipated characte r unfitted him to reap for llimself the fruitsof a mind fertile in resource,.and to this Johnson is due, probably, the main share of creditfor the result. In this retirement two years ofexperiment passed, and then Radcliffe issuedfrom it the pOssessor of a warp-dressing machine, valuable enough to satisfy and repayhim. Again: Cartwright's power loom was anattainment deliberately gone in quest of, andby a man unconnected with the 100m by interest, and unacquainted with it from curiosity.His own account is, that he happened to be in company with some cotton manufactur ers; he heal'd them canvass the value of sllch an engine, and pronounce with I'egret its impracti_ cability. Cartwr ight adopted the first opinion, and rejected the second; three motions, re. peated again and again, he said, were the whole operation, and what was this compared to the feats already performed by springs and levers; if machinery can play chess, surely itcan weave. (The automaton chess player wasnot then known to be, like the Trojan horse, to


enclose a human inmate; although, however,the machine did no t really play, the ingenuityrequired merely to make the varied movementsof the pieces may bear out Cartwr ight's analogy.) He conned the subject over, hired acarpenter and smith, and then a weaver, to setthe loom model, which, sure enough, turned outa piece of cloth, coarse sailcloth, he says, bu tit must have dazzled his 'eyes more than clothof gold. At a previous period the imperfectionof hand-spinning had been the obstacle to theprogress of textile art. Wyatt perceiving this,had for years laboured to supplant the humanarm by an inexhaustible untiring operator, bu tit required a sterner will to succeed in this, andthe rude, rugged, unscrupulous nature of Arkwright, who followed him, triumphed, like Peterthe Great, over every obstacle, natural and artificial, amassed a huge, fortune for himself, andadded vigour and influence to the whole nation . .As another instance of a certain degree of accident in the inventor's choice of an aim, takeJacquard, whose thoughts were first directedtowards weaving machinery by the perusal of alist of premiums offered by the Adelphi Societyof Arts (note, however, that he was by trade astraw platter, and .the ar t is next of kin toweaving). An d again, it was a lucky chancefor the world that sent Watt a model steamengine to repair, droppi ng a seed into the soil

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of a mind just fitted to receive it, by the studyof the laws of vaporization.

We spoke of energy as an union of toil anddaring, that either of these, when isolated, isinsufficient, is easily seen. The handloom weaver's shuttle flies to and fro throughout the

long day, and his wages save him from starvation, and do litt le more. The labour of thesempstress is incessant, but its fatal facilityallows universal competition to reduce its value.It is only from the labour tha t must havemental activity and attention to direct, andacquired skill to vary it, that wealth or discovery can be looked for. As little is to behoped from mere speculation. "Blind intuition," says an Edinburgh reviewer, "has nowlittle hope of success in the work of invention,mere chance still less; it never, indeed, had somuch as popular reputation gave it credit for."Bu t

the gambler invests his money in thelottery, when mere reckoning would show himthat the chance is mathematically adverse tohim, that his share cannot possibly be worthwhat he pays for the ticket; and a large proportion of would-be inventors follow theirschemes with as little circumspection or heedof reasonable probability. Mr. Babbage's expressions are strong. " I n no trade or profession," says he, "is there so much quackery,so much ignorance of the scientific principle,


and of the history of the art, as is to be metwith among mechanical projectors; the selfconstituted engineer, dazzled with the beautyof some, perhaps, really original contrivance,assumes his new vocation with as little conjecture that previous instruction, that thoughtand painful labour, are necessary to its successful exercise, as does the statesman or senator;"he urges on such persons, that the faculty ofinvention of mechanical contrivance is not rare,and tha t " the merit and success of those whohave succeeded in such affairs has arisen from,and was almost entirely due, to the unremittedperseverance with. which they. concentratedupon the successful machine the skill and knowledge which years of study. had matured."

A poet says of his own pursuit:

" The practised hand of art to flingWith rapture o'er th' accUjitomed string,To seem to wander, yet to bendThe whole to one harmonious end;These are the tasks that ripened age imposes,Which makes our day more glorious ere it closes"

I t is only the practised hand that becomesfamiliar with the means and capabilities of art;only in the practised mind that the trains ofideas follow in their order unconsciously, forat the moment of invention the means mustbe forgotten, as a graceful dancer is unmindfulof his steps and positions. The theory of a


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subject must be studied, the practice must beknown, but neither can be acquired at the timeof composition; he who would blend them successfully must have both at his fingers' ends.The so-called accidental discoveries in ar t orscience, when accurately looked into, show, as

has been observedin

almost every case, acasual circumstance only so far operating as itsets in motion a train of thought in an alreadywell-stored mind, and that train of thought,too, has, in most cases, been elaborated withpainful diligence from its rude original into fulldevelopment.

The fact is, that half these accidental narratives and anecdotes, like Newton's apple andSmeaton's oak (the type. of his lighthouse), arewhat the historians call myths, descriptions,posterior to the event, of what was thougbtplausible and natu ral, to supply the absence ofmore solid information. The Greeks judgedthat the distaff deserved an author, and theydeclared that Minerva was the in ventress.Our forefathers, not seeing how certain mattersof masonry or earthwork could be managedby human engineers, decided them to be thedevil's bridge, the devil's dyke, and so forth.Moreover, there have been motives for concealment by the inventor of his appliances andways of working, and when the wane of superstition deprived them of the veil of super-


natural agency, the nearest substitute was tocall their art genius, and repudiate rules ofoperation.

Be this as it may, such accidents are littlelikely to occur in time to come; "within thelimits of the visible horizon research has left,nulle terre sans seigneur;" new gold mines, ifany, must be stumbled on in distant and un ..trodden regions; industry, integrity and skillmust find the gold that is to be found at home.A retired tradesman, whose business had madehim rich, was wont to "thank God he neverwas a schemer," but his exultation, if appliedto legitimate invention, was il l founded. Arational idea of an improvement, followed withthe ardour and attent ion which he spent on atrade; made the subject of his daily records, hisleisure musings, his conversation, his dreams;would, probably, in the long run, have crowned

him with equal success. ' A man may easilyconvince himself how small the bulk of intellectual matter employed in the idea is, compared with that spent on the execution, byfirst picturing, in his mind's eye, a pile ofbuilding, or a bouquet of flowers, and then,pencil in hand, setting to work to embodyit into an actual existence of black lead andpaper.

But, before incurring the expense of !lindand talent and skill upon the execution of an


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idea (and the risk of failing to execute it at all,a contingency always to be included ill theestimate), it is well to consider the promise ofremuneration when the idea is executed, andthet'e will be two branches of this head ofinquiry, viz., the cOmmercial and the phys icalnature of the end in question. We pu t thecommercial first, supposing the invention tobe taken up as matter of business, 110t ofpastime nor scientific practice in overcomingobstacles, not to be such little contrivancesas may intend no more than the a n ~ u s e m e n tof a man's own leisure, or his friend's. Insuch cases, like field sports, he who makesthe exertion has in it his reward; if he is unreasonable enough to expect ulterior advantage, he will probably be disappointed.

