Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 6.djvu/497

 BBOWN V. DEEBH. 485 �patent of 1865 and its re-issue. Is the re-issne, &b1q each of its three claims, within the tenns of the original patent of 1865? �It is clear that the substantial improvement consisted in a new device, which, in combination with former devices, •wovla prodace an intermittent rotatory motion, with de- soribed checks, instead of an oscillatory motion of the seed- wheels. In the re-issae the matters inyented or suggested in the patent of 1865 are divided into three distinct claims. As the United States supreme court has held divisional patents valid, there can be no legal objection to subdividing the invention into distinct claims. So far as the present inquiiy is concemed, there is nothing new in horizontal reciprooal seed-wheels, a transverse reciprocating bar, and a hand- lever, operated in combination, nor was there in said combi- nation operating in connection with the valve in the seed-tabe. Now, if an intermittent rotatory seed-wheel was substituted for an oscillatory wheel, and devices given for effecting such rotatory motion, ' consisting of forks on the transverse bar, and checks on the wheel and bar, constructed as described, a valid and important improvement was made. Such was the scope of the patent of 1866. �The re-issue subdivides that invention into three claims; First, the combination of the peculiar wheel and transverse bar with a hand-lever, so as to produce the intermittent rotatory motion, substantially as, etc. Here is an introduction into old machinery of a new and peculiar wheel and forked transverse bar, whereby, in combination with well-known devices, the de- sired resuit could be produced, — a new combination. Second, the combination of the described forks and toothed wheels to operate as stated. That combination shows the general struct- ure of the forks and of the wheels and of the checks, whereby the intermittent rotatory motion was produced and stopped at each discharge of the radial seed-cups through the seed- valves. No similar combination exiated previously, and as to some of the devices they were entirely new. ThircL, this claim, unless limited to the devices used in the combination, would be too broad, and therefore void. It is for a combina- ��� �