Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/324

 316 FEDEEAL BBPOEÏER. �office, and request that |20 may be refunded to me, agreeably to an act of congress in such cases made and provided," �On the same day the $20 was returned to Dr. Page in per- son. Subseqnently, Dr. Page presented to congress a peti- tion dated January 16, 1866, in which he said: "During the years 1836, 1837 and 1838, your petitioner invented a mag- neto-electric apparatus for administering electricity as a remedy for diseases, and, also, for purposes of scientific illus- tration, since known under the varions names of Page'scom- pound magnet and electrotome, Page's induction coil, Page's separable helices, and Page's analysis of shocks, a distinguish- ing feature of which invention was an automatio or self- operating circuit-breaker, by which the presence of an attend- ant or assistant was dispensed with. Said apparatus also embraced other novel and original features of improvement. In the year 1842 your petitioner was appointed principal examiner in the United States patent office. Some time after said appointment, your petitioner discovered that his said invention was being introduced into public use by others without his consent, and being disabied, under the law, from obtaining a patent, your petitioner, at the recommendation of Hon. Henry L. Ellsworth, then commissioner of patents, in the year 1854 applied to congress to remove the disability in his case, inasmuch as the invention was made before his said appointment to office. Pailing in this to obtain relief, your petitioner, as soon as his circumstances permitted, did, in the year 1852, resign his ofBce, and, as soon thereafter as practicable, February 2, 1854, applied for a patent for this, his said invention. After a very thorough investigation, the com- missioner of patents decided that the invention was novel and original with your petitioner, but refused to grant a patent, on the ground of abandonment of the invention to the public. Your petitioner is unwilling to admit that the public use of said invention was with such entire consent and allowance on his part as in equity, to have worked an abandonment against him, as the circumstances were peculiar and extraordinary, and such as have never before occurred to an American inventor, and he, therefore, prays your honorable bodies to ��� �