Now the commercial merit of the objectsought, will be either superiority in the quality,or economy, that is, increase of proportionalquantity over the results hitherto obtained.Superiority is fj'equently a concomitant resultof improved art, but usuaHy a subordinate one;seldom it is predominant, sometimes absent, or even deficient. I f a mirror is required for a telescope, the artist must put forth all his ability to obtain a single article in its utmost accuracy and perfection; superiority alone is sought, and at any price. Bu t in most manufactures machineryis employed to fabricate an article for cheap-


ness-sake; it does, indeed, from its uniformity,also do its work better, for in very many thingsuniformity is perfection. In a yard of linen,for instance, however stout all the other portions are, if anyone place be defective, it willrend 'there, and the whole be pronounced bad.

And it is a curious proof of this accuracy ofmachine work, that some kinds of lace are tooregular for the market; it proves that they arenot hand made; so a little apparatus is attachedto the machine to give a capricious twitch nowand then, an d distort the boles a little. Such apreference of untrue work is quite exceptional,and would only occur in matters partaking ofthe nature o f ornament; 'in useful art, a crookedline is always a blemish.,' In printing, again,superiority is an accident, the primary obj ect is tomultiply copies cheaply ; these copies, however,are much more legible than manuscript, and in

. some cases, as sometimes 'with interminable lawdocuments, p rinting is resorted to, at an increaseof cost, to enable the eye to follow them withless effort. Sometimes the product while beingcheapened is -deteriorated. The modern pape rmachinery, which so marveHously transmutesthe vile remnants on which it feeds, does no tsupply the peculiar texture which the fine artsrequire, and drawing paper is still made bymanual labour.

The economy which 'renders invention p r o f i t ~

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able, results mostly from the multitudinous re .petition of the action of one fixed set of appa-ratus. A piece of cloth is, as it were, an im-mense number of impressions of, or deposits by,the action of a loom. The increasing develop-ment of internal and international intercourseand civilization, is always extending the compassof influence of this principle; similar wants andta:;tes are communicated to all parts of theglobe, and each part, as commerce and ex.,change increase, obtains a wider market forits own production, and has an inducement tomultiply these indefinitely. Thus the Englishmanufacturer spins, weaves and prints calicQfor the world; for in 1840 the annual quantity ofcalico printed by two houses was stated beforea committee of the House of Commons ateleven miles, while other kinds of commoditiesprecede, as Mr. Babbage remarks, our most

enterprising travellers. When in the interiorof Africa Clapperton's meat was sent him fromthe royal table of a native Sultan, it was servedup in a white earthenware basin of Englishmake. And at another time the same traveller'srecollections were excited by pewter ware ofgenuine London make, and duly marked andstamped accordingly.

The repetition of the process or action of themachine may either strike off an integral articleeach time, or a continuous line or surface or

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bulk. As to the former, it is well known thatsuch matters as buttons, pins, needles, &c.,trivial as they are, individually supply th e sub-jects of the most important patents; a minutechange in them may have great commercialvalue, as was stated by more than one witnessat

the patent committee; andthe

latter classmay be illustrated by the extent and conse-quence of the single department of cotton fac-tories employing (if we include their allied anddependent businesses of engineering, carrying,shipping, &c.) no contemptible portion of thewealth, intelligence, and industry of the king-d Q m ~Well might the historian of the cottontrade exclaim in wonder at the capital, the edi-fice, the population, associated only to pick andarrange, twist and plat an insignificant vege-table fibre. I t was hardly a jest when ours waspronounced to be the age of calico.

On the other hand, Nil', Webster, in his evi-dence, doubted the commercial success of al-most any steam engine patent. The number ofapplications of such an invention must, from itscost and magnitude, be few; and almost everyindividual requires, like the plan for a building,a degree of modification to the particular pur-pose in view, and again by its working is sureto .furnish hints for improvement in some partof the configuration of its details. Th e d ~ g l ' e ein which a permanent unalterable form may


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prudently be given to the pattern, varies evenin the same kind of artificial product. A singlecopy of a document, even if the printed character were desirable, would go to the ornamental penman ; a dozen copies would pay fora lithographic stone ; 500 must go to the printer,

whose type however is not finally spent on thatjob, bu t decomposed and applied to futureworks. A steel plate or a stereotype is onlyresorted to when the number of impressions islarge enough to occupy the metal "e n perpe-tuite," an d where future alterations are inconsiderable or wholly renounced.

With reference to the kinds into which artificial processes are divisible, the most systematic treatment of the subject will be foundin Mr, Babbage's work on Manufactures. Onemain distinction separates, I st. The poweraffording machines; and hel'e one section m u ~ tbe set apar t for animals, which (as horse-power)often precede, and are used to measure forcessubstituted for them; and then the section ofinorganic agents will consist of elementals,wind and watermiIls, and of automatics, suchas those of steam, gunpowder, galvanism, illwhich we seem to make power, or rather wecall it forth from a dormant state, and, unlikeHotspur's assistants, it comes when we call it.In the elemental section we find the force'sweeping down the channel, or over the coun-

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try, and merely arrest it and change its direction by the windmill, sailor waterwheel. And,2ndly. Having from any of these sources anamount of power under control, we expend iton saving us time and trouble; thus the copperwire 'supplies no electricity, bu t conveys it fromplace to place, to write our letters for us.Having got the power into the waterwheel oraxis of the sails, the millstones grind by it thecorn. Mr. Babbage's 3rd section, arts thateconomize natural properties, can hardly be coordinated with these. Glass making might bean example of it, in which the rubbish thatstrews the shore, th e seaweed, Byron's emblemof worthlessness and neglect, aids us to rivalnature's choicest rarities, and with the abundant plenty of the furnace to outvie the crystalof the cave.

We shall avail ourselves in part of the same

author's more elaborate' classification of machines (and tools, which admit of no definiteline of demarcation from them), according tothe services they render. The heads are, 1st.Those that ~ store up power, the fly-wheel.2nd. Those which regulate it, the steam governor. 3rd. Economists of material, the saw(at least, in comparison with the hatchet, forit is itsel f inferior to a blade which under machine power slices off a veneer without th e lossof a grain of saw dust). 4th. Economists of

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time, as when hammers are arranged to strikea rapid succession of blows while the iron ishot. Another proverb is still open to verification by some future engineer, who may setsteam power to turn aU the hay while the sunshines; science has already, by its barometer,

gone far toward telling when it will shine.5th. Clocks, which take in power in the mass,and retail it out in small parcels. 6th. Timesavers in certain physical cllanges in bodies, asbleaching, tanning, seasoning timber, &c. I tis worth notice, that nature does not alwayslike to be hurried, and the result exhibits aninferiority to that obtained by leaving her toher own pace. Our shoes are not made nowwith the leather of the good old times; and thesame chlorine which so rapidly takes all thestains out of the linen takes out some of thestrength. It is not certain that the long years

spent on some of our old buildings had not(like the slow growth of a timber tree) a sharein giving them durability. 6th. A result obtained too great for the mere muscular powerof man. Mr. B. instances a Bramah's press,by which on one occasion a workman, exertinga pressure equal to 1500 atmospheres, burst athree-inch thick iron cylinder. This is reallyonly a variety of the 1st class, both being casesof accumulation. 7th. As the human arm failsin power, so human sense unassisted fails in


delicacy; hence means of filtering, singeingoff the down of lace, and again, magnifyinginstruments for the eye. 8th. Counting machines, inanimate book-keepers and historians.The most splendid instance is the calculatingengine, which,in its fullest development, is due

to Mr. Babbage. There are many minor ones,as the gas meter, and the telltale, which ensuresthe fulfilment of the watchman's rounds. 9th.Means of identity in copies, and accuracy inall cases. We can only notice briefly the artsof reproduction; printing on surface; moulding on form; copying with variation of size, asthe pentagraph; of form, as the lathe (allied towhich is the printing cylinder); and of reversedsymmetry, as when a right-handed shoe-lastguides the cutting of its 'fellow. All these arehighly illustrative of the importance of repetition as aground for employing machinery, andin most of them the cost of the original infinitely exceeds that of a copy. One engravedsteel plate has yielded 80,000 impressions, andthe last was perfectly interchangeable with anyof its predece.'3sors. I f 80,000 copies be i n s u f f i ~cient, Perkins' process, or the electrotype art,will copy the metal pla'te itself, and supply any

~multiple of 80,000; and where less minute delivery is needful, even this estimate is exceeded. I t is said that in the Times office a

....

i


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2322 TH E VALUE OP INVENTION.

type does not get its discharge till it has gonethrough its exercise fourteen millions of times.

