6i8 
TIIE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
August 17, 
the world along the same line. The Patent Office has 
in its possession over 2,000,000 patents that have been 
granted by foreign governments and at tbe close of 
business on June 25, 1907, 857,360 patents and 12,667 
reissues had been granted by our Government, making 
a total of 3,000,000 patents to search. Besides these 
SQUASII IN A CORNFIELD CORNER. FIG. 305. 
patents, the Office has thousands upon thousands of 
books, pamphlets, trade journals, technical reviews, re¬ 
ports of scientific associations and publications of every 
conceivable sort and in all languages, full of informa¬ 
tion of what is being and has been done in the industrial 
world. The patents have all been classified in an im¬ 
perfect way as well as the meager force of assistant 
examiners we have could do it, but the publications arc 
practically unclassified. By classification we mean that 
all the things that relate to a certain thing are put 
together in one place. An assistant searches through 
the class to which the invention he has in hand be¬ 
longs and brings the things that are like it to the Prin¬ 
cipal Examiner, who allows or rejects the claims of the 
inventor according to what the search has revealed. 
Third, the thing for which a patent is asked must be 
useful. That is, it must operate in the manner the in¬ 
ventor says it will. It must not be immoral or frivol¬ 
ous or injurious to the public health. 
Fourth, it must be for an art, machine, manufacture, 
or composition of matter, or for an improvement there¬ 
of. A patent will not be granted for anything else. 
The value of a patent to the inventor or owner de¬ 
pends upon four things; its validity, its breadth, the 
necessity for the device and the ability of the inventor 
or owner to handle it as a business proposition. If it 
possesses the four recpiisites and the inventor is the 
first and original inventor, that is, the invention was 
not stolen or pirated from the actual inventor, it is 
valid. If it covers a device that is entirely new it is 
a broad patent and may be exceedingly valuable, but 
if it is an improvement on existing devices it is more 
or less narrow, and more or less valuable accordingly. 
Entirely new things are extremely rare. The telephone 
as patented by Bell was new. The phonograph as pat¬ 
ented by Edison was new. The telegraph as patented 
by Morse was new. As soon as a new thing appears 
it is only a short time before applications for improve¬ 
ments on it begin to roll into the Office by the scores 
and hundreds, and in a few years there may be forty 
applications for improving some small part of the new 
device and each improvement different from the others. 
It hardly seems possible, but on January 1, 1902, there 
was a count of the patents and there were 1,812 patents 
on improvements on coal-oil lamps, not including lan¬ 
terns or headlights of any description. We grant pat¬ 
ents on all improvements, but no improver can use his 
device during the life of the first patent without paying 
royalty to the owner of the first patent. Neither can 
the first patentee use any of the improvements without 
paying royalty to the improvers. It sometimes happens 
that an improvement renders the first or previous de¬ 
vice so superior that the improvement is worth many 
times as much as the first device, from a commercial 
standpoint. Then there are improvements on improve¬ 
ments ad infinitum. The result of it all is that the 
people owning the patents generally sell out to each 
other in some way. At present nearly every patent 
granted is for an improvement on something, and as 
the Patent Office does not in any manner concern itself 
with the question of infringement, leaving that entirely 
to the courts to determine, it follows that there are few 
patents granted that do not infringe some prior patent. 
That should not discourage an inventor, for we arrive 
at perfection by small advances. Manufacturers are 
quick to appreciate even the smallest improvement if 
it is a real substantial one, and not merely a change 
that neither cheapens the production of the device nor 
makes it operate better. One trouble with most inven¬ 
tors is that they overestimate the value of their inven¬ 
tions. “Every man thinks his geese are swans.” A 
friend of mine made a small improvement, and was 
offered $2,500 for the patent by a manufacturer. I ad¬ 
vised him to take it, but he thought it was worth at 
least $10,000 and refused the offer. In a few months 
a machine appeared with his improvement on it. He 
sued and spent several hundred dollars in lawing. The 
party he sued succeeded in convincing the court that 
the improvement did not amount to an invention, but 
was no more than a skilled mechanic would do, so his 
patent was gone and his money too. A patent lawyer 
told me that a man in Alabama wrote to him to see if 
he could get a patent on a new trip for a mousetrap of 
the squirrel cage kind. The lawyer wrote him to send 
a model and he would find out for him. The inventor 
wrote back: “Not on your life will I show it unless 
you lay down half a million cold plunks first.” 
