An Outline of the Law of Chemical Patents1 - Industrial & Engineering

An Outline of the Law of Chemical Patents1 .... The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency must implement a worker and community chemical safety regulat...
0 downloads 0 Views 638KB Size
INDUSTRIAL AND EiVGIiVEERIAVG CHEiVISTRY

426

Vol. 19, x o . 3

An Outline of the Law of Chemical Patents’ By Edward Thomas 165 BROADWAY, N E W YORK,N. Y

I n f r i n g e m e n t (Continued from February issue) The second of these all-important facts led the Supreme Court to say, many years ago: The claim * * * in referring to the material to be treated, mentions only straw, but the object of the claim was to secure a monopoly of the process, not to enumerate the materials to which it might be applied * * * The specification speaks of “straw or such other fibrous matters,” of * * * “straw or fibrous substances” * * * and it uses other similar forms of expression * * * It would * * * be too narrow a construction of the patent to hold t h a t i t is for a process applicable only to straw or other similar vegetable substances and not applicable to vegetable substances eenerallv reauirinp. like treatment for the uses mentioned. knericak Wood Piper Co. 2’. Fiber Disintegrating Co. (Wood Paper Patent), 23 Wall. at 606, 607. IMPROVMENT L ~ A YINFRIXGE A PATENT-In t h e celebrated case involving the saponification of fats by steam to produce stearic acid, oleic acid, and glycerol, the Supreme Court said:

Another ground on which the defendants argue that they d o not infringe the patent is, that they do not, in their process, use water alone in admixture with fat, but use also some portion of lime * * * It is unnecessary to determine what precise part the lime used by the defendant plays in their process * * *whether * * * it saponifies the fat to a certain extent, leaving the remainder to be acted upon by the water alone * * * or whether * * * the lime produces more perfect and active commixture * * * The introduction of a n improvement gives no title to use the primary invention upon which the improvement is based. Tilghman D. Proctor, 102 U. S. a t 731, 732. More briefly the Supreme Court said elsewhere:

A new idea may be ingrafted upon an old invention, be distinct from the conception which preceded it, and be an improvement. In such case it is patentable. The prior patentee cannot use it without the consent of the improver, and the latter cannot use the original invention without the consent of the former. Smith a. Nichols, 21 Wall. 118, 119. PRODUCT CLAIMSIIWLUDED IF POSSIBLE-The serious handicaps resulting from failure t o include product as well as process claims in a patent appeared in a suit upon a patent for a process for making phonograph records, wherein the plaintiff failed because he proved only sale of the product. The Court said:

A process patent is not infringed by selling the product, and the vendee of a product which has been made in infringement of a patented process cannot be held liable to the patentee, or in any extent to be a n infringement. Similarity or even identity in appearance of a product is not sufficient, and the charge of infringement can only be sustained by certain proof that the defendant uses the process of the patent. American Graphophone Co D. Gimbel Bros., 234 Fed. a t 368. CHEMICALEQUIVALESTS-KO text-book writer can safely lay down a rule by which it may he decided in advance what will be and what will not be found to be chemical equivalents for the procedures and substances named in a patent. One summary by Judge Townsend can hardly be improved upon. I n a suit upon a dye patent, partly quoting others, he said:

“It is therefore safe to define an equivalent as a thing which performs the same function, and performs that function in substantially the same manner, as the thing of which it is alleged t o be a n equivalent” * * * I think the law must be that where the new ingredient is such as would have been known to or employed by the ordinary skilled practical chemist, or is such as would naturally have been developed in the growth of the art, and the substitution thereof involves no alteration or new operation or result, it is covered by the patent, provided the speci1

Received June 29, 1926.