We need not dwell longer on this topic; allclassifications of this kind will be found arbitrary and defective, and a recent report byMr. Wyatt to the Society of Arts will show

the difficulty experienced in arranging satisfactorily the contents of the Paris Expositionof Art and Manufacture. The most comprehensive of our treatises on those subjects is,perhaps, Ure's Dictionary, which merely follows an alphabetic plan. The different objectsto be attained are variously combined in thesame machine, and generally the same contrivance would find a place under different headsof the preceding arrangement, according to theaspect under which it was viewed. A clockmight be shifted to the class of counters, oragain to the regulators (the pendulum regu

lating the spring or weight.) The fly-wheel ismore of a regulator than an accumulator, andso on. It is a serious omission too, that structUl'es are neglected, though, as material products and producers of art, they run side by sidewith machines. The vice, which is at least athird hand to the workman, Mr. Babbageclasses with the machines; it is, however, atemporary structure. Other divisions wouldbe into movables and immovables; enclosures,as all kinds of factory buildings; supports,


as the framework of machinery, vessels, &c.Some curious arrangement of the arts of civi

,-II

lization will be found in a recent work on

I architecture by Mr. Fergusson.The broad division, however, is that of pro

ducers and consumers of power; the former, fewin kind, and not numerous in individuals-thelatter infinite in number and variety; and whenone of each, as a steam engine and a powerloom is united, we complete the circle of operation; we put in the power (the coal) at one end,and we get the motion at the other exerted uponthe threads of cotton or wool, which, after a certain amount of jerking and struggling, settledown at last into an orderly community. Andhere occurs the inflexible law which so many asc.:hemer has struggled against, viz. that whatever force you pu t in, whatever sum you payinto the bank; that amount, and no more, canyou draw out again; nay, more, there is a deduction for expenses of managemen t, for friction,

\ &c. Bu t for this unlucky rule, how many a carriage w o u l ~have run without horses; how manya perpetual motion would have rewarded andjustified its pursuer! The variety of the latterof the classes keeps increasing, as human work

) manship constantly throws off fresh branchesi of ar t to add to its domain; division of labour

keeps reducing a man's occupation in its sco-pe,

~ till it becomes the mere repetition of a very few


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movements, and the workman fails, from theimpossibility of attaining the unceasing monotony required, or of increasing his speed of production beyond the limit of human action andsensation, and he resigns the occupation to thecreature of the engineer. This transfer is Some

times long deferred. Thus the irregularities ofareas of ground render agriculture almost in -accessible to stearn: a steam plough is still(1850) only a theo ry; and in the s c ~ v e n g e r ' sdepartment, the street sweeping machines displace the broom slowly. Here, however, themachine may be capable of improvement, andthe labour so displaced is of the lowest price,and sometimes charitable or pauperial. Themerits and demerits of a new construction maybe so nearly balanced, that accidents of ownership and custom may incline the beam in favourof or against its adoption; and the novelty gains

a footing without expelling its predecessor. TheHansom's cab is very unlike the four-wheeler,yet they occupy the stand in common.

To judge of practicability in any case, thestate of the allied arts must enter into account:Steam locomotion was for long a failure; it succeeded when it had roads as hard and true asits own anatomy. And the history of the cottontrade shows the curious action and reaction ofcarding and ~ p i n n i n g ,weaving, dying, andprinting on each other; each alternately taking

TH E V ALUE OF INVENTION.

the lead in the career of invention. Besides,each new development of the machine calls foradditional skill in its construction, and thisagain makes the process more perfect. Mr.Babbage illustrates the influence of copyingprocesses on one another by the instance of a

book; this is an impression of a stereotype, thelatter is reproduced from a plaster cast, thatagain moulded on the type, the type cast in acopper matrix, and parts of this are obtainedfrom a steel punch.

So successful has been our engine making,aided by our peculiar abundance of mining produce, and under the stimulus of the demand ofthe manufacturers, that we seem likely to become machinists for our neighbours also, theprohibition against exportation having beenwisely repealed; and that too in the palmy daysof protectionism, notwithstanding the threatthat 'We should thus forge weapons for the destruction of our own manufactures (see a parliamentary report, and the comments of Mr.Babbage): How wide a field this opens to theskill of the inventor is obvious, and what aninfluence it may have on the resources of thenation. The intimate connexion of the textile.manufactures with the steam engine is a markedexample of th e relation previously alluded to,

'f'

which unites modes of acquiring with modes ofusing power; and it is curious, that the same

c


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26 TH E VALUE OF INVENTION ~

year (1769) witnessed theb,iJ1;hoftwo greatpatents, Watt's and that of Arkw.riglft's: thereis another connection, howeyer,;Q( a very influential nature, that with the huwa,n m ~ c h i n e r y .The industry and discipline of .the o p e r ~ t i v e ,which so materially contributes. to our manufac

turing pre-eminence,~ s

the result of cultivation.Arkwright mayor may not have borrowed hismachine, but his real source of affiuence, andbest title to fame, was the invention and execution of the factory (the social engine), in opposition to the opposition or prejudice, violence orinertness, which had often proved insurmountable, when every physical difficulty was overcome. Occasionally, however, a strike has stimulated a manufacturer to contrive some manageable substitute for his refrQ.ctory workmen, andthe opposition and ridicule encountered by aprojector may serve to test the soundness of hisprinciples, and consolidate his straggling ideasinto definite form. The relations between machinists, capitalist and operative constitute thefactory system, under which the dense massesof wealth, skill and population are aggregatedin Lancashire. Sometimes a single establish .ment repairs, or even makes its own instruments on the spot, retaining upon its staff anable engineer to devise new improvements suggested by the working result, or adopt themfrom extraneous sources.

27TH E V:ALUEOF INVENTION.

