complete specification filed, the provisions of the Act relating to annual payments apply, and that the letters patent must be read as subject to such provisions. All difficulty would be avoided by the Board of Trade issuing a new form of letters patent for these cases, as they are authorised to do under sect. 101. cation. In the memorandum issued with the original draft The appliof the Bill, the alterations made by the Act as to the See p. 4. steps necessary in order to obtain a patent were referred to as follows: "Under the existing Acts it is necessary for an intending patentee or his agent to apply personally at the Patent Office at least seven times, and make four separate payments, using four documents for the application. "By this Bill [Act] an applicant or his agent will only have to call twice at the Patent Office, to use three documents, and to make two payments; but applicants may, if they please, transact their business entirely by post, and thus avoid either personal attendance at the Office or the payment of agency fees. This will be best illustrated by the following tabular comparison : KEY TO PROCEDURE ON AN UNOPPOSED APPLICATION, WITH PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.* As the majority of applications for letters patent are by way of provisional protection, these observations refer to applications with Provisional Specifications in a correct form. "It is also proposed to sell the new application and specification forms ready stamped at the Patent Office, or to send them by post at the price of the fee, i. e., no charge to be made for the blank form itself. Only two stamped forms will be necessary, one a £1 declaration form, and another a £3 form, for the complete specification. The Inland Revenue Department will also arrange to sell these stamps at post offices in the principal commercial centres of the kingdom. At present, persons residing in the country must either employ an agent in London to obtain the stamped forms, or obtain them through a stamp office from the Inland Revenue Department by post." "The fees payable at present in order to obtain a patent amount to £25, with further payments of £50 before the expiration of the third year and £100 before the expiration of the seventh year of the patent. Under the Bill [Act] a patent will be obtainable for £4, and, while the amount of the further payments remains unaltered, the payment of the £50 is postponed to the fourth year; so that a four years' patent will only cost £4." The first step to be taken by an intending patentee is to obtain a form of application. This may be obtained at any of the places mentioned in the Patents Instructions on payment of £1. After filling it in the applicant is required to sign it himself, and, inasmuch as it contains a declaration, such signature ought to be made before an officer duly authorised to administer declarations. It may be made before a commissioner or a notary (Law Times, Feb. 9th, 1884), but, if made before a Justice Examination of the of the Peace no extra stamp will be required, and the delay necessary to obtain such stamp will be avoided. Though the application may be accompanied by the complete specification, yet inventors will find it their interest to send merely a provisional specification. By adopting the latter course, not only will they gain time to perfect their inventions, but they will avoid the risk of losing the £3 paid for the complete specification in case their application is refused. The application is referred to an expert, called in application, the Act an Examiner, to report thereon. It is not See p. 9. his duty to say if the invention is the proper subjectmatter for a patent. His duties are restricted to ascertaining if the invention is fairly described, and if the application is properly prepared, and if the title sufficiently indicates the subject-matter. The object of the examination would thus seem to be,to render assistance to inventors in the framing of their specifications, but not in any way to relieve them of the legal duty of sufficiently describing their inventions. In other words, whilst the Comptroller, acting on the report of the Examiner, will see that the application is prepared in the prescribed manner, and will require the specification on the face of it to describe an alleged invention, the object of which is stated in the title, yet the acceptance of the application is not conclusive as to the sufficiency of the specification. This seems to have been the view of those in charge of the Bill when passing through the House of Commons. In the debate on the second reading Mr. Davey said :-"He did not understand that the right hon. gentleman intended by his Bill to make the examination conclusive, but that the only object was to assist the parties to put their patents into a proper form," and Mr. Chamberlain did not dissent from this statement. It has been suggested that the recital in the new form of ‘a patent, viz., that the inventor has "by and in his complete specification, particularly described the nature of his invention," is strong evidence that the examination of the specifications is to be conclusive. The truer view is rather that this recital is merely a recital of the fact that a complete specification has been lodged before sealing as required by the Act, and for this reason, viz., the recital does not cover all the requirements of the Act as regards the complete specification. By sect. 5, sub-sect. (4), the complete specification must not merely "particularly describe the nature of the invention," as the recital would seem to require, but must also "ascertain the nature of the invention, and in what manner it is to be performed, and must be accompanied by drawings, if required." A specification that fulfilled the requirements of the recital would not necessarily fulfil the requirements of this section. acceptance tion. The Comptroller may require the application to Amendbe amended subject to an appeal to the law officer. ment or The working of the Act in regard to these and the of applicaother appeals to the law officer will be regarded with See p. 10. some interest. The duties of the law officers are so varied that it is doubtful how far these appeals will give satisfaction. If the appeals are numerous, it is difficult to see how the law officers can find time to deal thoroughly with them, unless they act on the |