Tinker v. Wilber Eureka Mower & Reaper Manufacturing Company.
(Circuit Court, S. D. New York. January 20, 1880.)
Invention—Specification—Drawing.—In a suit upon a patent a drawing can be looked at, if necessary in order to explain an ambiguous or doubtful specification, but cannot be made to supply the entire want of any part of a specification or claim.
Same—Patent.—Although a patent gives an exclusive right to the patented invention for all uses to which it could be put, whether contemplated by the inventor or subsequently discovered, still the invention must, in some way, be covered by the patent before such exclusive right can be acquired.
Wheeler, J. This suit is founded upon the second claim of Letters Patent No. 51,364, dated December 5, 1865, granted to John B. Tinker, for an improvement in mowing machines. Among other defences the defendant denies infringement. Both the orator's and the defendant's machines are operated by direct draft, and have finger bars resting in shoes, hinged backward to other parts at each end, which are carried by rollers, and alternately run in the standing grass. They are placed forward of the shoes, and roll down the standing grass in their paths, and thereby prevent tangling, which would occur and be detrimental, if the grass should be divided towards the bottom, for them to pass through. One question is whether the plaintiff's patent covers a roller so placed. The only part of the specification describing them, or in any way referring to their location, after referring to the shoes, says: "The shoes also carry rollers, 'F,' in front of the finger bar, which run upon the ground and sustain the weight of the finger bar." In other parts it describes the finger bar and cutters as arranged to do their work wholly between the driving wheels, or the courses of their tracks. The drawing shows the rollers, not only in front of the finger bar, but forward of the shoes.
The second claim is for "the combination of the carrying-rollers, 'F', with the hinged and extended shoes, 'E', arranged and located substantially as herein described." The arrange-