fications and claims are sufficiently broad to include it * * * I n the case a t bar the defendants’ body is a mere substitute. Czz It existed in is the next succeeding homolog of (2x0, CZO,(22,. the arts: was referred to in literature: the patented process of Coupier was capable of producing it * * * The defendants * * * have taken the CSZ,existing prior to the patent * * * subjected it to the process described in the patent, and obtained the patented product. Read Holliday and Sons u. Schulze-Berge, 78 Fed. a t 496. Judge Lacombe made one of the most interesting applications of the law relating to infringement in the following case: The first claim reads: 1. “A pyrophoric alloy, containing cerium alloyed with iron, substantially as and for the purposes set forth.” * * * As defendant’s compound consists of cerium with from 11 to 15 per cent of magnesium, the first claim only is declared upon * * * The doctrine of equivalents does not confine a patentee to equivalents which he has expressly referred t o * * * We are satisfied t h a t the “equivalency” of other metals with iron is to be found, not in their chemical structure, but in their functional efficiency when combined with cerium in a metallic alloy * * * We are satisfied * * * that * * * each and every nonrare earth metal is a fair equivalent of iron. Treibacher-Chemische Werke, etc. 2’. Roessler and H. C. Co , 219 Fed. a t 211, 212, 213. CONTRIBUTORY I,vFRISCE~ENT-Infringement may be indirect, or contributory as i t is called, by making i t possible for another to infringe. This may be done even by supplying apparatus. Judge Lurton, while Circuit Judge, said of one defendant; They have infringed the process of Johnson because they supplied the apparatus adapted to employ Johnson’s process with intent that the plant should be or would be operated as that put in for the Tennessee Fiber Company. It was therefore guilty of contributing to the infringement Johnson a. Foos Mfg. Co., 141 Fed. a t 88. I m p o r t a n c e of F u l l Description The importance of including a full description of a discovery in the patent application as originally filed appears in many cases. In one Judge Hough said: I know no limit upon a n applicant’s right to build claims upon his actual invention, and to keep on building them as his own comprehension of his own achievement grows upon him, provided that he first and in his original application described his achievement in terms justifying his largest claims. It is immaterial that he did not see all there was in his described means or method when his solicitor first proposed claims. If, however, ignorantly (and luckily) he filed a sufficient application, he can obtain any claim justified thereby, H. Ward Leonard, Inc D. Maxwell Motor Sales Co., 288 Fed. a t 71. Amendments must be made cautiously, because what is struck out of the claims by amendment is assumed, by law, t o be conceded as no part of the invention. This may prove fatal in suing an infringer. In one such case the Supreme Court said: H e put a claim to the mode of preparing rawhides by the fulllng operation and the preserving mixture. That claim * * * he withdrew * * * Nor can he, under the present patent, claim as a new article of manufacture the rawhide thus prepared, for he made that claim * * * and he struck it out. * * * It is well settled, by numerous cases in this court that under such circumstances a patentee cannot successfully contend that his patent shall be construed as if it still contained the claims which were so rejected and withdrawn * * * The principle thus laid down is, that where a patentee, on the rejection of his application, inserts in his specification, in consequence, limitations and restrictions for the purpose of obtaining his patent, he cannot. after he has obtained it, claim that it shall be construed as i t would have been construed if such limitations and restrictions were not contained in it. Royer u. Coupe, 146 T;. S. a t 532

