Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/321

 PAGE V. HOLMES BUEGLAB ALAKM TELEGRAPH 00. 813 �•jfupter, in the publication of the same thing by Golding Bird, in the London, Edinburgh and Dublin Philosophîcal Magazine for January, 1838." Dr. Page replied thus, on the seven- teenth of Pebruary, 1854 : "I have examiued the publication of Golding Bird, upon which you have rejected my claim, and, if you will take pains to read the whole of his article, you will find that he gives me credit, in so many words, as the first inventor. I therefore ask for a reconsideration of the case." He also, on the same date, addressed the patent office thus: "As my invention for the medical application of electricity has been for some years in public use, if the office, in view of the affidavit which I have recently filed, should consider the question of abandonment, I begleave, further, to state that I have from the first had in contemplation the making of this application as soon as practicable, and that I used ail reasonable diligence in seeking protection of my rights in relation thereto. I made application for a special patent for this invention to the only tribunal to which I was allowed to go as soon as I discovered that it was going into public use, and that application, it would seem, might be regarded as still pending and entitling me to privilef:;es of protection as well as those who, under the law, make applica- tion to the patent office. I ask of the patent office as much indulgence as the law gives to inventors and patentees withiu the pale of the law. An inventor is not debarred his patent by reason of public use for any number of years after his application and before his patent, nor are his acts of consent and allowance called in question, if his application lie un- touched by him for years. Nor is public use and sale for any number of years within the term of a patent held to be a bar to the recovery of that which was inadvertently not claimed ; though its publication, unclaimed in a patent, seems to me to approach very near a formai dedication of it to the public. The statute of limitations applies neither to the applicant nor the patentee in this particular; and, as my case is novel, peculiar, and without precedent, I trust the office wni leave this question to be decided by the courts, and ��� �