colourable compliance with the 5th subs. of sect. 5 of the Act of 1883, and not a distinct statement of the invention. claimed.' (Smith's Patent, 1 Griffin P. C. 268.)

In Siddell v. Vickers (5 R. P. C. 416) it was held that the 5th subs. of sect. 5 of the Act of 1883 is merely directory, and that non-compliance with the direction does not invalidate the patent.

As a patentee cannot recover damages in respect of infringements committed before the publication of the complete specification (sect. 13 of the Act of 1883), it is desirable in many cases to file it with as little delay as possible.

By subs. 4 of sect. 9 of the Act of 1883, unless a complete specification is accepted within twelve months from the date of application, then (save in the case of an appeal having been lodged against the refusal to accept) the application will become void at the expiration of that time. But the Comptroller is empowered, by sect. 3 of the Act of 1885, to extend the time for three months on payment of the prescribed fee.

In the event of the applicant's death before leaving a complete specification, no power is expressly given by the Act to his legal representatives to leave a specification at the Patent Office, or to the Comptroller to accept it if tendered. But perhaps it may be held that such powers are impliedly given by subsection (3 b) of the twelfth section of the Act of 1883.

On the acceptance of the complete specification the Comptroller will give notice thereof to the applicant, and will advertise the acceptance in the official journal, and the application and specification or specifications, with the drawings, if any, will then be open to public inspection (sect. 10, and Rules 21 and 22).1

After the acceptance of a complete specification, and

If anyone wishes to be informed as soon as a complete specification is accepted, or an application for an amendment is entered, he should forward a copy of Form Q (bearing a stamp of 5s.), with a request for such information.

until the date of sealing a patent in respect thereof, or the expiration of the time for sealing, the applicant shall have the like privileges and rights as if a patent for the invention had been sealed on the date of the acceptance of the complete specification: Provided that an applicant shall not be entitled to institute any proceeding for infringement unless and until a patent for the invention has been granted to him (sect. 15).

It was decided in Ex parte Henry (L. R. 8 Ch. 167) that a second applicant who had filed a complete specification along with his petition under the ninth section of the Patents Act of 1852, and had thereby become entitled for six months to the like powers, rights, and privileges, as might have been conferred on him by letters patent duly sealed, as of the date of the application,' did not acquire the rights of a patentee so as to prevent a person who had previously applied for a patent for a similar invention from obtaining a patent.

It is directed by section 9, subsection 5 (as amended by sect. 3 of the Act of 1888), that the reports of examiners shall not in any case be published or be open to public inspection, and shall not be liable to production or inspection in any legal proceeding, unless the court or officer having power to order discovery in such legal proceeding shall certify that such production or inspection is desirable in the interests of justice, and ought to be allowed. Specifications accompanying applications which have been abandoned or become void are not to be open to public inspection or published (sect. 4 of the Act of 1885).

Clerical Errors. In case of clerical errors in a specification they could only be amended formerly by order of the Master of the Rolls. (Johnson's Patent, L. R. 5 Ch. D. 503, and the cases there cited.) This jurisdiction still subsists. (Re Gare's Patent, L. R. 26 Ch. D. 105.) In Dixon's Patent (January 15, 1881) the M. R. required from the applicant an undertaking not to take proceedings for infringements committed before the date of the amending order. But now, by sect. 18 of the Act of 1883, such

errors may be amended, after the patent has been granted, by the Comptroller on such terms as he may think fit. Before the issue of the patent clerical errors in or in con'nection with the application may be corrected by him under the 91st section of the Act of 1883.

DRAWINGS.

The Patents Act of 1883 (sect. 5, subsect. 4) directs that a complete specification must be accompanied by drawings if required. Those who are called upon to interpret the instrument will look both at the words and the drawings, with the view of making them explain each other, and of arriving at the patentee's meaning. (Abbott, C. J., in Bloxam v. Elsee, 1 C. & P. 564.) Many inventions can be explained perfectly well without any drawings; but wherever machines are the subject of or connected with the invention, drawings should always accompany the specification, for in such a case the relation of the parts will be clear at once through a visual representation, when a verbal description might be utterly unintelligible. Care must be taken that the patentee does not bind himself to the particular form given in the drawing when he does not so intend. It may be that only a particular form is required to be secured, because no other form will effect the proposed result. In such a case, if the form is not copied, the invention is not made use of. But in most cases it is more than one form which is sought to be protected by patent, and the form given in the drawing is only to be taken as an illustration. This fact ought to be distinctly shown in the specification.