March, 192i

INDUSTRIAL A N D ENGIA’EERISG CHEMISTRY Amendments to Issued Patents

METHODS OF AMENDMENT-The Patent Statute provides two methods for amending a patent after i t issues: by disclaimer and by reissue. A disclaimer is relatively simple. Its effect is easily understandable acd needs no special notice here. Section 4916 of the Revised Statutes reads: Whenever any patent is inoperative or invalid, by reason of a defective or insufficient specification, or by reason of the patentee claiming as his own invention or discovery more than he had a right to claim as new, if the error has arisen by inadvertence, accident or mistake, and without any fraudulent or deceptive intention, the Commissioner shall * * * cause a nen patent for the same invention * * * to be issued * * * for the unexpired part of the term of the original patent * * * but no new matter shall be introduced into the specification. Many interesting problems have arisen before the Courts in applying this section. The meaning of the word “new,” the view t h a t rights are lost by delay to reissue, the accepted doctrine that a patent cannot be reissued t o dominate persons who have acquired “inrervening rights,” and many other questions contributed to the building up of much necessary courtmade law relating t o reissues. In one case the Supreme Court said: The change made in the old specification, by eliminating the necessity of using the fat liquor in a heated condition, and making in the new specification its use in that condition a mere matter of convenience and the insertion of an independent claim for the use of fat liquor in the treatment of leather generally, operated to enlarge the character and scope of the invention. The evident object of the patentee * * * was not to correct any defects in specification or claim, but to change both, and thus obtain, in fact, a patent for a different invention. This rcsult the law * * * does not permit. Russell D. Dodge, 93 U. S. a t 464, Other Courts have said: Having disclosed the process, the failure to claim was * * * the result of inadvertence, accident or mistake * * * The process and the apparatus are connected in their design and operation * * , 1Vhatever of doubt there may be * * * should * * * be resolved in favor of the inventor * * * There was error in refusing the reissue application. I n re Heroult, 127 0. G 3%li, distinguishRice, 104 C . S. ing James is. Campbell, 104 U. S . 356, Heald 737, Giant Powder Co. t i . California Powder IVks., 98 L. S. 126. REISSUEFOR S x l f E I x ~ ~ r i ~ r o s - ? ? horiginal e patent was for a process, to wit: a mode or different modes, of exploding nitroglycerin; whereas, the reissues are for manufactured compounds or mixtures, namely : mixtures of nitroglycerin with gunpowder, gun-cotton and rocket powder * * * Sow, inasmuch as the reissued patents * * * are for compounds * * * it i s impossible not to say that they are for an entirely different invention from that secured or attempted to be secured by the original patent. If the patent had been not for the mode or process (of exploding nitroglycerine, but for the process of compounding nitroglycerine with gun powder and other substances, inadvertently omitting to claim the exclusive use of the substances so produced, the case would have been one of very different consideration. Giant Powder Co. is. California Powder Xk’ks., 98 C . S. a t 133, 136. The patent is plainly limited by its language to * * * the particular parts of the very machine described * * * On the other hand the claim of the reissued patent is broad enough to cover the process of sawing paper boards in a wet state by means of hand saw * * * This surely is not the same invention as that described in the original patent. Eachus F . Broomall, 115 U. S. a t 438, 439. IvHAT IS h-Ew ~ I A T T E R ? - T ~expressions ~ in the specification of the original patent chiefly relied on * * * to show the conception of the invention covered by the reissue are: * * * “fine insulated wire” * * * but a winding with fine wire * * * does not necessarily imply lightness * * * He * * * described i t not as of light material, but “of insulating material-such as shellacked paper” * * * The claims in suit of the reissue cannot be sustained, because the description in the original patent fails to show that the invention covered by said claims was intended t o be secured in the original patent. ’CVeston Electrical Instrument Co. 2’. Stevens, 134 Fed. a t 5 i 9 , 580. The original patent was * * * for an improved paint compound * * * There was no allusion in the pat.ent to anything to contain the paint * * * But the reissue is not limited to that particular kind of paint * * * is of all kinds of liquid mixed paint zt.

427

packed in tight vessels * * * This reissue cannot stand. Averill Chemical Paint Co. D. National Mixed Paint Co., 9 Fed. a t 463, 464. The attempt in the reissue is to claim the oil product, no matter by what process produced; to sweep into complainant’s net every new method of producing the desired rcsult * * * The claim of the reissue has been unlawfully broadened. Vacuum Oil Co. v. Buffalo Lubricating Oil Co., 20 Fed. a t 850, 8\51, \THATIs BROADENING A CLAI%I?!--It is insisted that the claim is limited to the invention of an additional feature * * * It does not, however, aid the complainant, to show that it has been narrowed a t one end when i t is quite apparent that it has been doubly expanded a t the other * * * The claim is no longer limited to the process of cleaning and drying seed, or to the feeding of seed over the inclined surface of a conical steam-coil. Gage ‘is. Kellogg, 26 Fed. a t 242, 243.

Double Patenting Certain highly technical fields of patent law must be touched on in addition to the field of amendments which has been just discussed. LfTithout the knowledge that pitfalls are t o be found in these fields, overhasty and misleading conclusions are likely t o be reached. Inventors often seek a second patent, having failed t o understand the scope of their achievement and properly claim it when applying for their first patent. The Statute provides the only legal remedy for such a situation-viz., a reissue. A patentee’s second patent for a given invention is void, unless the patent is a reissue, because of “double patenting,” as the Courts have termed it. As is customary in legal matters, the Courts have endeavored to bring coherence into their reasoning by formulating general rules for settling questions which arise out of double patenting or the existence of overlapping patents. Judge Severens has summarized the rules : “No patent can issue for an invention actually covered by a former patent * * * though the terms of the claims may differ” * * * In the Palmer Pneumatic Tire Co. Case * * * we said * * * “the rule rests upon the broad and obvious ground that, if the second patent is for an invention that was necessary to the use of the invention first patented, it cannot be sustained.” But we were there considering a class of cases where the subjectmatter of the later patent was a n essential and necessary part of the former invention, and covered by the patent granted therefor; and the observation quoted has no application to that other class of cases where the subject-matter of the later patent (that is, the invention covered by it) was not a component part of the former invention, but was an independent invention, not necessary to the composition of the first, or included in it. Dayton Fan and A I , Co. v. Westinghouse E. and Mfg. Co., 118 Fed. a t 574, 575.

