IMPROVEMENTS IN RULERS OR INSTRUMENTS FOR RULING, AND IN THE MODE OF CONSTRUCTING THEM
Year: 1863

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Joseph Maurice at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 3rd June 1863.
I, JOSEPH MAURICE, of No. 3, Langham Place, Regent Street, Dentist,
do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN
RULERS OR INSTRUMENTS FOR RULING, AND IN THE MODE OF CONSTRUCTING THEM,"
to be as follows:-
Instead of a plain cylinder of wood or other suitable material, and instead
of the kinds or descriptions of "parallel ruler" in use or employed for enabling
lines or a series of lines to be drawn parallel to each other rapidly and with
facility, I take a perfectly cylindrical piece of lignum vitæ, ebony, or other
wood, or of other suitable material, and turn down or reduce each end to form
a pin for the purpose of enabling the cylinder, roller, or ruler to turn freely
and truly in suitable holes or plates; or instead of turning down the ends I
may bore a small hole along the axis of the cylinder or ruler for the purpose
of receiving a rod through its centre; this rod or pin is secured at each end in
a suitable carriage or end piece. I form a sheath or hollow case, or piece of
wood, metal, or other suitable material of sufficient length to form a frame,
and receive the ruler or cylinder within it and the end carriages or pieces in
which it is intended to revolve freely; the transverse section of the sheath or
case may be semicircular internally to receive the cylinder forming the ruler,
and externally it may be of circular, polygonal, square, or other shape; one edge
or both edges (the leading or back edge) forms a fence, bar, or face against
which the pencil, pen, or ruling instrument is pressed and guided. Or, instead
of the sheath or hollow case or frame just described as entirely covering the

page_text: upper side of the ruler, the ruler may be fitted between the two end pieces or
projecting carriages of a frame, rail, or ruling bar, more or less surrounding
the ruler, and having a finger piece or means of moving the ruling apparatus
back and forward, so that the pen or ruling instrument may be freely and
unimpededly moved along the edge or face of the fence.
For the purpose of guaging the distance apart of the lines to be drawn, I
drill or form a hole at one or both ends of the sheath or fence rail for the
purpose of receiving the guage; and if the sheath or fence rail be wood, I
prefer to insert a short ferule therein. The guage is formed by a pin upon
which a short metal or other tube or ferule is made to slide; this tube is
graduated with grooves or rings turned in it, and these may be numbered.
The rod, with its graduated tube, may be removed from the hole when not
required, and there may be several tubes or ferules differently graduated, but
to fit the same pin, or each pin may be graduated and several pins may be
supplied with each ruling apparatus according to this Invention. The external
surface of the sheath or case or its equivalent (which in every case is longer
than the cylinder, roller, or ruler, which it more or less partly surrounds and
supports by trunnions or pins projecting therefrom, or by a pin or bar running
through it), may have engraved on it, or have fixed thereto, or otherwise carry
a scale or scales of divisions of length or tables of weights and measures, or
any other useful information for the office or general reference. The sheath,
case, or its equivalent may be cast in metal from accurately finished and
suitably engraved patterns, or it may be cast in "ebonite," "vulcanite," or
other suitable material, or be made in wood, ivory, and such like materials,
but when made of wood they should be grooved out internally and shaped
externally at one operation in long lengths, and then be cut off to the length
required for each instrument; the end pieces in which the pins of the roller
or ruler revolve, or which support the long pin or rod on which when a hollow
cylinder, roller, or ruler is employed it revolves freely, are secured by screws,
pins, or other ordinary means.