In Arnold v. Bradbury (L. R. 6 Ch. 706) it was contended by the defendants in a suit for restraining the infringement of a patent for an improved ruffle, and the

'Rules 30-33 of the Patents Rules, 1890, contain regulations as to the sizes and methods of preparing the drawings accompanying the provisional or complete specifications. Rule 33 directs that if an applicant desires to adopt the drawings lodged with his provisional specification as the drawings of his complete specification he should refer to them as those 'left with the provisional specification.'

machinery for making the same, that the patentee had not described the mode in which the ruffle was made; but Lord Hatherley, C., held that as the machine was very simple, and as the drawing showed how it was worked, that was sufficient. (See also Hastings v. Brown, 1 E. & B. 454; Morton v. Middleton, 1 Cr. S. 3rd Ser. 722; Daw v. Eley, L. R. 3 Eq. 500 n., 14 W. R. 126; Poupard v. Fardell,

18 W. R. 127.)

It seems that a patentee will not be allowed, in an action brought by him for an infringement, to refer to a drawing as descriptive of a material part of the invention not described in the letterpress of the specification. (Clark v. Adie, L. R. 10 Ch. 667; affirmed on appeal, L. R. 2 App. Cas. 315; Macfarlane v. Price, 1 Stark, 199, 1 W. P. C. 74 n.)

In the matter of Pullan's Patent (May 1878), leave was given by the Lord Chancellor upon an ex parte application to correct a filed specification by the addition of drawings alleged to have been omitted through inadvertence. The drawings so added were not described in the specification. Some months after the addition was effected an application was made to the Lord Chancellor by a person who had been threatened with an action for infringing the patent to re-hear the original application. The Lord Chancellor decided to hear the matter afresh, and upon reading the affidavits filed on both sides, and finding that his order had been made on imperfect information, ordered the added drawings to be struck out of the specification, with costs.

RELATION OF THE COMPLETE TO THE PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.

We have seen that the provisional specification need not contain all the details by which the invention is proposed to be carried into effect; it is sufficient if a broad outline of the invention is there sketched, so that its whole nature is ascertainable. On the other hand, it is permissible for a patentee to let drop some of the features of the provisional specification when he comes to prepare his complete specification, provided there is no fraud; that the

essential features of the invention are preserved; and that the complete specification does not claim something different from the invention described in the provisional specification. (Thomas v. Welch, L. R. 1 C. P. 192; Penn v. Bibby, L. R. 2 Ch. 134; Stoner v. Todd, L. R. 4 Ch. 58 ; Wright v. Hitchcock, L. R. 5 Ex. 46.)

It is essential that the nature of the invention shall be the same, but upon principle and authority (said Lopes, L. J., in Woodward v. Sansum, 4 R. P. C. 178) it is clear that improvements in the arrangement of the mechanism, in the relative position and adaptation of the different parts with the view of producing the same results, the substitution of mechanical equivalents and modifications and developments within the scope of the invention set out in the provisional specification are allowable.

Although portions of the provisional specification may within the limits above mentioned be omitted from the complete specification without endangering the validity of the patent; and although the invention set forth in the earlier document may be expanded and developed when the complete instrument comes to be prepared, in accordance with the fuller knowledge which the inventor may then possess, yet he must carefully keep within the lines originally laid down, and must sedulously avoid introducing into the complete specification anything which can be construed as a larger or different invention. A material addition to, or deviation from, the invention for which he originally sought protection will not be permitted. Thus, where the provisional specification set forth an invention for preserving animal substances in a fresh state for some time, which consisted in the application of a definite mixture of an aqueous solution of gelatine with an aqueous solution of bisulphite of lime, whilst the complete specification, in addition to the use of that mixture, claimed the use for the same purpose of an aqueous solution of the bisulphite of lime alone, this was held to be a distinct matter not covered by the provisional specification. It was an invention larger than and different from that disclosed