CLAIMS OF THE AUTHOR; 69 



ment with sulphur and heat, and the importance of that change, 

 there need be no more said in this place. The statements made 

 in other parts of this work, relating to the substance both in its 

 native state and after it is vulcanized, may at any time be tested 

 and demonstrated, by the employment of chemical agents. 



As to the third claim specified, which relates to the fibrous 

 fabrics, it needs to be distinctly understood that this claim is 

 made for laminated fibrous fabrics, and not for the mixing of 

 fibrous substances with gum-elastic by grinding. For a process 

 of mixing fibres by grinding, a patent has been issued in the 

 United States, to' my brother, Nelson Goodyear. 



In 1844, the writer obtained a patent in the United States, 

 for a method of manufacturing raw cotton and wool, when lam- 

 inated with alternate layers of gum-elastic ; but notwithstanding 

 five years have elapsed, he did not succeed in demonstrating the 

 practicability of the invention, even to his own satisfaction, 

 until 1848. It is now^ rendered practicable only by important 

 modifications of the original method of operating. Neither is 

 there an unqualified claim made to the first idea of combining 

 fitrous substances with gum-elastic. The mixing of fibrous 

 substances with gum-elastic has been discussed since the com- 

 mencement of the manufacture ; but to the development and 

 practical demonstration of that which had existed only as a 

 vague and undefined theory, the author makes unqualified claim. 

 One argument in reference to the invention of the laminated 

 fabrics, and the different articles made of them, should be con- 

 clusive in all future time, as to whom these inventions rightfully 

 belong. It is this : although the number and quality of speci- 

 mens of these inventions are amply sufficient to demonstrate 

 their utility, they are, at the present time of writing, 1851, so 

 new, that the writer is nearly alone in his estimation of their 

 value ; and his judgment is not only doubted by the public, but 

 even by his associates and licensees, as to the importance of 

 these inventions. He is, however, equally confident of their 

 great value, in a mechanical or constructive sense, as of the 

 value of the vulcanizing process in a chemical point of view. 



