half with each, is some sort of packing, so that the rope or cable passing through this hole will be pressed against sufficiently, it is expected or intended, to prevent the escape of compressed air from the air lock. Here, as already intimated, is neither invention nor patentable novelty. In place of this and conforming to the rope or cable the 1901 locks have a bushing of brass or steel to prevent wear and enlargement of the hole. This is the substitute if it may be called that. Clearly there is no patentable novelty or even novelty in the two-part valve. These are very old, and it is immaterial whether they open in the air lock or not, so far as invention or novelty is concerned, whether they are hinged and swing or slide. These forms are old. Nor is there anything new or novel in their closing against a seat, the seat described, on the inner side of the air lock. Clearly the hole or opening is not new or novel. Such a two-part valve with such an opening or hole and opening as described, and closing against a seat as described, presents nothing either new or novel, and the defendant does not infringe this claim when he uses all these things, and does not use in the combination a stuffing box or its equivalent. But assume a stuffing box, not new or novel in itself, and I see no novelty or patentable invention in the combination. In all essentials it is a pair of doors with a small hole therein at the point indicated for the passage of a rope or cable, which hole conforms in size and shape to the rope to be used. These doors open and shut when occasion demands, either by sliding or swinging, and, of course, open away from the rope. They open down or swing down, when open, into the air chamber of the lock, so that, when closed, the compressed air will press them up against their seat, and keep them closed and in close contact with the surrounding edges of the material forming the upper part of the air chamber, not necessary to describe. All this is to prevent the escape of compressed air when closed and at the same time have a two-part valve, double doors, which can be thrown wide open, when it is not desired to keep the air chamber closed, to permit unobstructed ingress to and egress from the air chamber and, when closed, close about the rope or cable hanging in the center of the air chamber and space above. This rope must not be interfered with. At the same time, when closed, these doors, or this two-part valve, must come in such close contact with the rope or cable that whether it moves up and down or remains stationary there will not be any material escape of compressed air. This, in claim 3, is provided for by flexible packing, any flexible packing attached to the edges of the rope or cable opening in two parts, one part on each door and carried with it, and, as matter of course, this packing will press close against the rope or cable at all times, and, if of the proper material, will substantially prevent the escape of compressed air both while the rope moves and when it is stationary. If properly attached to the two halves of the valve, the packing will not be detached and will serve its purpose until worn out. In my judgment it was not invention, in view of the prior art, to conceive the idea that stationary packing about a moving rope or cable passing through it would make a sufficiently tight joint to retain the compressed air in the air chamber. And there is nothing new or novel in the entire combination amounting to patentable invention, unless the application of the combination to a new

purpose in a new place amounts to or discloses patentable novelty. So far as this court is advised, this combination of old elements, described in claim 3 of the Moran patent, was never used until Moran applied it to air locks for the purpose described.

But we have many patents for hatchways and hatchway improvements with the two-part valve and cable or rope in the center, with notches and holes in the center of the valve, or doors for the movement of this rope carrying the load, without disturbing the valves, and we have all forms of devices for the opening and closing of these valves. In some cases they slide horizontally, in some cases they swing downwardly into the chamber below, and in others they swing upwardly and the seats against which they lie when closed are arranged accordingly. We also have substantially the same thing in blast furnaces with seals or gas seals or valves operating to make them air or gas tight upon precisely the same principle. It may not be amiss to call attention (without describing) to the John M. Bradner patent of 1872, No. 129,646, for "improvements in modes of closing hatchways," the Alexander Holstrom patent of 1855, for new and useful improvements in "apparatus for atmospheric pile driving," where we have a working chamber and an air lock with a manhole, one flange opening upward into the air lock and the other downward into the working chamber, but when closed this is kept closed as follows:

"When there is a greater pressure in the inside than outside, the manhole cover, b", is always closed and is kept up by said pressure."

And, further, says the patent:

"It may be remarked that all the covers are either ground or gum joints and kept tight by mere contact of surfaces."

But in other parts, as where a shaft passes through, the patentee says, "the joints being kept tight by stuffing boxes as shown in Figs. 1 and 2." See, also, C. N. Creamer patent of 1868, No. 78,265; J. N. Wilson patent, No. 131,923, of 1872; S. I. Russell patent of 1872, No. 134,169; John L. Peters patent of March 28, 1882, No. 255,663; H. Albert patent of September 18, 1883, No. 285,097; Fayette Brown patent, No. 313,849, of March 17, 1885, showing gas sealing doors or two-part valves; W. Kennedy and J. Scott patent of June 21, 1887, No. 365,077, showing gas sealing doors or a two-part valve with opening for cable as in the patent in suit, and, in fact, the entire combination of claim 3, except the packing. In the operation of a blast furnace, when the charge is introduced, it is all important that the pressurein the furnace shall not be released. Hence the use of a gas seal. In these the use of the two-part valve or two-part door, with rope opening in the center, was old when Moran came into the field. In the Kennedy patent, already referred to, the function of the gas seal and the desirability and advantage of this two-part door are described as follows:

