The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1851-11-08

the cAna VI Frouch pe~Suy HoEers, before tnu
United Sts1ss DiNfrict Court for Eastern Fonn-
syvanis, ~ squi1y, has been decided by Judge
Kane in favor Of NE mplainants, and decree
Of injunction directed IN pursuance of The prayer
of their bill.
The opi..ion OF Judge Kane is published in
the Philadelphia papers It's quite lengthy, and
embraces matter Of general and practical interest
in regard to the working of the magnetic tele.
graph System, as we'll as the originality Of its
discovery by Professor Morse.
The pleas of the respondents were directed
to the validity of the original patent to Morse,
and tho illegality of the subsequent amendments
and reissues. These, which are three fold, are
treated by the court AS chiefly technical, and in.
consistent with the spirit Of the several patent
laws of Congress, to which he allows a liberal
construction. The first, that Morse's United
States patent does not run from the date OF
Morse's French patent, is set aside as disproved
by the date of the original application in this
country, which was several months before the
French grant
The court then proceeded TO consider the
claims of Mr. M0rse's first patent of 1910, applied
for in l838-in the description of which he re-
marks:
II. That he (Morse) was the first to devise
and practice the art Of recording language, at
telegraphic distances, by the dynamic force OF
the electro magnet; or, indeed, by any agency
whatever, is, to our minds, plain npon all the evi.
dencc. tits unnecessary to review the testimony
for the purpose of showing this. His applica
ton for patent in April, 1888, was preceded
by a series of experiments results, illustrations
and proofs of final success, which leave no doubt
whatever but that his great invention was con-
summated before the early spring Of 1897
There is no one person, whose invention has
been spoken of by any witness or referred to in
any book. as involving the principle OF Mr.
Morse's discovery, but must yield precedence of
date to This. Neither Stcinheil, ror Cooke and
Wheatstone, nor Davy, nor Dyer, nor Henry. had
at this time made recording telegraph OF any
sort. The devices of the three first were merely
semaphores, that spoke to the eye for the moment
bearing about the same relation to the great
discovery now before us, as the Able Sicard's
invention of a visual alphabet for the purposes
of conversation bore to the art Of printing with
movable types. Mr. Dyer's had no recording
apparatus, as he expressly tells u.s. and Profess
sOr Henry had contenled himself with the album
dant honors ofhs lab ,rntory and lecture rooms"
To this follows the sequence that as Professor
Morse set forth as the essence of his invention
the use Of the motive power of the electric or
galvanic current, electro gavanism, as he now
terms IT'D however developed, for making or
printing Ineligible characters, signs or letters
at any distance" through the several forms Of
specification claiming and renewing his Claim of
property in the same invention, he declared the
existence Of new at, asserted his right in it
as its inventor and owner, and announcing fully
its nature and dement's, invoked in return the
contracted protection Of the laws.
From this time, his title of patentee TO the
art vested. Other men became competitors with
him only in the work of diversifying and per
fecting its details He himself CONTINUES the
courD used the stylus, to impress paper, or wax
coated tablets, it may be; though he sometimes
made colored record by the friction of pen
Gil another substitutes liquid pigment, or stains
his paper with chemical ink the next, perhaps,
stains his paper beforehand, and writes on it by
the colorng matter and another
yet, moro studious of originality than the rest,
writes in cyclovolnte instead of straight
line, and manufactures his ink as he goes along,
by decomposing the tip OF his stylus on chem-
callly moistened paper. They are, no doubt. all
Of them inventors; as was the man who first
cast types in a mould, or first bent metal into
the practical semblance of the grey goose quill
or first devised sympathetic ink, that the curious
in letter-writng might veil their secrets from the
psofane. All these toied ngenously and well,
to advancesor embellish pre-exsting art. But
they had no share in the discovery of the art
itself, and can no more Claim 10 share the pro-
perry which its discovery may have conferred on
another, than he who HIS devised some appro-
pirate setting for gem, can assert an interest in
the gem itself"
The second patent of Mr. Morse is also treat.
ed at considerable length. This relates to what
is termed the local circuit 1t ia described by
the court in popular language" without refer,
enae to the varying niceties Of scientific no.
menclature' The following extracts are both
graphic and, as emboyding information not gene
rally appreciated, even by many who employ this
wonderful invention, quite interesting:
T" II is well known that a current Of galvanic
electricity, while passing along wire that has
been wound spralIy round bar of soft iron,
communicates to the iron in certain degree of
magnetic virtue, and that the iron loses this
magnetic character again as soon as the ele:.
tricity ceases to pass along the wire that sur.
rounds IL. it is also well known that the cleo
trio fluid may be paused along wire of great
length, and yet retain, even at the furthest ex-
tremity of the wire, sufficient degree of energy
to impart this occasional magnetism to the iron,
and to make il capable for the time of attract
ing any small body Of iron that may be near it.
If such n small body OF iron be made to form the
extremity of a nicely balanced lever il is plain
that while one extremity of The lever is at
tracted towards tho temporary magnet the other
extremity will be moved in the opposite direc
ton; and If to this other extremity we afiix o
pencil or stylus, this will press upon whatever
surface may be interposed in the way Of its
motion, and may either mark the surface or. if
it be Of a yielding nature, It. 1t plain,
also, that when the bar OF soft iron ceases to be
magnetic, in consequence of the electric fluid
eeasing to pass round it, the lever will take its
original position. end the stylus cease to press
upon the resisting suffice.
If now we suppose that surface 10 DE moved
below the stylus, it is obvious tina. the
surface will be marked with straight line, and
that this marked line viii be interrupted during
any ntermisson Of the electric current, so as
10 form a broken series Of straight iigss, or il
The electric current passes and intermits in rapid
0 series of dots or points. These
broken traces OF tte styl9s. the lines and dots,
constitute the alphabet of Mr.. Morse; certain
succession of either, or combination Of the two