of old patents granted anterior to
eighteen hundred and fifty-two; he is printing
the whole of them. Down to Midsummer
last past he had printed and published three
thousand five hundred; and at the intended
rate of two thousand five hundred a-year he
expects to bring the great work to a
completion in or about the year eighteen hundred
and sixty. About thirty modern patent
specifications make up a goodly volume. Cheap
as these specifications unquestionably are
singly, they mount up to a cost of great
magnitude collectively. Thus the Fire-arms
series, even at cost price, amounts to nearly
ten pounds. The copies printed of most of
the specifications are two hundred and fifty
in number; and there will be about twenty
thousand pounds per annum expended, until
the work is completed, on the paper, printing
and lithographing. This large outlay,
and all other expenses, are more than covered
by the fees paid by patentees.

Another work published by these law
officers is the Commissioners of Patents'
Journal; a sheet of eight large pages,
published twice a week, and sold to the public
at two pence per number. It contains
information touching grants of provisional
protection for six months; inventions protected
for six months on deposit of a complete
specification; notices to proceed for patents;
patents sealed; patents extended; foreign
patents; official advertisements, and various
notices. It is a patentees' newspaper, telling
all the current news on the subject.

One of the best features in the proceedings
of the Commissioners, is the desire shown to
extend the usefulness of their labours by as
much publicity as possible. They have
presented copies of all their publications to the
chief magistrates and corporations of the
principal towns within the United Kingdom,
to be placed in such public free-libraries as
now exist, or as may hereafter be formed;
under certain conditions calculated to insure
free and easy access to the books by all
persons without fee or charge. Every Monday,
such specifications and engravings are
sent as may have been published during the
preceding week. This excellent gift has in
numerous instances laid the foundation of
public free-libraries where none previously
existed. Down to Midsummer eighteen
hundred and fifty-six, about eighty corporate
bodies had complied with the conditions
essential to the receipt of this boon. In
some of the towns, there have been held
Industrial Exhibitions of the lithographic
drawings relating to the several patents on
one particular subject; while foremen and
workmen from the factories are often to be
seen busily poring over the books and drawings
in the free-libraries. Complete sets of
the Commissioners' publications have also
been sent to the respective colonies, and to
the chief foreign governments. Mr. Woodcroft
has collected a valuable store of books
of reference relating to patents; besides numerous
models of inventions, which may one
day be displayed publicly in the new building
now being constructed at Kensington
Gore.

The room near Chancery Lane, opened for
the reader's especial behoof, remains yet to
be noticed. The building once occupied by
the Masters in Chancery, is now placed at
the disposal of the Commissioners of Patents.
One among the many rooms in this building
is now a reading-room, open to the public for
the study of any and everything relating to
patents. A small room it is: much too
small, indeed; but as it is the beginning of
a good thing, its gradual growth may be
pleasantly watched hereafter. It is well
filled, and tended by officials, who show the
utmost courtesy to visitors having any
reasonable motive for going thither: mere
curiosity is hardly a reasonable motive.
Indexes and lists, specifications and
lithographed drawings, are ranged around in
formidable number; insomuch, that if the
visitor desire to know aught concerning any
one of twenty thousand patents granted since
the time of James the First, he can obtain,
if not the specifications and drawings, at least
a brief outline of the matter. This he can
do, either by his own researches, or still more
readily by the aid of the polite attendants.
It is estimated that in about four years the
specifications of all the old patents, as lately
implied, will have been printed; that the old
and new patents together will, by that time,
number not much less than thirty thousand;
and that the printed specifications of all
these, ranged together in chronological order,
will fill about eight hundred massive octavo
volumes or cases —the largest record of
inventive ingenuity to be met with in any
country: a record of failures that have
dashed many a hope, and of successes that
have founded many a fortune. The ABC
to the lives of Watt and Wedgwood, of
Crampton and Hargreaves, of Kay and
Arkwright will here be met with; and to the
deaths of many luckless inventors who have
been worn down to the grave by patent
vexations. The steam-engines and the
textile fabrics alone bid fair to demand
whole shelves for their printed patent
specifications.

Let the controversy for and against patents
take what turn it may, this room near
Chancery Lane marks one improvement in
the state of the law; it does not sever
us from contact with routine and
redtape, but it renders those unpopular
symbols less obstructive and annoying than
before.