Assignments and Licenses In the absence of a specific contract an employer has ordinarily no rights in the inventions of his employee beyond a “shop right” in those inventions which are within the scope of the employees’ employment and are worked out a t the expense of the employer and in ordinary business working hours. Few decisions of the Courts have applied the law of shop rights and other implied licenses to chemical inventions. Litigation over licenses of any kind has usually proved as unsatisfactory as litigation over oiher types of obscure contracts, for unforeseen circumstances often rise in connection with patent licenses which make their words almost meaningless. Licenses are, therefore, extremely difficult documents t o draw. I t is unnecessary to discuss assignments further here. The status of a n employee became an important factor in an interference between him and another employee of the same company : Ladoff, also a chemist, was employed a t laborers’ wages. H e was not employed in research * * * He conceived the idea of burning these pencils containing rutile, in a body of coke * * * Learning that Ladoff had applied for a patent through others on his own account, and would not sign the application prepared

428

INDUSTRIAL A-VD ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY

for him, efforts were made to induce him to remain in the employ of the company, and t o assign his invention to it. Failing in this a bill was filed t o enjoin him * * * on the ground t h a t he had verbally agreed on entering the employment * * * to assign his inventions t o the company * * * The bill was dismissed as unfounded * * * The company would undoubtedly own the patent if granted t o Dempster * * * it would have to contract for it if granted t o Ladoff. Ladoff v. Dempster, 166 0. G. 311.

IMPLIED LICENSES-TWO decisions of the courts serve to show the difficulties which may have to be solved in dealing with licenses. In one case Judge Hough said: If the circumstances indicate such a n intention, a license t o use implies a license t o make the thing used * * * It is difficult t o see how any one can be licensed to use a process, without by necessary implication having the right to devise and build whatever amaratus exemulifving. the urocess seems good to the licensee.* Dunkley Co. 6. califokia Packing CoFp., 277 Fed. a t 998,999. It is outside the scope of this essay t o quote the interesting discussion in this case of who was the successor to the original licensee. The question, however, came up in another case, in connection with a patented process for making ruby glassware. The patentee had died. Judge Buffington said: The firm of which the patentee was half owner having built, paid for, and used the ten muffles with the full knowledge, consent, and participation of the patentee, we think the firm must be deemed to have the license, permit, and consent of the patentee to the full and continued iise of them for the purpose for which alone they were built * * * We think the license * * * carried with i t the right to such reasonable extension and enlargement, in the way of further muffles, as were needed to treat the output of t h a t particular shop. Mueller v. Mueller, 95 Fed. at 158. ROYALTIES TO BE PAID o x SUBSTITUTES-There is, however, one condition under which a license may be construed most favorably t o the licensor, for: A licensee is liable, not only when he uses the identical article covered by the patent, bnt also when he uses an article equivalent thereto. Barber Asphalt Paving Co. v. Headley Good Roads Co., 283 Fed. a t 239. Interferences When the Patent Office finds t h a t two inventions can be described by the same claims, steps are taken which result in incorporating identical claims . in the patent applications covering both inventions. Priority proceedings, termed a n “interference,” then ensue, and these claims, common to both applications, and called the counts of the issue, are the basis for determining who is prior inventor. The technicalities of these proceedings have been so highly developed, through many contests between eminent lawyers over valuable inventions, t h a t they have been described as the most highly technical proceedings known t o lawyers. It is, therefore, useless t o attempt detailed explanation here. Attention will be called t o the need t h a t an inventor so word the claims forming the issue t h a t these claims will describe in detail his earliest completed invention or reduction t o practice. He can then direct his most persuasive evidence to these claims. Failure t o do this has lost, for many an inventor, his invention. I n one case the Court said of the issue:

It will be observed t h a t this is a broad count, and the junior party, having deliberately elected t o claim the invention broadly must stand or fall upon the claim as drawn. Had he desired t o protect a specific embodiment of the invention, he should have framed his claim t o t h a t end. Holslag v . Hollup, 285 Fed. at 1006. Infringement Suits Infringement is not only a question of fact, but is a tort or wrong, the burden of establishing which, as in all torts, clearly rests on those who charge such wrong. The absence of actual fact proof is not met by the presence of expert speculations

no matter how voluminous.