"This construction not only acts to secure the uniform feeding of the furnace, but also as a perfect gas-seal, because the chamber, b', is tight, and the doors, g', are closed when the bell d is open and the bell d is closed when the doors, g', are open, so that there is no time, when the top is open, to permit the escape of gas, and consequently no heat is wasted at the top, and the irreg

ular action of the blast heating stoves, due to periodical escaping of gas at the top, is avoided."

The function and mode of operation of the gas seal of the Kennedy patent and the doors of the air lock are the same so far as I can see. It seems to me that the blast furnace is an analogous art, and is properly considered in determining the questions involved here. It seems to me that Moran, having the prior art before him, and I have not referred to it in extenso, so far as claim 3 of his patent is concerned, only did what any person skilled in the art would have done, exercising that skill and the thought necessary to apply the prior art to an air lock. In my judgment there was no conception amounting to patentable invention in making the old hatchway devices strong and also air-tight by means of suitable packing carried on and with the doors or valves themselves, and applying them to an air lock. It is conceded there was patentable invention in the packing box or stuffing box, T, of the patent carried on the rope, and in its application, but as seen that is not used by defendant. There is patentable invention in other claims of the Moran patent unquestionably, but that is not the question presented here.

We return, then, to the question: Can claim 3 of the Moran patent be sustained on the ground that Moran first applied the combination, with packing, not the stuffing box, T, to an air lock? If so, it is valid and the defendant McMullen has infringed by the use of the 1901 locks. My attention has been directed to many decisions on this question, and I have given them careful attention. Possibly it is not far from correct to say that the question is whether this case is governed by Cash Register Company v. Cash Indicator Company, 156 U. S. 502-514, 15 Sup. Ct. 434, 39 L. Ed. 511, and similar cases, or by Pennsylvania Railroad v. Locomotive Truck Co., 110 U. S. 490, 4 Sup. Ct. 220, 28 L. Ed. 222, and cases following on that line. Is there any substantial change in the manner of the application of this combination or any result obtained substantially distinct in its nature from those in former uses? It is settled that the end or purpose sought to be accomplished by a device is not the subject of a patent. The new and useful means for obtaining such end or accomplishing such purpose is. Knapp v. Morss, 150 U. S. 221, 227, 14 Sup. Ct. 81, 37 L. Ed. 1059; Wollensak v. Sargent, 151 U. S. 227, 14 Sup. Ct. 291, 38 L. Ed. 137, approved Cash Reg. Co. v. Cash Indicator Co., 156 U. S. 515, 15 Sup. Ct. 434, 39 L. Ed. 511. We have a good illustration in Fond du Lac County v. May, 137 U. S. 395-397-406, 11 Sup. Ct. 98, 34 L. Ed. 714, where there was a new application of old devices and elements in a new place for a new purpose, viz., to a prison to keep the prisoners from the keeper. And in Wollensak v. Sargent, supra, at page 227 of 151 U. S., at page 293 of 14 Sup. Ct. (38 L. Ed. 137), it is said:

"The novelty must be a novelty in the means or mechanical device, and not in the use to which the combination is put."

Here the primary end or purpose to be accomplished, so far as this patent is concerned, was to carry the load continuously from the working chamber of the caisson through the air lock to the open air by means of the same rope or cable, at the same time maintaining the com

pressed air pressure in such working chamber. To do this it was necessary to maintain the compressed air pressure in the air lock proper notwithstanding the movement of the load and of the rope or cable carrying it through the hole in the valves in the upper part of the air lock, until such time as the operator saw fit, in the proper operation of the air lock and caisson, to equalize the air pressure in the lock with that outside. Hence the immediate object or purpose of the combination of claim 3 of the Moran patent was to prevent the escape from the chamber of the air lock of the compressed air through the opening in the valves provided for the passage of the rope or cable. Have we any new or useful means for accomplishing this purpose or object? To accomplish this purpose Moran brought to his aid the old two-part valve or double doors opening in the air lock (but there was nothing new in this mode of opening), and closing in the old way against a seat on the inner side of the air lock (necessarily there) having the old central opening for the passage of the rope or cable, the exact equivalent of the rod carrying the load in the blast furnace construction, and the exact construction found in hatchways, and the old stuffing box arrangement (not the stuffing box, T, carried on the rope) described as follows:

"About the hole N I may arrange a stuffing box in two halves as shown in Figs. 4, 5, and 6, or flexible packing arranged in some other way so as to make a close joint with the cable."

