Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 07.pdf/81

 58

fair presentation of the accounts. But it was not the practise of Her Majesty to grant any prolongation where the inventor had been adequately rewarded during the life of the patent. Their lordships were of opinion that in this case the inventor had been ade quately and generously rewarded. Their lordships would therefore humbly advise Her Majesty to dismiss the petition with costs, which their lordships fixed at five hundred pounds." This defeat was a disappointment to the petitioners, but I could not say that it was undeserved. The whole course of the trial impressed me as a fine exhibition of judicial dignity and impartiality, and in subsequent interviews with our counsel, I learned that they concurred with me in the opinion that the judgment was a just and proper one. My client was the owner of a trade-mark. It had created the trade-mark and the manu factured article to which it was affixed. Upon principles of law professed to be rec ognized among all commercial nations, this trade-mark was property. It had been pirated in France in the most outrageous manner for no other purpose than to enable the pi rates to impose upon the public a worthless imitation as a genuine article of great utility, exclusively manufactured by its owners. It was not at that time known to me as it is now that in France no action upon a pat ent or to protect a trade-mark was ever decided in favor of a foreigner against a Frenchman. My client consulted an Eng lish solicitor who resided in Paris, who pre pared his case with great labor and corres ponding expense. He showed by the records that our client's right to the exclu sive use of the trade-mark had been estab lished by judicial decisions in the United States, in England, and in Scotland, — that its ownership was acquiesced in every where save in France, where it was pirated for the sole purpose of imposing an inferior article on the public as genuine. Counsel

of celebrity at the Paris bar were then con sulted whose opinion was clear that such a transaction was prohibited by the code, and could be restrained by legal proceedings. These had been begun; the trial of the case was approaching; I went to Paris to render such assistance as I could in its preparation. A consultation with the avocat was neces sary. In this country, if a suitor wants a consultation with his lawyer, he goes to his office and has it. Not so in Paris. It is a difficult thing to get, and is to be had only in one and the time-honored way. There was then, and I suppose still is, in France, a fifth wheel to the carriage of civil justice, called an avouc. What he is used for I never could clearly ascertain. I did learn that he was expensive and indispens able. As well as I could make it out, the attorneys and the avocats are not permitted to communicate with the judges except in court. There is no knowing what would happen if they should. If either wants any one of the many things always wanted in the progress of the cause, instead of going to the judge and asking for it, he must do as the party did in the poem, who "went and told the sexton, and the sexton tolled the bell." The attorney must go and t?ll the avocat, who will go a^1d tell the avone, who will go and tell the judge! And there is only one way for the client to get speech of his avocat. He must make his request to the attorney, who carries it to the avoue, and the avotte to the avocat, who appoints the consultation. After several days' delay, it was finally determined that there should be a consulta tion at which I should be present. It took place at the chambers of the avocat. At the appointed hour I was driven to a house on one of the quais. I climbed the single stairway in a large apartment building to the cinquieme ctage, in company with butchers' meat and all manner of market supplies, meeting on their way down buckets of coal cinders, baskets of empty bottles,