Vol. 19, No. 3 Fried. Krupp Aktien-Gesellschaft

v. Midvale Steel Co., 191 Fed. a t 591.

I N JUNCTIONS-This doctrine applies especially strongly when i t is attempted t o stop infringement by injunction before trial. I n one such case, involving filtering tubes, Judge (now Chief Justice) “aft said:

The complainant obtained from Allen a piece of broken tube. which was subjected t o chemical and mechanical analysis. The results of these analyses are given in affidavits of chemists. They do not establish that the process of manufacture used was the same as that described in the patent, though they have some tendency to show that the materials were probably the same * * * * An affidavit, introduced by the defendants * * * swears that the process which he follows * * * for the defendants is a secret process * * * entirely different from that of the complainants: t h a t he subjects the material to a heat * * * which would utterly destroy the tubes of the complainants * * * There was not sufficient proof * * * to justify * * * the injection. Societe Anonyme du Filtre, etc. u . Allen, 90 Fed. a t 816, 817. SKILLEDIN THE ART-The meaning of the phrase “skilled in the art” has been thus defined for a n expert witness by Judge Mayer in a suit involving paper stencil sheets: The specification was clear anough to a chemist * * * In this situation, “the man skilled in the art” means a chemist, when slight errors as to light, heat, and other details may make a difference. The phrase is always relative. Some patents are addressed t o mechanical problems of a minor order * * * The man skilled in the a r t in such instances may be even a journeyman * * * Where chemical ingredients or units are employed, it would be quite deterrent of inventive enterprise if i t were held that the chemist was too high in the scale. A. B. Dick Co. v. Barnett, 287 Fed. a t 577, 578. ACCOUNTING FOR IXFRINGEMEST DAMAGES-After a patent has been adjudged infringed by the Court comes the problem of accounting-of computing and collecting the damages, and in some cases, the profits. No systematic study of accounting cases has yet been published and on many possible phases of patent accountings no clear-cut generalized rulings have been yet made by the courts. A few suggestive cases will be excerpted. I n one case involving extract of logwood, Judge Lacombe said: The defendant had a certain quantity of hematine paste. Some of it he sold as paste. Some of it he treated in the nonpatented way, selling it as one of the old dry powders. Some of it he treated as the patent directed, and sold the proceeds as nonhygroscopic powder * * * Why, under these circumstances, he should not account for the profits he made in selling paste transformed into nonhygroscopic powder by the pa tented process, we fail to see. Hemolin Co. v . Harway Dyewood and E. Mfg. Co., 166 Fed. a t 436. In a case involving a process of bleaching nuts, the Court said: Prior to the date of the invention there was but one method of bleaching nuts, and t h a t was the sulfur process: * * * there are certain classes of nuts which this process will not bleach at all * * * the proportion of such nuts is a t least 10 per cent of the total crop * * * the patented process will successfully treat them, and convert them into first-class nuts * * * if they are treated by the sulfur process they will be classed as culls * * * the difference between what they actually brought as firstclass nuts and what they would have brought if they had been sold as culls constitute the savings or profits. Fullerton Walnut G. Assn. u. Anderson-Barngrover Mfg. Co., 166 Fed. at 452, 453. Sometimes the courts seem very drastic in conforming t o what seems t o be a n established doctrine. I n suit on an electric furnace process patent, Judge Bradford, speaking for the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, said: Under the process patent No. 319,795 the iMessrs. Cowles * * * had a right * * * to manufacture carborundum, and * * * until the Acheson patent was obtained * * * t o use and sell any carborundum made by them * * * Whether the defendant did or did not hold a valid patent for carborundum as a product is * * * immaterial * * * for profits having been rendered possible only through the infringement of patent No. 319,795 the whole amount * * * must be awarded t o complainant. Carborundum CO. V . Electric Smelting and Aluminum Co., 203 Fed. a t 984, 985.

March, 1927

ILVDUSTRIAL AND EXGINEERI,VG CHEMISTRY

I n a widely cited case on a process for manufacturing car wheels, the Supreme Court said: What advantage did the defendant derive from using the complainant‘s invention over what he had in using other processes then open to the public and adequate to enable him to obtain an equally beneficial result? The fruits of that advantage are his profits * * * What was the advantage in cost, in skill required, in convenience of operation, or marketability, in bringing car wheels from the condition in which they were when taken hot fromthe molds, to a perfected state, over bringing

429

them to the same state by those other processes, and thus rendering them equally fit for the same service? That advantage is the measure of the profits. Mowry v. Whitney, 14 Wall. a t 651. MARKISC “PATEh-TEn”-The courts have considered the requirements of the patented articles shall be so marked and have held that “This requirement is inapplicable t o the case of a process.” United States Mitis Co. v. Midvale Steel Co., 135 Fed. a t 112.