A. F. KINNAN. 
SMUT DISEASE IN WHEAT. 
Dawson’s Golden Chaff wheat raised here extensively was 
affected with smut last year and this. What is the reason 
and cure? Is there any other variety proof against it? 
Ontario Co., N. Y. H - F - c. 
It is a recognized fact among wheat growers and plant 
pathologists that different varieties of grains resist at¬ 
tacks of fungus and bacteria diseases in different de¬ 
grees. Yet it is difficult to say in specific instances 
whether the greater damage is due to the variety being 
more susceptible to the trouble, or whether the seed 
was more abundantly infected with the fungus. Either 
of these might cause quite a variation in the result. 
Dawson’s Golden. Chaff wheat has been grown at the 
college farm for a number of years. Only in one in¬ 
stance, however, have we observed that it was more ex¬ 
tensively affected with smut than other varieties grown 
in the same vicinity. In this case Dawson’s Golden 
Chaff and Gold Coin were grown side by side, and the 
former was much more affected by smut than the latter. 
We are not able to say, however, that it was because of 
its greater susceptibility, because we are not sure that 
the seed was not more extensively infected. 
The loose smut of wheat which seems to be the one 
doing damage in Ontario County is not as amenable to 
SHROPSIIIRES ON AN OHIO PASTURE. FIG. 306. 
treatment as the similar fungus affecting oats. In “The 
Cereals in America,” Prof. Hunt has this to say: 
Loose Smut. —This fungus belongs to tbe same genus as 
the smut so commonly found on maize. The spores adher¬ 
ing to the grain germinate and enter the young wheat plant 
through the sheath of the first leaf.- The fungus grows 
within the wheat plant without external manifestation until 
the wheat plant is about to flower, when the whole spike 
except the rachis is reduced to a mass of black smut spores. 
The loss from loose smut is rarely large, although as high as 
eight per cent has been reported. The remedy is known 
as the modified hot water treatment and is as follows : 
Soak the seed grain for four hours in cold water, let 
stand for four hours more in the wet sacks, then immerse 
for five minutes in water at a temperature of 133 degrees 
Fahrenheit; then dry and sow. Since this treatment injures 
the germinating power of the seed, one-half more seed per 
acre is required. The purchase of non-infected seed is also 
to be recommended. 
While it may be true that Dawson’s Golden Chaff is 
somewhat less resistant to the smut fungus than some 
other varieties it is probable that the inquirer will secure 
satisfactory results more readily by seeking seed free 
from infection and by using the hot water treatment 
named above rather than seeking new varieties that are 
more resistant. _ J- l. stone. 
CHICKEN MANURE FOR GRASS. 
We clean all the henhbuses twice a week, making a 
manure spreader load from each house. This, begin¬ 
ning with last Fall, we spread five to 10 loads to the 
acre over a piece of Timothy and clover, 13 acres, 
until the grass was too high; then we spread on the 
corn land with spreader until corn was planted, and 
now we have it in wagon and spread with shovel 
lightly on growing corn. As soon as we are through 1 
mowing will spread on hayfield in places where we 
missed, and keep on corn land as long as we can get 
through with a wagon. I have tried keeping it in 
houses, but believe the waste from decomposition and 
evaporation is too great. The manure as it comes 
from the house is fully 50 per cent dry dirt raked in- 
with it. I am now cutting Timothy averaging over 
four feet high from this field; where in places the 
spreader did not cover it is from 10 to 24 inches. Can 
I - broadcast kainit over this field, say 300 pounds per 
acre, with advantage? It will be covered again this 
Fall with 2 l / 2 to five loads per acre chicken manure. 
