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INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 195 
any individual making such a rediscovery, or reinvention, 
or even introducing a useful invention, so as to wézlize or 
turn it to a useful purpose, should be, to all intents and 
purposes, entitled to the benefits and advantages accruing 
from a patent, or protective grant, during a period of 
years, varying according to the laws of the different 
countries wherein such patent is granted. 
Were this wise and enlightened view of the case not 
taken, how many hundreds of useful and important dis- 
coveries and inventions would now still continue hidden 
in the dormant state to which, in ages past, the accidental 
death, even the poverty, of the original inventor and dis- 
coverer, a slight mischance, or a local difficulty, might 
perhaps have consigned them. Weeven see, in our own 
day, how many really useful inventions are suffered to 
languish and become inoperative for lack of energy, want 
of encouragement, &c., or the thousand and one chances 
and obstacles to the successful introduction of modern im- 
provements and inventions. We can well understand, 
therefore, how strongly all these, and other causes, may 
have operated in less advanced, less enlightened, and less 
enterprising ages. 
I have been led to these few introductory observations 
by-the reflections which have been forced upon my mind 
within the last few months, whilst following up the sub- 
ject matter involved in the history of sugar manufacture, 
from the earliest records to the present day; and of the 
plants from which the natives of various countries ex-— 
tracted a kind of sugar or jaggery, before the sugar cane 
was so universally diffused over the globe. 
In the year 1847, whilst I was engaged in writing my 