W.e have b ~ ' l ; n .speaking of the objects of invention, a.nd .now come to the means to be employed, and.on this head, the first rule must be,before commeneing the future, to look into thepast.. Too much stress cannot be laid upon it." I t is a maxim equally to be regarded in ar t

and science,that

the man who aspires to fortuneor to fame by new discoveries must be contentto examine with care the know ledge of his con- .temporaries, or to exhaust his efforts in attempting again what he will most probably findhas been better done before." N ot a whit lesspositive on this head is the Reviewer: the iden

tical, mechanism which has broken down adozen times in other hands is once more madethe subject of new patents by men not onlyignorant of scientific . principle, which wouldteach them their folly, bu t even of the fact, thatthe self-same ideas have long since been workedout and abandoned as impracticable; little acquainted with the art, they attempt to do betterthan others that which they do not know howto do a ~all," and the writer enforces his arguments by examples. Some equally appropriateillustration will be found in the vague futileendeavours, by 'men with mathematical attainments of the slenderest character, to square thecircle, see article Quadrature in Penny Cyclopredia. Whe the r the precept, if s""allowed, willminister any ~ l 1 r a t i v a . e f f e c tis doubtful; Falstaff

"


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T H E VALUE OF I N VENTION.8

reminds us that "wisdom crieth out in thestreets and no man regardeth her." And thelesson may be worth purchase, even at the costof some experience, if the . osses and mishapsthus uselessly incurred do not waste. too much

. of the Promethean fire of the inventor, or drain

his purse too deeply, and above all,if it

dono t

quell his own confidence, and preclude him fromthe confidence of others by permanently marking his schemes for failures and himself for adreamer.

Bu t it is not only his predecessors' learningthat must be mastered, he must diligent1y acquaint himself with all the accessible seiencethat exists in his own time. To do this completely is indeed impossible, and even as to theattainable extent, the subject is too long andtoo difficult to be treated of here. Nor has theprocess of invention ever been methodized intoa systematic form; the materials for such a worklie widely scattered throughout th e provincesof mechanics and chemistry on the one hand,and logical and metaphysical science on theother. There are no schools for contrivancing,no professors of the art of useful design. Eachman learns for himself to build up into a whole,wheel and crank with joint and screw; or tosever an entire mass into surface and interior,and apply to each the precise substance required.Sometimes instruments gradually wear them-

TH E VA L U E OF INVEN' l ' ION.

selves down to their exact proportion by innumerable small experiences and alterat ions. Nopoint, for instance, could be assigned for theinvention of a modern carriage, it has graduaUy.been trimmed into its present shape from'theclumsy bone-shaking engines that satisfied the

luxury of out Saxon forefathers; as ll;mguage,by unnoticed abbreviations, is always droppingsome superfluity, and always -enlarging its capability by stealthy importations. The analogy between machine and mathematical notation is very close; the symbols of the latter,almost always, according to De Morgan, intheir earlier stages, err in over-distinction;they effect their purpose, bu t incur a degreeof superfluous friction, which practice teachesthe subsequent investigator to pare away, tillhe reaches a minimum of construction in themachin'e, or signification in the ~ s y m b o l s .Thewhole length of this journey may, in somecases, be traversed by a single individual, aswhen Davy proceeded step by step to the production of the miner's lamp. The passage of thegas through a small tube extinguished the flame,then the tube was shortened again and again;as one of these stopped ignition, equally so

. would two, or a dozen, or any number side byside, till this became equivalent to a piercedmetallic plate, and the plate differed in nothingmaterial from a wire net, the form finally em


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30 T H E VALUE OF INVENTION.

ployed by him, and which (modified and im-proved) is still in operation and repute.

On these and similar subjects valuable assistance is obtainable by consulting works whichtreat of invention with reference to intellectualoperations, to observing facts and obtaining them

by experiment, constructing therefrom and verifying theories. Herschel's well-known littlevolume is at once concise, lucid and agreeable.Whewell's Philosophy of Physical Science ismore elaborate, and the companion work on itshistory contains much that is applicable to thepresent subject. Thus, to the case of a fundamental principle, destined to revolutionize awhole province of human knowledge, first hitupon in some obscure corner, and unappreciatedby the finder, and who, if he knew its value,knew not how to cut and polish the roughdiamond; then neglected, for a generation

perhaps,' before it takes its place as a recognized element of doctrine, while a further peliodmust be spent in developing its details and following out its consequences; we find parallels inmechanic art; thus it was the science of Wattthat advanced the steam engine from obscurityto the foremost position among useful apparatus, and from that time to the present i ts 'fabrication and development has employed theingenuity and study of the engineer. Minormatters are, it is true, less tardy, their growth


indeed is sometimes precocious. The ardour ofmodern speculation fastens upon some strikingnovelty, a certain amount of utility is prettyclearly shown, and this is liberally multipliedby the imagination. No suspicion occurs ofthose qualifying disadvantages which attend

almost every natural material, and the noveltyis soon on sale in every street and canvassed inevery conversation. This is, of course, followedby a recoil, and ultimately the invention subsidesinto the channel of employment to which it isreally suited, the previous rage for it havingserved the useful purpose of a wide course ofexperiment on its capabilities for all sorts ofservices. Mill's Logic is another work, whichmay be referred to for a masterly exposition ofthe mode of dealing with natural objects andphenomena, their properties, laws and relations.Much a l ~ ois to be gathered from treatises onthe fine arts, such as Reynold's Lectures; thus,the habit he recommends for cultivation, of beingever on the look out for hints to appro'priateand work up into shape for the special object inpursuit, picking them up in highways andhedges, and adding them to the store of associations which constitute a man's mental capital,is available in its full extent. Haydon, indeed,justly ridicules the affectation of this-by theCaracci, seated at the dinner table with penciland paper ostentatiously at hand, that they might


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32. TH E VALUE OF INVENTtoN.

drop knife and fork to catch a fleeting glance or attitude. And though a man (like Brindley) lie abed by the day, diving in his brain for ideas of aqueducts and bridges, he need not spring up in ecs tacy from his couch, like the literary lady who used at midnight to summon her attendant,

" Mary! Mary! a thought! a thought !" Cer-tain it is, however, tha t some valuable ideas have come from singular bir thplaces; Lee dis-

. cerned his future stocking frame in the play ofhis sweetheart's fingers as she sa t knitting.Useful hints have been borrowed from veryuseless toys, even metaphysicians are, by DugaldStewart, recommended to pay attention to thetricks of conjurors. And, as before said, it isby the wrecks of a man's previous errors, andthose of others, ifhe be wise enough to see them,that a man's course may best be shaped; roundevery schemer" much embryo, much abortion

lies," but this should be a meansof

approxi.mation, not a chaos, as we draw a straightline by the aid of the bent ones which remain onthe paper. Mr. Babbage found, as the resultof a wide range of observation, in the history .of every article and fabric, a series of failureswhich had led the way to success. Comparethe observations of the Edinburgh Review onthis head, "To know where the barrier lies, willtell us where lie the domains of richest promiseyet,unrufHed by discoverers, to know what it is

TH E VALUE OF INVENTION. 33 '

will guide us in selecting aids by which it maybe broken or overleapt. Hooke says, wheneverhis researches were stopped by an insurmount-able difficulty, he was sure to be on the brink ofan important discovery." Some instructions forthe collection of objects of natural history, issued

a few years ago by the British Museum, afterrejecting the ordinary kinds of minerals androcks as specimens in themselves, set an expressvalue on the commonest fragments of stone andsoil, having their history appended to them, thesituations of the strata from which and to whichthe changes of nature had brought them; whenthus connected with and made to illustrate sci-entific facts, they were highly interesting.