The land is poor and sour in places. Will the potash 
and salt in kainit help to sweeten it? I sowed clover 
and Timothy over the field this Spring to try to force 
it, and had a fine catch. I cut 35 tons clear Timothy 
on 13 acres. I have two to three times as much hay 
on that field as on the other, or any other farm within 
100 miles of me, and yet they say that hen manure 
is not (properly used) worth 30 cents per hen per year. 
Maryland. buchanan burr. 
R. N.-Y.—We would not use kainit alone on this 
grass. Muriate of potash will give a cheaper dressing 
df potash, and the salt in the kainit will not sweeten 
the soil. You need lime to do that, and you need phos¬ 
phoric acid also to make a balanced ration. Kainit 
contains \2]/ 2 pounds of potash; thus your 300 pounds 
give 37 pounds, which would be found in 75 pounds of 
muriate. We should use at least twice as much as 
that, for one ton of Timothy hay contains 40 pounds 
of potash. We should use 500 or 600 pounds basic slag 
per acre in addition to the potash. This will furnish 
phosphoric acid and also lime. The latter will help 
sweeten the soil. __ 
USE OF A “DIVINING ROD". 
Recently a reader asked for experience from those who 
have used “divining rods” to locate water. In using such 
a “rod” the operator walks slowly along with a crotch or 
two twigs shaped like a wishbone in his hands. When the 
operator is a "water witch” the rod turns down and points 
toward the ground on passing over a place where water is 
near the surface. We have here the experience of a “water 
witch” and one who had the water located for him. 
In answer to the inquiry of A. D. C. I will say that 
I have had considerable experience in that line. I 
came to this town, now a city of 35,000 inhabitants, in 
the Fall of 1854, and have resided here since that time. 
I am what some call a “water witch ” I have never 
kept a record, but I have located not less than 100 wells 
in town. Before the introduction of city water I had 
numerous calls to locate water, but now I have calls 
only outside of the limits of city water and the sur¬ 
rounding towns. I think that the rod is as sure to in¬ 
dicate hidden veins of water as the magnetic needle is 
to point to the north pole. I have never known but 
two failures and then I have no doubt it was because 
the parties got discouraged and did not dig deep 
enough. It is a well-known fact, that electricity and 
water i avc a great affinity, and scientific men say that 
when a person is highly charged with electricity, either 
positive or negative (I forget which) it will work in 
their hands. In locating water for a railroad company 
I had occasion to pass under some telegraph wires, and 
the rod would point right straight up to the wires. Be¬ 
cause the rod (I use whalebone) will not work in every 
person’s hand it leads some to think there is some 
witchery about it. I have seen a great many people 
try it, but very few could feel the least pull. E. N. c. 
Fitchburg, Mass. 
Some years past our water troubled us, the supply 
being short, so I asked a man to find a new spring. In 
trying the rod near the old spring it would work very 
quick four feet from the spring, but at the spring only 
very slowly. The spring was dug one side of the vein 
of water. When the vein was opened there was a good 
supply. The second time the man passed over a place 
where everyone said there was water, as water stood 
NATURAL AND HYBRID PRAIRIE GOOSEBERRIES. 
Natural Size, Fig. 307. See Euralisms, Page 622. 
in a hollow, but the rod refused to work. About six 
feet on one side the rod did work so quickly that the 
bark came off the stick. We had to go only three feet to 
find water in abundance. One cold Winter the water 
pipes froze. There were 40 cows to water. The rod 
worked in the cellar of the barn; at the depth of 20 
feet we found water, which has furnished a full supply. 
Hampshire Co., Mass. t. l. c. 