AMERICAN CONTEMPORARIES Henry E. Niese

T

HE individual, whether human or animal, must be studied

in its favorite haunts, so those wishing actually to know the American contemporary whom we have been asked t o sketch must seek him in his office a t 117 Wall Street, near the lower end of Manhattan Island. After the watchful doorkeeper has satisfied himself as to your motives, you will be taken by elevator to a n upper floor and then conducted through a labyrinth of halls and passageways until, turning abruptly up a short stairway, you emerge finally into the spacious room of an ancient building with a beautiful outlook upon East River and the heights of B r o o k l y n . If a kindly faced, elderly gentleman rises from his desk as you approach, it is a certainty t h a t you are being greeted by Henry E. Niese, the dean of American sugar refiners. Mr. Nieqe was born on February 2,1848, in Burg on the Island of Fehmarn, Germany-the son of a clergyman and seminary director. He spent his boyhood here and a t EckernfKrde in Schleswig-Holstein, amid scenes which have been described in the delightful stories of his talented sister, Charlotte Niese, whose name is known internationally to all lovers of German literature. After the death of his father young Niese emigrated, in April, 1873, to the United States and began his career in the employment of the Xatthiessen and Weichers Sugar Refining Company, where he rapidly rose to the position of superinHenry tendent in their Jersey City refinery. I n 1887 Matthiessen and Weichers entered into a combination known as the Sugar Refineries Company, whose interests in 1891 were merged in the newly organized American Sugar Refining Company, of which hlr. Niese became general superintendent, succeeding later, upon the death of J. 0. Donner, to the position of chief refiner. While still continuing in the duties of this office, he afterwards served on the board of directors of the American Sugar Refining Company. I n all these positions he has contributed greatly to the improvement of refinery practice not only in the plants of his own organization but in all parts of the United States. With the advancement of age Mr. Niese retired from his active duties as refincr and director, although he continued to serve his company as an advisor in planning the construction of new refineries and in many other ways. H e has not limited his attention, however, to sugarrefining alone, but has maintained an active interest in cane and beet sugar manufacture. He was greatly interested in the estabI

lishment of the New York Sugar Trade Laboratory, of which he has been a director and president on three different occasions. SOCIETY have witFew members of the AMERICANCHEMICAL nessed so complete a transformation in the methods and processes of industrial chemistry as has Mr. Niese. At the time of his arrival in the United States there were operating in the New York district over twenty- sugar - refineries in which the old and new methods were vying for supremacy. The disgusting process of blood clarification and the antiquated fill-house (with its endless equipment of cones and draining pots and its wasteful requirements of space, time, and labor) were then in full sway. The refining business was in a ruinous state; the margin between the prices of raw and refined sugar was continually dropping; competition was keen, and i t soon became a mere question of the survival of the fittest. One by one the less efficient refineries were discontinued, with the result that in 1880 only twelve establishments were left to continue the struggle. Attempts were then made in the interest of self-preservation to limit the meltings of sugar, but these efforts proved to be utterly futile. The outcome of i t all, w h e n t h e g r o w i n g losses of business threatened a wide disaster, was a general consolidation with a reduction in the number of refineries to t.he present basis. In this triumph of efficiency over wasteful indifference chemistry played a leading E. Niese part and no chemist was more activein effecting the much needed reforms in sugar-refining practice than was Mr. Niese. If you can persuade him, during your visit, to tell the story of this revolution, his tale will have all the interest of a romance. If he should digress a little to speak about “Blue Billy” and the other chemical “dopes” that were used by the old-time refiners, a considerable element of humor will also be added to his narrative. Mr. h’iese was most fortunate after his arrival in America to select as his life companion hfiss Hattie Frances hloring (now deceased), a gifted woman of sterling quality, who took a prominent part in the various charitable enterprises in Jersey City where Mr. and Mrs. Niese made their home. Three sons and three daughters were born of this happy union, all of whom are living. It is interesting to know that Mrs. Niese was a sister of Mrs. Arno Behr, whose distinguished husband, a winner of the Perkin Medal, found his first employment in America a s