It is not likely that one experiment will suf-fice. it must be the combination of them. Thereis an amusing account in one of Cooper's novelsof the proceedings of an American wild bee-

hunter. He catches a bee and confines itunder a half opake glass, through which hecan just discern the action of his captive. IIIthe dull light the bee becomes tranquil, ,andshortly after applies himself to a little store ofhoney, treacherously placed under the glass.The hunter, watching the insect till its honeypouches are filled, and then releasing i t, care-fully observes its flight, which, after a prelimi-nary circle or two, is in a straight line home.The direction of the swarm to which the bee

c5


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3534 THE VALUE OF INVENTION.

has just carried his load is clear, bu t not so thedistance; it may be miles away, and with allsorts of impediments between. The huntertherefore, moving on a little, waylays anotherunsuspecting insect, and cheats it into giving himsimilar information. Now, without knowing

the more abstruse points of trigonometry, it iseasy to see that the lines of flight of the twobees will intersect at an angle exactly wherethe honeycomb is situate; provided alwaysthat the said bees firstly and secondly hereinbefore mentioned belong to the same establishment. I f not tant-mie.u:c for the bee hunter, hestands upon both, as 'the card players say; hehalf knows the whereabouts ,of two swarms,which the next two bees entrappM roay reduceto c e r t a i n t y . , ~

Such works as Ure's Philosophy of Manu.",:factures and Young's Lectures 011 Natural

Philosophy, are useful compendia of artificialinstruments and processes, and convenientlyarranged, but in no instance absolutely completewith reference even to the then existing stateof things, while the store, however well selected,of an inventor's knowledge, unless constantly'\'eplenished, will leave him unacquainted withthe contemporary degree of perfection. A regular perusal of some of the scientific periodicals will aid in this, and especially if the planof noting up (as lawyers say) all the new cases,


referring each to its place in his general' system,and observing the addition made by it to thatbranch of art. Some leading principles, whichmight serve merely as a starting point for thes.tudent of mechanical invention, were well put1forward in the article already cited in the Edin

burgh Review, and we shall here give a briefindication of them.-Invention is bounded, and so obtains a definite form by the restraint of two

kinds of limitary forces or principles; first,those arising from the natural qualities ofbodies; and, secondly, from the manner inwhich these are dealt with and applied to cons t l ' u ~ t i o n ;the latter are progressively to beeluded or overcome, the former are inflexible.Thus, among the former class, the subjection ofall bodies to the liquefying agency of heat putsa limit to our power of melting and fusing substances; ' the same heat which liquefies the subject of our operation is equally irresistible byany material we can apply to the furnace or thecrucible (quis custodiet ipsos custodes); under theinfluence of the fire-blast, porcelain, firebrick,and plumbago, the materials we rely on for infusibility, combined in all sorts of proportion,sunk down into a pasty mass. So, in a locomotive, the rapidity of vaporization of the waterfrom the ho t iron is stopped by the melting ofthe iron itsel f; the boilers are seen dropping intothe flames like honey. The blowpipe and gal


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376 TH B VALUE OF INVENTION.

vanic points, it is truE:', surpass the furnace inheat, bu t it is on too small a scale for usefulpurposes.-A similar limit in another directionis dens ity; a substance, says the Reviewer, as 'much heavier than platinum as the latter is t

.heavier than cork, would instantly make a ilarge addition to the range of means at ourcommand. A mere strip of such a substance,nailed on a ship 's hold, would ballast her. A ii'ame-work of it would be a firm light-houseon the Goodwin Sands. As a missile weapon,it would surpass Captain Warner's long-range.The superior efficiency of iron over leaden bullets is well known; and t h ~ " ' C o v e n a n t e ' r saimedat Claverhouse with silver, but such a metal asis supposed would, by the distance and intensity of its action, completely change the linesof tactics at sea or on land.-Strength of materials limits our building, when the structure willexactly and but just support itself. Bu t although the O r i e n t ~ l ssay that the last f e a t l z e ~broke the camel's back, English architects andengineers fall far short of such accuracy. Bridgebuilding, for instance, has by no means beenp u ~ h e dto such a point. In the opiriion of thiswriter, there is . nothing to prevent the nextmetropolitan bridge from spanning the water atone bound, unaided by a single pier betweenWestminster and Lambeth. Nor is the cohesion, the crush-resisting power of the column,


fully used up; the Gothic architects indeedloved to reduce the pillars that carry their massy .vaul ts overhead to a delicacy that seems dangerously frail. But, in fact, the builder dare notapproach the maximum of load and minimumof sectional area of support; a very large margin

must be left for casualties and contingencies,human violence and accidents of the elements.A column, theoretically, supports so many tonsof vertical pressure, but the slightest settlementof the building may widely alter its duties andliabilities. A beam which carrIes a certain loadmay be subject to tenfold its fair work by achance concussion. Inte rnal defects again, aknot in a beam, a crystal in a casting, are to beallowed for; so that Lord Bacon's rule, to leaveone-third for contingencies in estimating yourexpenses, would fall short of the prudence required I in constructive art. The change in an

art,however, is usually in the direction of reducing material. Executive force is, at first, inexcess over executive skill to use it ; Look atthe relative amount of support in a Gothiccathedral compared to a Norman predecessor,or compare a classic temple with its Egyptianprototype.

The second class ot limiting causes differsfrom the first, in affording problems solved forth e most par t relatively, inasmuch as they depend on human skill, experience, and means,


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3938 TH E VALUE OP INVENTION.

which must be taken as for a particular time andplace. The amount of available ingenuity, andthe costs of execution, being a fluctuatingquanti ty, unlike the properties of nature, thelaws regulating which in all ages offer to theinventor equal opposition or assistance, these

difficulties we may legitimately hope to getround by some new device, or supersede bysome new material, or by the reduction of somerarity to abundance and economy. Watt couldnot complete his engine because his piston wasno t steam-tight; after a certain delay, a sub-invention supplied him with a " tight fit," andhe moved on again. Often has a rivalry withhis great invention been attempted by the galvanismists, and very ingenious have been theirmechanical adaptations, but the difficulty is ofthe other class, as Liebig long ago pointed out;copper and zinc, and sulphuric acid, will cost

a certain price, and, unfortunately, will not giveout more than the old measure of force-nothaving it to give. And moreover, no substancein the chemist's catalogue is capable to remedying this failing.

The Reviewer enlarges on the struggle betweenthe locomotive and atmospheric roads, in whichthe great efforts of the supporters of the tubewere devoted to getting an air-tight valve insteadof establishing the pneumatic action; this, forsome reason or other, cannot be transmitted to


a sufficient distance. The reason is not clear,bu t the fact, it would seem, was got at byPapin, a century ago. Probab ly the locomotives themselves have a similar story to tell.The earlier steam carriages (which, however,aimed at turnpike road travelling) were put to

get.b.er in all sorts of ways, to convert expansioninto vehicular motion, bu t the supply of expansion ran short, and the success of later inventions lay in the tube boiler, which supplied thematerial for conversion at so rapid a rate.Power looms again, at first only mimicked iniron the to-and-fro actions of the weaver's arm,and made little progress, bu t a new principle inweaving, the fly shuttle acting by springs,allowed the machinist to drive other power outof the market.

There is something like this in natural history. ' A plant or an animal only flourish, orindeed exist, under two kinds of conditions.Outside, there must be food within reach, mechanical support and foundation to attach to orto walk upon, and a quantum of warmth, moisture, oxygen, and so forth. Inside, there mustbe an anatomic structure, or, at least, a power ofconstruction (the vital force, or nisu.


