Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 4.djvu/921

 WASHBUEN & MOEN MANCf'G 00. V. HAISH. 907 �inventive genius. The mere mechanical adaptation of old things to new uses is not usually invention, unless in combi- nations; and yet it is extremely difiScult in many cases to say just whare the inventive faculty asserts itself as the controU- ing force. And the authorities furnish us no satisfactory test to apply and de'- jrmine this question. Although there ia usually little diffioulty in determining, as a matter of fact in each case, whether a devioe is or is not in some degree the resuit of invention. If there is any invention required, then the law mil not attempt to ndeasure its extent or degree. If, for instance, the proof had shown that wire provided with barbs, spurs, or prickers "was a well-known article used for other purposes than fencing, there would be no difficulty in say- ing that it did not require invention or the exercise of the in- ventive faculty to substitute it for fencing putposes in place of plain wire which had been used before. But we cannot say that the inventive or creative faculty is not required in devis- ing a mode by which plain fence wire can be armed with spurs 80 as to make it avàilable as an effective fencing mate- rial. The proof does not show that such wire was known and applied to other uses. No one, so far as this record shows, had made or used it before for any other purpose ; so that;, to our minds, it seems quite clear that it required invention to devise and produce a barbed wire which could be practically used for fencing purposes. In the absence of any other test the courts have seemed to assume that the fact of the acceptance of a new device or combination by the public, and putting it into extensive use, was evidence that it was the product of invention ; or, as one of the counsel for plaintiff expressed it, "utility is suggestive of originality." �In Smith v. Goodyear Dental Vidcanite Co. 93 U. S. 486, Mr. Justice Strong said : "Undoubtedly the resuit of consequences of a process or manufacture may in some cases be regarded as of importance when the inquiry is whether the process or manufacture exhibits invention, thought, and ingenuity." Webster, on the subject of patents, page 30, says : "The utility of the change, as ascertained by its consequences, is the real practical test of the sufficiency of an invention; and, since the ����