266 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
[Oct.  i,  i892. 
work  vertically.  In  the  Standard  it  was  the  lower  sur- 
face that  had  to  be  moved  to  reduce  the  rolling 
•pace;  in  the  oase  of  the  Excelsior  it  was  the  upper 
surface  which  was  made  movable  vertically  in  order  to 
admit  the  leaf  for  rolling  and  to  allow  of  the  pressure 
on  the  leaf  being  regulated.  Another  advantage  gained 
toy  the  new  machine  was  that  the  upper  table  while 
carried  so  near  to  the  lower  table  as  to  prevent 
leakage  of  leaf  yet  did  not  touch  the  lower  table  and 
the  immense  amount  of  friction  present  in  the 
Standard  was  taken  away,  with  the  result  at  once  to 
be  anticipated  and  expected  that  the  machine  was 
easier  to  drive ; it  took  less  motive  power  to  drive  it 
than  was  the  case  with  the  Standard  and  it  was  not 
so  stiff  or  cumbersone,  while  the  oil  could  not  have 
access  to  the  tea,  feeding  was  far  more  easily 
accomplished  and  ventilation  was  secured  to  a much 
greater  extent  than  could  be  done  in  the  Standard, 
and  there  were  many  other  advantages  which  it  was 
not  necessary  to  point  out.  One  great  improvement 
waB  that  the  driving  machinery  was  taken  off  from 
the  upper  rolling  surface  and  attached  to  the  case 
or  jacket.  That  improvement  had  been  taken  by  the 
defendants  and  applied  to  the  Triple  Action  Roller, — 
that  was  the  appropriation  plaintiff  complained  of. 
Passing  on  counsel  drew  attention  to  the  Triple 
Action  Roller,  pointing  out  that  while  the  case  in  the 
Triple  Action  was  round  and  in  the  Excelsior  square 
yet  the  function  in  each  case  was  to  hold  the  leaf 
and  to  confine  it  between  the  two  rolling 
surfaces,  and  the  one  point  in  the  Triple 
Action  machine  which  justified  its  name  over 
and  above  what  appeared  in  the  Excelsior,  was 
the  revolution  of  the  j upper  rolling  surface. 
He  asked  the  Court  to  picture  the  machine  made 
square  instead  of  round  and  then  to  consider  the 
action  on  the  leaf.  The  two  machines  worked  so  as 
to  produce  the  same  action  on  the  leaf. 
The  Chief  Justice  asked  if  this  was  really  the 
case ; if  the  two  machines  had  exactly  the  same  effect 
on  the  leaf  ? 
Mr.  Wendt  replied  that  this  was  so  if  the  rotary 
motion  of  the  Triple  Action’s  upper  surface  was  left 
out  of  consideration.  Opinion  was  divided  as  to 
whether  that  in  itself  was  an  advantage ; but,  leaving 
that  alone,  the  action  was  the  same.  Of  course 
the  machines  sought  to  imitate  the  action  of  the 
human  hand  in  rolling  the  leaf.  Hands  were 
u*ed  in  China  still  aDd  these  machines  were  made 
to  imitate  the  rolling  there.  The  effect  of  these  two 
machines  was  the  same. 
The  Chief  Justice  remarked  that  it  seemed  to  him 
that  the  motion  of  the  one  was  distinct  from  the 
other;  one  being  rectilinear  whereas  the  other  was 
circular. 
Mr.  Wendt  said  this  was  so  in  the  result  but  the 
motion  of  the  two  rolling  surfaces  by  themselves  was 
the  same,  namely,  circular  which  would  be  demon- 
strated if  a pencil  were  attached  to  either  surface 
and  made  to  mark  a line  on  a piece  of  paper.  In 
addition  the  defendants  had  provided  wbat  they 
olaimed  as  aa  improvement,  namely,  rotary  movement 
of  the  upper  surface.  The  upper  rolling  surface  was 
given  a rotary  motion  on  its  own  axis  while  at  the 
same  time  to  quote  the  defendants  words,  it  had  the 
eocentrio  motion  imparted  to  it  by  the  hollow  cylinder 
corresponding  to  the  jacket  in  the  plaintiff’s  mach- 
ine. As  the  plaintiff  said  the  rotatory  motion  of  the 
upper  rolling  surface  might  or  might  not  be  an  im- 
provement. Let  it  be  so ; it  was  open  to  anyone  to 
apply  that  rotatory  motion  to  anybody  else’s  machine 
so  long  as  permission  to  do  so  bad  been  granted  ; but 
what  the  plaintiff  contended  in  this  case  was  that  the 
defendants  had  adopted  this  principle  of  giving  the 
eocentrio  motion  to  their  rolling  surfaces  from  the 
plaintiff’s  machine.  This  induced  him  to  pause  end 
say  that  the  Standard  was  said  to  have  been  common 
property  in  Ceylon  before  the  Excelsior  wns  pa- 
tented ; but  this  improvement  could  not  possibly  he 
applied  to  that  common  property  for  in  the  Standard 
the  upper  rolling  surface  was  kept  in  one  position  by 
sliding  on  two  parallel  rods.  Defendants  could  not, 
possibly  have  applied  the  rotatory  motion  there- 