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4140 TH E V A.LUE OF INVENTION.

within and without balance, determine the formand limit of the organism. Now human inge-nuity may sow any kind and any quantity ofseed, train into any kind of shape, rear any kindof live stock, but cannot make sunshine, evenou t of Dean Swift's hel'metically sealed cucum-ber;

we may bring soil and food into the farm,bu t they must first actually exist without. Byour arrangements within, we turn our power tothe best account, but we must not hope to makeone atom of matter do the work of half a dozen.The heat in a pound of coal may be sent intothe most capricious form' of boiler that evercame from a factory, bnt it will only be theheat of a pound of coal still. " We can onlyconquer nature by obeying her laws."

These natural Hmits are infinitely various,and sometimes pop in upon the inventor as un-expectedly as they are unwelcome. The coppersheathing for ships perished by the corrosion ofthe sea water. Davy, as being peculiarly compe-tent, was called in to prescribe; he dnly iIlves-tigated the subject in all points of view thatoccurred to him, and devised a remedy to hisown entire. satisfaction. The rusting was stop-ped indeed, and the metal remained quite bright.Bnt Sir Humphrey had been catering for otherparties than his employers. The ship's bottombecame " a n eligible spot for building" to allsorts of barnacles, till the ship rapidly became


fonI, and it was found better to bear the evil ofspoiling the copper than fly to others whichthey knew not of, and spoil the sailing. Al-though, however, the canker system could notbe entirely dispensed with, the operation waseconomized by a valuable patent, which only

allows corrosion enough of the metal to poisonthe surface and make it uninhabitable. Suchan indirect benefit, however, even of corrosionand decay, enforces the lesson of turning all toaccount. H Every lane's end," says Autolycus," yields a careful man work."

With reference to the process of invention,one distinction is too important to be passedover unnoticed. Some things admit of beingdetermined and arranged, if not by calculationin a man's head, at least without more apparatusthan pencil and paper; the trains of toothedwheels, the form and bearings of framework,

may be settled at the desk. But there areother matters which admit of no demonstrationa priori, and must be ascertained by experi-ments on a larger or smaller scale. Chemicalmatters are obviously in point; and many por-tions of the theory of cohesion ar9 but littleexplored; the manner in which a material,rigid, elastic, or malleable in various degreesand directions, will conduct itself under a blowor a twist, is not to be worked out on pa per;and so in most cases, where the motions of


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42THE VALUE OF INVENTION.

fluids have to be estimated. Even models \,sometimes are insufficient, and the trial is un -satisfactory till made on a full sca le; thus the action of the waves on a breakwater admit of no imitation.

Out of this distinction flows a very material

rule, viz. that the pen and pencil must havethe preference, such parts only as they are notcompetent to deal with being left for practicaltrial. The model will have the same precedenceover the experiment on a full scale, for an outline or miniature will at least narrow where itdoes not exhaust the debateable ground, andheighten the probability of success, while, if itfail, it must, in most cases, supersede the necessity for any further procedure. Both branchesof the rule lead to diminishing, as far as possible,the cost of experimentation. The inventor ofthe calculating machine boasts that he orga

nized itso

completely, and adjusted every partso accurately at his desk, that the actual machine was executed without a single alterationfrom that on his paper. Bu t then' this was amatter of absolute mechanism. A chemistwithout his laboratory is as powerless as Harlequin without his wand. Where' calculationis available, in matters of force, motion, pressureand momentum, mere words and figures go far.The Reviewer mentioned protests, that, as to alarge proportion of the inventions t h a ~crowd

T HE VALUE OF INVENTION,

the patent list, the simple perusal of their ownspecifications ought, in nine cases out of ten,have shown their authors the inherent fallacyinvolved in the idea, the impossibility of suc-.cess, and he regrets that models are not, as inAmerica, required from an applicant at the

patent office. Who would ever have wasted his_money on patenting a perpetual motion, if thedeposit of a working model had been an indispensable preliminary? The first model maybe a rough one (one of the power looms wasfirst embodied in a wooden copy, cut with theinventor's pocket knife); and a readiness incontriving and a handiness in executing littlesubstitutes for deficiencies immensely facilitatepreiiminary trials: some excellent hints and

. observations on this head will be found inFaraday' s Manipulation. Care must be takenthat the idea be not rejected. upon a failure due

to imperfect execution, not only in experiment,bu t even in real machines. The progress of aninvention has been checked by the imperfectmechanism applied to carrying it out. Strutt'sself-acting mule (according to Baines) wasfully in vented in 1790, btlt for w ~ n tof properworkmanship lay for forty years neglected.Cartwright's first loom, made under his patent,took two men to work it, and they, too, couldnot keep at it long; he then, in his own words," condescended to see how other people wove."


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~


Two years later his loom arrived at a state ofpracticability.

The difficulties encountered by poor or obscure inventors in this stage of their history isoften a striking part of the narrative. See theaccount of Arkwright's assistants: first, a journeyman clockmaker; then, persevering againstrebuff, he pressed a smith into service; a strikingcontrast with the means at command of a modern cotton spinner, whose engines employwhole factories in their construction, and a special class of architects for the gigantic buildingsthat house them when completed. The importance of the best possible mode of execution thatexists to do justice to an idea, has led to the suggestion of repeating, at long intervals, old andabandoned schemes, affording them the advantage of all the subsequent improvements in mechanism, material and workmanship.

I t was the low state of the ancillary arts whichprobably stood between the ancients and theattainment of printing (that is, block printing,not moveable types); for they not only had diesfor stamping alphabetic letters, bu t even, asmay be seen in the British Museum, engravedrevolving cylinders, the exact prototype of ourmodern marvels in printing machinery; nodoubt , however, the demand for multitudinouscopies of works was less, and therefore the provocation less to substitute the printer for. the

45TH E VA L U E OF I N V E N T I O N .

penman. Wyatt's idea of a spinning machineoccurred to him in 173U; three years elapsed,and before him was his model-his two-footsquare model-A.T WORK! "n o one else was pre

. sent," and he "was all the time in a pleasingbu t trembling suspense;" and pleased he had aright to be. Unlike the speculatist, of whom wespoke, he had inquired of his model, whetherfor years of imagination and uncertainty he hadbeen pursuing reality or a phantom, and themodel stood there, the undeniable evidence ofhis success. Bu t the triumph of his theory alonerepaid his toil; unable to make his art into amanufacture, he added another to the list ofthose who plant the seed and rejoice in theblossom, bu t perish hefore the fruit ripens; orlive to see it plucked by others. And this willlead us to the subject of remuneration.

The ~ u t h o rof the machine is too often, likehis brother genius of the pen, " lighted up likea candle, to burn out for the good of the public." Prometheus, the fire-bringer from the sk y,was the first inventor, and in 11is misfortunes isan example of the class; and if in later timesFranklin, who performed a similar feat, livedand died in worldly prosperity, it was becausehis scientific pursuits were but his amusement.More frequently, all the time and vigour beingspent, and all its pleasure found in the exerciseof the creative faculty, there remains neither

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46 THli: VALUE OF INVENTION.

capacity nor relish for, nor experience in world-wisdom. Arkwright, it may be said, died a mil-lionare; but it seems difficult to decide whetherinventor or appropriator be the term best suitedto his mechanical character, and his nerve anden.ergy, amounting to extravagance (he said, or

had the credit of saying, t hat he would payoffthe national debt), make him an exception toall rule. Hargrave, in the same group of me-chanics, was harassed in life, and died in ob.scurity, though not, it seems, in a parish work-house. Pau l appears on the patent list ofthe same su bject; but nothing more appears of'him. Horrock, whose loom is said to be ingeneral use, sunk into poverty. Radcliffe failed.The merit of Crompton, the first mule spinner,a man of too mild and unambitious a temper topush his own way, was not wholly unrecog-nized; he obtained from public and privatebenevolence a small slice of the wealth. he hadso materially helped others to accumulate. Insome cases, no doubt, the finder has been allunaware of the value of his treasure; thus, theinventor of the resist dying parted with hissecret for 5; the principle (which was elabo-rated, especially by the house of the Peels) be-came ultimately of great importance. There isno reason to SUppose that this class, of bene-factors to the community meet with ingratitude,peculiarly in our own country. We may passover to a very civilized nation, which openly and

47THE VALUE OF INVENTION.

avowedly persecuted Jacquard to expatriation;though, fortunately for himself and them, helived long,enough to enable them to atone fortheir injustice, and acknowledge his desert.

