Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/523

AMEBIOAN BELL TELEPHONE CO. V, SPENCER. 509 �Akbbioan Bell Telephone Co. and others v. Spenoeb and others. (Circuit Court, D. Massachusetts. June 27, 1881.) �1. Patent No. 174,465— Impkovbmbnts m Tei/Eskaphy— Telephone— Validity �— Infbeigembnt. �Letters patent No. 174,465, granted March 7, 1876, to Alexander Graham Bell, for unprovements in telegraphy, held valid as to its flfth clalm, "for a method and apparatus for transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraphically by causing electrical undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompanying the vocal or other sounds," and infringed. �2. Patent- CoMBiNATioK of Old Devices— Substitution of a New Eiement— �Infbingbmbnt. �If a patent is for a mare arrangement or combination of old devices to pro- duce a somewhat better resuit in a known art, the substitution of a new element, not known at the date of the patent, may avoid inf ringement. �3. DiscovBEBB op New Aet— Bboad Claim. �The discpverer of a new art is entitled to the broadest claim for it which can be permitted in any case ; not to the abstract right to the art without regard to the means, but to all means and processes whiCh he ha« both invented and claimed. �4. Section 4922, Rbv. St., Consteubd— Costs. �Section 4922, Rev. St., providing that where a patentee has claimed too much in any part of his patent, in a suit brought thereon, he shall not recover costs, does not mean that claims not in issue should be contestedfor the mere purpose of setthng the costs. �6. Patent No. 174,465 — Telephone— Anticipation— Infeingbmbnt. �Bell's invention, consisting of the method and apparatus for transmitting vocal sounds by transferring to a wire undulatory electrical vibrations like those which the sounds have made in the air, and carrying them to a receiving instrument capable of echoing them, Jield, not antieipated by the invention of Reis, in Germany, in 1860, consisting of an apparatus for transmitting sounds by the use of membranes and electrodes, which was of no practical utility ; and infringed by defendants' method and apparatus, in which undulatory vibra- tions of electricity corresponding to those of the air are produced and trans- mitted to a receiver, though the specifie method of producing the undulations is supplemented by the use of an instrument which intensifies and makes audi- ble very feeble sounds. �J. J. Storrow, Chauncy Smith, and E. N. Dickerson, for complain- arfts. �Frederick H. Betts, for defendant. �Lowell, C. j. The bill alleges an infringement of two patents (No. 174,466, dated March 7, 1876, — improvement in telegraphy; No. 186,787, dated January 30, 1877, — improvement in electrio teleg- raphy) granted to Alexander Graham Bell. The defendants admit that they have infringed some valid claims of the second patent, but the plaintiffs are not content with this admission ; they rely, besides, ��� �