Any old stuffing box, or any flexible packing arranged in any old way. I fail to discover anything new in this arrangement. No new function is performed by either element or by all the elements combined. The old hatchway is made air-tight by close construction and seating, and by packing about the apertures therein in the old way of making anything air-tight. Hatchways had not been made perfectly air-tight for the reason that no one desired an air-tight hatchway, except as necessary to keep the cellar or room from freezing in winter time, and every country grown man knows that in the winter time the hatchway was secured against the inrush of cold air by packing of various descriptions, such as cotton, wool, and old clothes. Some principles in patent law are quite well settled and should not be departed from. "A new arrangement or grouping of parts or elements which is the mere result of mechanical judgment and the natural outgrowth of mechanical skill, is not invention." Also, "the combination of old devices into a new article without producing any new mode of operation, is not invention." Florsheim v. Schilling, 137 U. S. 64, 76, 77, 11 Sup. Ct. 20, 25, 34 L. Ed. 574. "The application of an old process or machine to a similar or analogous subject, with no change in the manner of applying it, and no result substantially distinct in its nature, will not sustain a patent, even if the new form of result has not before been contemplated." Pennsylvania R. R. v. Locomotive Truck Co., 110 U. S. 490, 4 Sup. Ct. 220, 28 L. Ed. 222, approved Howe Machine Co. v. National Needle Co., 134 U. S. 397, 10 Sup. Ct. 570, 33 L. Ed. 963. See, also, cases there cited. In Mast, Foos & Co. v. Stover Mfg. Co., 177 U. S. 485-493, 20 Sup. Ct. 708, 44 L. Ed. 856, it was held that under the state of the art "it required no inven

tion to adapt to a windmill the combination of an internal toothed spur wheel with an external toothed pinion, for the purpose of converting a revolving into a reciprocating motion." At page 493 of 177 U. S., at page 712 of 20 Sup. Ct. (44 L. Ed. 856) the court said:

"Martin, therefore, discovered no new function; and he created no new situation, except in the limited sense that he first applied an internal gearing to the old Mast-Foos mill, which was practically identical with the Martin patent, except in the use of an internal gearing. He invented no new device; he used it for no new purpose; he applied it to no new machine. All he did was to apply it to a new purpose in a machine where it had not before been used for that purpose."

The court also reiterates what was held in Potts v. Creager, 155 U. S. 597, 608, 15 Sup. Ct. 194, 199, 39 L. Ed. 275:

"If the new use be so nearly analogous to the former one that the applicability of the device to its new use would occur to a person of ordinary mechanical skill, it is only a case of double use."

The court then says:

"The line between invention and mechanical skill is often an exceedingly difficult one to draw; but, in view of the state of the art as heretofore shown, we cannot say that the application of this old device to a use which was only new in the particular machine to which it was applied was anything more than would have been suggested to an intelligent mechanic who had before him the patents to which we have called attention. While it is entirely true that the fact that this change had not occurred to any mechanic familiar with windmills is evidence of something more than mechanical skill in the person who did discover it, it is probable that no one of these was fully aware of the state of the art and the prior devices; but, as before stated, in determining the question of invention, we must presume the patentee was fully informed of everything which preceded him, whether such were the actual fact or not."

So here it may be that it had not occurred to persons familiar with the construction of air locks to use this combination, and so Moran did not find it in actual use with air locks, but had he looked into hatchways and blast furnaces and pile drivers he would have found the same combination used in different ways. In the pile driver patent, cited above, packing was not used as ground joints and surfaces made it unnecessary, and that fact is mentioned. In Aron v. Manhattan Railway Company, 132 U. S. 84, 10 Sup. Ct. 24, 33 L. Ed. 272, the court, affirming the court below, quoted the language of Judge Wallace and affirmed on his opinion. Judge Wallace had said:

"A brief reference to the prior state of the art will indicate that the combinations referred to in the several claims are merely an application to a new situation of old devices which had been previously applied to analogous uses. *** This partial exhibit of the prior state of the art demonstrates that what the patentee did was to adapt well-known devices to the special purpose to which he contemplated their application. *** The patentee is entitled to the merit of being the first to conceive of the convenience and utility of a gate opening and closing mechanism which could be operated efficiently by an attendant in the new situation. His right to a patent, however, must rest upon the novelty of the means he contrives to carry his idea into practical application. It rarely happens that old instrumentalities are so perfectly adapted for a use for which they were not originally intended as not to require any alteration or modification. If these changes involve only the exercise of ordinary mechanical skill, they do not sanction the patent."