Consolation, however, exists for the inventor,if he will take a comprehensive view of these

matters; his class, as a whole,are changing theirsocial position, and the change is for the better.In classic periods of history they do not maketheir appearance at all; useful art was contemp-tible, and theref


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merchant, WllO, buying up the produce of theharvest, raised prices, and so warded off famineand starvation. I t is curious, by-the-bye, thatthe oldest patent for an invention that has comedown to us is one granted by Edward III. forthe philosopher's stone, under the wholesome

precautions, however, of appointing a commission to inquire into its efficacy (which mightserve as an antique precedent for those who admire the American system of granting patentsby commissioners), who are to be satisfied ofthe value of the subject of the grant.

I t is a striking recognition of the value ofinventive art, that the Commons, in the heat ofthei r contentions against the monopolies grantedby Elizabeth and her successor, should have expressly admitted the fitness of exclusive privileges for " any manner of new m a ~ u f a c t u r e s . nAnd though, since that period, patents have

added bu t little to the statute book, it has beeumore from caution than neglect, from a chariness of meddling with a system of judicial lawlaid down by men of the highest capacity, andadapted closely to practical exigences as theyoccurred, and which in most respects neglectssymmetrical structure only because it aims atthe administration of substantial justice. Besides the patent-law system, pecuniary rewardshave been from time to time granted by thelegislature for the accomplishment of scientific


purposes; a li st of these for a considerable periodis given in the appendix to the House of Commons' Report in 1826. Some of these objectswere too purely scientific to have possessedcommercial availability, as the means of discovery of the longitude (a similar government. .premium has been erroneously said by some foreign writers to be extant for the quadrature of the circle), and these will very likely in future be replaced by the scientific pensions now granted. . Some other donations were meant to compensate for admitted hardships in the working of the law, or were bestowed on those who had been unlucky or unwise in taking its benefits-Fourdrinier, who introduced the beautifulpaper making machinery ; Crompton, of whomwe have spoken ; Gurney, as having advancedand promoted steam travelling, though withoutreaching a matured result; and again, inventors of matters exclusively national, as Congreve,for improvements in shells and rockets. In thelatter cases, honours are sometimes conferred,and the sovereign occasionally confers the lowest order of semi-nobility, the dubious honourof knighthood, on architects and sur:eyors, andeven other clAsses of inventors, as Arkwright,where they can add wealth to their other quali

fications.Some of those sums were matters of express

bargain , prizes held out to com petition; othersD


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estimated and granted on a representation togovernment of the circumstances of the case.Small premiums have for a long period been bestowed by the Society of Arts, bu t rarely uponany solid and substantial performance, whichthe pos.sessor would seldom be willing to barter

for a medal or testimonial,' although such encouragements of trivialities may have cultivatedand fostered the powers of the ingenious formore valuable subsequent efforts, as when theyaroused the latent ambition of Jacquard. Oflate years the exclusion of patented inventionsfrom the Society has been wisely given up, anda class of subjects encouraged and introducedby them of a much higher standard of merit.

Of all modes that can be devised, patentsafford the fairest measure of remuneration; theyare in fact simply the application of the naturalprinciple of property as the reward of labour.They merely give a man his own, and as tothe rest say to the government laissez faire,the labourer gets his wages for his work and isindependent of the bounty of the state. Thepublic cannot object to pay for what it choosesto purchase, and pays a market price instead ofthe vague estimate of a parliamentary committee. In the discussion relative to the expectedart-exhibition of 1851, some of the Manchesterpeople denied the necessity for any prizes at all." Give us a new dyE', and we will instantly give:you 5000 for it."

51TltE VALUE OF INVENTION.

The complete intellectual devotion howeverrequisite for undertaking the scientific cond netof any wide spreading change in a manufacture,will absorb the energies of most ordinary iuventors, who will require capital, encouragementaIld commercial introduction. The steam en

gine is due not only to Watt bu t to Boulton.There is some cost in obtainment of the letterspatent, and merely to advertize a novelty requires. much tact, and sometimes a very largeexpenditure. So again the assistance of otherswill be required to contriving the subordinatedetails of mechanism, and in delineation onpaper; branches of skilled workmanship, whichwill not often meet in the same individual,and co-exist with original conception, nor thelatter probably with sufficient acquaintancewith the history and prospect of the art. Aman need not fear that his share of the effortswill be lost sight of among his co-operators;talent, natural or acquired, must be paid for,and never more so than where division of labouris most advanced. A physician'S fees are notless because the druggist makes up his prescription. An English artizan, who knows notwhence his material is brought or how his toolsare made, is better off than the savage wholops l1is own timber and chips his own flintknife. 'A servant of all-work for a year of her

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multifarious occupations gets less than a professed cook for dressing a single dinner.

Crompton's workmen furnish a curious illustration of the combination principle. There being then no regular class of operatives f01' thepurpose, his set of hands were recruited fromall adjacent sources, which happened to beoverstocked; and hence the advantage followed,that, when any thing in the machinery wentamiss, a council of war was held, and each hadhis remedy. The cobbler's opinion would be" nothi ng like leather, " the joiner would tr yup a bit of wood, and the hatmaker suggest thevirtues of felt; probably each pla n would betaken on approval, and that which best performed its part would obtain the situation. Itis not unlikely, tha t this may have suggested .toMr. Babbage the (( trades union," proposed byhim in his work of manufacture._A 'party ofworkmen (the branches of work being filled in

proper proportion) are to club their purses I;mdabilities to set up a sort of business republic,one or two travellers and book-keepers beingincluded to look afrer the commercial department. Some pure capitalists would join, bringing only money into the joint-stock, and, on the

'other hand, some would bring nothin g buttheir labour. The fundamental rule is, that thefair amount of each man's labour and each

Ti lE VALUE OF INVENTION.

man's interest in capital being first determined,half this amount should, to find them in necessaries, he paid weekly out of the capital. Thenall their further income would arise from amonthly or quarterly adjustment of profit andloss. The res ult relied on is, that each would

have a direct and constant motive to executethe best possible work with the utmost economyof time and matel'ial, bu t with a qualification,that any decided improvement should entitleits contriver to a little domestic paten t right or"royalty" on th e amount saved by it for somany weeks or months after its establishedsuccess.

r

This appendix, however, looks rather like aconfession of want of confidence in the virtueof the original principle to induce each to dohis best,. And indeed, to say nothing of thedifficulties which our present law of partnership

would interpose, it is hardly necessary to pointout the ipsuperable moral obstacles to t he establishment of any other measure of the valueof services than that of supply and Clemand.And though in a new business like Crompton's,general inventiveness be advantageous , it .is

L . ~ . doubtful how ~ far other cases agree in that reI I spect. A factory much resern bles an ar my in i ts

!'I

I

high organizati on; and in an army, those whodirect are the few; the rest only execute. BruneIopposed the notion of engineering engine dri.