fore, without  getting  the  upper  rolling  surface  free 
of  the  jacket  surrounding  it.  In  the  Standard  the 
motion  was  imparted  to  the  case  or  jaoket  from  the 
- upper  rolling  surface  while  in  the  Excelsior  and  the 
Triple  Action  the  principle  was  motion  imparted  to 
the  upper  rolling  surface  through  the  case  or  jacket, 
and  that  was  the  point  on  which  they  claimed  that  there 
had  been  an  infringement.  Passing  on  to  the  judg- 
ment delivered  by  the  District  Judge,  counsel  alluded 
to  the  fact  that  beoause  certain  portions  of  the  jacket 
in  the  plaintiff's  machine  answered  the  purposes  of  a 
connecting  rod,  certain  scientific  witnesses  called  by 
defendants  who  had  studied  meohanios  in  the  abstract 
declared  that  those  parts  were  a connecting  rod,  but 
he  submitted  that  the  whole  was  a case  or  jacket 
because  it  confined  the  tea.  Defendants'  witnesses  had 
6aid  that  it  formed  a connecting  rod  however,  and 
the  learned  Judge  appeared  to  have  gone  off  on  that 
line.  Mr.  Wendt  then  went  on  to  refer  to  defendants’ 
specification,  and  then,  reverting  to  the  District  Judge’s 
remarks,  he  6aid  that  the  D.  J.  had  stated  that 
the  motion  of  the  plaintiff's  upper  rolling  surfaoe  was 
acquired  by  impact  whereas  the  defendants’  rolling  sur- 
face got  no  impact  whatsoever.  Plaintiff,  however,  con- 
tended that  it  received  impact  from  the  outer  case  by 
means  of  the  bracket.  Then  the  District  Judge  had 
said  that  the  defendants’ machine  cruld  be  worked 
if  the  wooden  lining  was  taken  out.  They  granted 
that,  and  with  their  machine  it  was  exactly  the  same 
thing;  but  they  were  only  producing  models  and  the 
defendants’  model  had  been  so  made  that  it  could  be 
disseoted,  which  was  not  the  oase  with  the  Excelsior 
mode’,  and  this  appeared  to  have  impressed  the  Judge. 
Their  model  was  made  as  though  it  was  a machine 
for  work  and  it  was  not  so  made  that  the  wooden 
portion  could  be  taken  out.  Then,  too,  the 
learned  Judge  said  that  the  upper  rolling  surface 
had  its  rotatory  and  its  horizontal — other- 
wise called  its  eccenlric — motion  entirely  in- 
dependent of  the  ca>e  or  jacket.  If  the  learned 
Judge  meant  that  piece  of  wood  that  might  be  trap, 
bnt  if  the  hollow  cylinder  carried  the  upper  rolling 
surface  it  was  not  true,  beonuse  their  lordphips  would 
see  that  the  defendants  in  their  own  specification  de- 
scribed this  upper  rolling  furfaee  as  having  a rotatory 
motion  in  addition  to  the  eocentrio  motion  imparted  by 
the  hollow  cylinder.  The  fact  that  the  machine 
worked  without  the  limng  had  evidently  impressed  ths 
District  Judge,  and  ho  disregarded  the  rest  of  the 
evidence  and  said  he  saw  with  his  own  eyes  that  it 
could  he  taken  off  and  this  was  not  done  with  the 
Excelsior.  But  the  Exce'sior  Roller  would  work  on 
the  same  principle,  And  then  came  the  part  on  which 
he  desired  to  lay  great  stress,  because  it  was  the  part 
that  be  had  said  should  have  been  followed  by  a ver- 
dict for  the  plaintiff.  Said  the  District  Judge  : “ As 
the  Excelsior  was  an  improvement  on  the  Standard,  so 
the  Triple  Aotion  Roller  is  an  improvement  on  the 
Excelsior,”  and  he  added,  “ and  is  a decidedly  far 
more  efficient  and  satisfactory  machine” — a thiDg  he 
was  not  called  upon  to  say.  H«  desired  to  repeat  this 
passage,  for  it  was  an  important  one.  Plaintiff  im- 
proved on  the  Standard  by  disconnecting  the  driving 
mechanism  from  the  npper  rolling  surface  and  con- 
necting it  to  the  jacket.  The  learned  Judge  said  that 
defendants  had  improved  on  their  improvement. 
The  Chief  Justice  said  it  seemed  to  him  the 
whole  question  hinged  on  what  was  the  jacket  ? 
It  seemed  to  be  time  thrown  away  by  arguing  ques- 
tions of  motive  power. 
Counsel  agreed  ; but  pressed  his  last  point.  It  was 
a principle  that  if  he  improved  another  man’s 
machine  that  had  been  patented  it  did  not  entitle 
him  to  any  right  to  the  machine.  If  A had  patented 
a tea  roller  and  he  discovered  something  that  would 
add  to  its  efficiinc.y,  all  he  could  patent  was  the  im- 
provement he  had  discovered.  Suppose  he  found 
A.’s  machine  might  be  bettered  by  fluting  a surface, 
or  by  making  the  machine  of  some  other  material, 
he  might  patent  his  improvements  so  as  to  prevent 
the  original  patentee  from  adopting  them,  bnt  he 
could  not  adopt  A’s  machine  for  the  purpose  without 
obtaining  his  license. 