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54 T H E VA L U E OF INVENTION.

vel'S, declaring that he would himself be a mostunfit man for the employment; no sooner wouldsome defect or variation of the machinery catchhis eye, than he would be off into scientificsand devising the remedy; and th e possibleconsequences of the drivers of an express trainsetting to work to solve problems in mechanicscan be hardly even thought of in joke. The" tribute work" of the Cornish miners, cited byMr. Babbage, in which each man enters intohis own litt le speculation, sees as far as he can(not into a brick wall, but) into the side of theplot marked out for excavation, estimates theratio of ore to the labour of getting at it, andtakes the job by competition at a per-centageon the produce, is a case of limited application;it is merely a peculiar mode of estimating piecework where the amount of laboUF spent on acertain amount of produce is excessively un-certain. No such plan is necessary in ordinarycases, the quantity of the article produced being usually a sufficient measure of the dexterityor diligence of the operative.

( 55 )

pART II .

PROPERTY IN INVENTION.

To patent law therefore, perfect or imperfect,the inventor must look for his reward. Thetax is onerous, bu t taxes in their fairest shapeare seldom grateful to the taxee. The formsare v e x a ~ i o u s ,dilatory, sometimes prejudicial,bu t there is no escape from a compliance withthem. To have to petition for what he thinkshe ought to demand may offend his pride, butrights in all ages have sprung from the concessions '..of the powerful, and, as in this case, re-

o tain the form of a favour long after being ad

mitted as absolute claims. He may argue fora perpetuity of right as the true theory, andpoint to the landlord, whose broad acres donot fall into communism because the tenant'sfourteenth yearly rent is paid; but in practiceto save a part he must give up the remainder.The nations"that were or are pastoral wanderersoccupied' land itself bu t for a term. An Arabor Tartar has as little notion of " real property"in land as we of permanent intellectual do

'! mains, which nevertheless may supply somei ~ .

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56 PROPERTY IN INVENTION.

future generation with questions of economy and jurisprudence. The fourteen years, even now, has, since Lord Brougham's act, a degree of elastici ty, and copyright has been gradually gaining ground in several directions. The worst fault of the present law is its unaccom

modat ing disposit ion; one period (extension cases apart) is granted to aU, and all pay one se t of fees, and, sUppoSillg the average standard a fair one, many cases must lie widely distant on the side of excess or defect. It is not at alluncommon for half the term of fourteen yearsto elapse before the inventor's profits even beginto come in from a large and costly subject ofinvention, while some nicknacks pay in thefirst few years, if at all, and before the periodexpires are completely superseded. The extension act partially remedies the first objection,and, 011 the other, it is very much to be desired that the proposal of semi-patents, viz. forseven years, at half the present cost, wereadopted. The designs act, to which we shallreturn in some measure, performs this function,but by no means satisfactorily. It

I ~A preliminary question, however, is whether ,to patent at all, and it turns on two considera "tions : - l s t . I f no one can get at the secret, noone can make a nefarious use of it. A feudal

jiinoble, so long as his castle walls were soundpiand solid, had no need of protection from act

5.7 PROPERTY IN INVENTION.

of parliament. 2nd. An invention may be accessible to all the world, and yet unavailableto any but the owner ; as some ideas are said,.like anchors, to be secure from thieves by reasonof their great weight. Su ppose a pianoforte MS.of Thalberg's, which the author alone could

play; here, no judicious pirate would meddle. with the copyright. On the other hand, inestimating the efficiency of patent protection, ifa large capital and plant is requisite (thoughthe article itself be trivial), the number of

. competitors becomes limited, not only in number but in class; men of substance only canembark, and their property i8- responsible for,and therefore a guarantee against positive fraud.And this indicates the only true security againstforgery of bank notes and other valuables, which.should be such as require men of reputation toengrav.e, and expensive machinery to prepare

materials for and prin t from. Brewster's ka -leidoscope, and Cowper's printers' ink rollers,might be reproduced by the most ordinary skill,and with materials procurable anywhere; andboth of them, though patented, were so generally and rapidly pirated, that prosecutions werequite out of the question.. Sometimes the fixedpermanent type, or means of reproduction, embodies a large amQunt of peculiar individual skilland execution. None, for instance, bu t the artisthimself can give the peculiar touch and handling

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~ " V l

to an engraved plate, which is in that casereally as independent of, although nominallyprotected by some special copyright acts, asan original picture. Perhaps the plate mightbe electrotyped, so as to satisfy a connoisseur,but at an events possession of the plate itself

would be requisite, as it would be required tostrike off fraudulent impressions; akind of theft,which, as the reader will recollect, occurred inPrince Albert's case by the dishonesty of theprinter.

I f possession will afford the power of effectualsecrecy: it is far preferable to a patent, with itsfees, and forms and litigation. Th e few instances that allow of this are principally of achemical nature: Wollaston's metallurgical secrets of trade are said to have been lucrative,and some of them to have perished with him.A friend, unbidden, had penetrated on one oc

casion to the scene of his operation:-HDo yousee that furnace?" the intruder assen ted; "thenmake a profound bow to it ; it is the first timeof your seeing it, and will be the last." Thealchemists were adepts at concealment, but wemay venture to doubt if their poverty of scientificattainment were not the main thing to conceal;as pub1ication of the compounds of a quack me

Nidicine would not only put a stop to the exclusiveness of the enjoyment, but show how littlevalue was to be enjoyed. A gentleman begged

PROPERTY IN INVENTION.

the late Rev. Rowland Hill to examine his son,who had, he said, superior ability, but was idle,and buried his talents in a napkin. " I haveshaken the napkin," was the communication inreply, " but there is nothing in it." And if therites of the Freemasons inclose any secrets ofar t worth knowing, they are much wronged bypublic opinion. A famous nostrum, one Jame s'sfever powder, however, was patented, and a falsespecification enrolled, to misdirect the world asto its real nature, which therefore the owner hadfaith in ; bu t the real secret is more frequentlythat the vendor has credit (well or ill-founded)with the public for his superior integrity in selecting material, and care in the manufacture.The buyer tru sts him, knowing his inability toanalyse and verify for himself, or, perhaps, because habit or fashion determine his patronage.Bolts to doors, and blinds to windows, will im

pede the research of the curious, especially whenthe parts of a thing can be taken asunder, and,being separate, exhibit nothing of the mode inwhich they act in combination; and this may be,even if assistants are employed, each upon asingle portion, or when ingredients are obtainedfrom various sources. Bu t still, a secret worthkeeping is also worth finding out; a certainamount of close analysis of the result, sharpenedby a sufficient prospect of advantage , will almostalways detect the means. Peculiar kinds of art,


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enol1gh that they have it potentially, thoughnot actually; that they might have known it,)

" whether they did know it or not. The generalprinciple of giving a man as of course his owncopyright, is not applied to useful arts andprocesses, the property in which only vests

under a special grant, and the right either in

"

r copyright or manufacture once acquired by thepublic; in the former case, by the voluntary" de-dication," or even a certain degree of neglector acquiescence on the . p ~ r tof the author;in th e latter, by the merest acc.dent or gr

Documents

Turner Counsel Inventors Improvements 1850