Opinion of the Court. an undivided handle-bar, have adopted a different method for fastening the same to the steering head, and do not use either the complainant's open-slotted lug and two sleeve-nuts or their detent. (5) Patent No. 323,162, of July 28, 1885, to Emmit G. Latta, relates to a form of protecting or cushioning the pedals of a velocipede with india-rubber. There are eight claims to this patent, the second and third only of which are alleged to be infringed. They are as follows: "2. The combination, with the pedal-frame, of a rubber pedal-bar, H, provided with a central longitudinal groove, h, and two bearing-surfaces, h1 h1, on opposite sides of the groove, h, substantially as set forth. "3. The combination, with the pedal-frame, of a rubber pedal-bar, H, pivoted to the frame by a rod, i, and provided on each of its sides with a longitudinal groove, h, and two bearing-faces, h1 h1, on opposite sides of the groove, whereby the bar, H, is adapted to receive the pressure at its sides or edges and be compressed on opposite sides of the rod i, substantially as set forth." The invention in these claims consists in the pedal-bar, combined with the pedal-frame, the pedal-bar being rubber, constructed with grooves and bearing-faces; the second claim providing for the bar being pivoted to the frame, so that it works easily either side up, and will turn on its bearings as the foot. presses on the front face or the rear face of the pedal. The pedal is centrally grooved and has two bearing-faces, one on each side of the centre-rod on which it is pivoted. The application of india-rubber to foot-pedals is shown in the English patent to Harrison of July, 1877, to prevent the slipping of the feet on the pedals. This rubber is made corrugated, and is placed in the same position upon the pedals as the ordinary smooth surface rubber had been placed. The English patent to Jackson of 1876, also shows a treadle cast in one piece, having suitable grooves formed therein to allow of india-rubber being affixed within them by means of cement. It is entirely clear that the coating of pedals to prevent slipping being once conceded to be old, there is no novelty in the Statement of the Case. particular shape in which these rubber coverings are made, or the form which the corrugations or groovings shall take; it is a mere matter of taste or mechanical skill. If there be any novelty at all in the Latta patent it must receive such an exceedingly narrow construction that the defendant cannot be held to have infringed it. In short, the patents which are made the basis of this bill are, in view of the state of the art, all of them of a trivial character, and, so far as they possess any merit at all, are not infringed by the devices employed by the defendant. The decree of the court below dismissing the bill, is, therefore, Affirmed. POPE MANUFACTURING COMPANY v. GORMULLY & JEFFERY MANUFACTURING COMPANY. (No. 3.) APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS. No. 207. Argued March 10, 11, 1892. - Decided April 4, 1892. The monopoly granted by law to a patentee is for one entire thing, and, in order to enable an assignee to sue for an infringement, the assignment must convey to him the entire and unqualified monopoly which the patentee holds in the territory specified. A conveyance by a patentee of all his right, title and interest in and to the letters patent on velocipedes granted to him, so far as said patent relates to or covers the adjustable hammock seat or saddle, is a mere license. Claim 1 in letters patent No. 314,142, issued to Thomas J. Kirkpatrick March 17, 1885, for a bicycle saddle, when construed with reference to the previous state of the art, is not infringed by the defendants' saddle. THIS was a bill in equity for the infringement of two letters patent, namely, No. 216,231, issued to John Shire, June 3, 1879, for an improvement in velocipedes, and second, patent No. 314,142, issued March 17, 1885, to Thomas J. Kirkpatrick, for a bicycle saddle. Both patents were contested by the defendant upon the grounds of their invalidity and non-infringement, and in addition thereto it was insisted that plaintiff had no title to the Opinion of the Court. Shire patent. Upon the hearing in the court below, the bill was dismissed, and plaintiff appealed to this court. Rep. 893. 34 Fed. Mr. Lewis L. Coburn and Mr. Edmund Wetmore for appellant. Mr. Charles K. Offield for appellees. Mr. W. C. Goudy was with him on the brief. MR. JUSTICE BROWN delivered the opinion of the court. There are two patents involved in this case, both of which relate to what is known as hammock saddles for bicycles. (1) The second claim of the Shire patent, No.216,231, which is the only one alleged to be infringed, and the only one to which the plaintiff appears to have the title, is as follows: "2. In a velocipede, an adjustable hammock seat J, substantially as set forth." Plaintiff derives its title to this patent by assignment from Thomas Kirkpatrick, who himself claimed title to it from Shire, the patentee, under the following instrument: "Be it known, that I, John Shire, of Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan, for and in consideration of one dollar and other valuable considerations to me paid, do hereby sell and assign to Thomas J. Kirkpatrick, of Springfield, Clark County, Ohio, all my right, title and interest in and to the letters patent on velocipedes granted to me June 3, 1879, and No. 216,231, including all rights for past infringement so far as said patent relates to or covers the adjustable hammock seat or saddle, except the right to use said seat or saddle in connection with the velocipede made by me under said patent, in my business at Detroit. "Signed and delivered at Detroit, this 10th day of July, 1884. "JOHN SHIRE. "Witness: J. M. EMERSON." Opinion of the Court. The instrument should evidently be read as though there were a comma after the word "infringement," as the following words are evidently intended as a limitation upon the prior granting clause. It is then only so far as this patent "relates to or covers the adjustable hammock seat or saddle," that the patentee conveys his right to the same to Kirkpatrick. The patent itself contains four claims, and covers not only the adjustable hammock seat mentioned in the second claim, but three combinations set forth in other claims, of which the hammock seat is an element in only one. Did this instrument, then, vest in Kirkpatrick the legal title to that element in the patent embodied in the second claim, or was this a mere license giving him a right to make, use and sell the device in this claim, but not vesting in him the legal title, or enabling him to sue thereon in his own name, nor to convey such right to the plaintiff? It really involves the question, which is one of considerable importance, whether a patentee can split up his patent into as many different parts as there are claims, and vest the legal title to those claims in as many different persons. This question has never before been squarely presented to this court, but, in view of our prior adjudications, it presents no great difficulty. The leading case upon this subject is that of Gayler v. Wilder, 10 How. 477, 494, wherein it was held that the grant of an exclusive right to make and vend an article within a certain territory, upon paying to the assignor a cent per pound, reserving to the assignor the right to use and manufacture the article by paying to the assignee a cent per pound, was only a license, and that a suit for the infringement of the patent right must be brought in the name of the assignor. While that of course was a different question from the one involved in this case, the trend of the entire opinion is to the effect that the monopoly granted by law to the patentee is for one entire thing, and that in order to enable the assignee to sue, the assignment must convey to him the entire and unqualified monopoly which the patentee held, in the territory specified, and that any assignment short of that is a mere license. "For," said Chief Justice Taney, "it was obviously not the intention of the leg Opinion of the Court. islature to permit several monopolies to be made out of one, and divided among different persons within the same limits. Such a division would inevitably lead to fraudulent impositions upon persons who desired to purchase the use of the improvement, and would subject a party who, under a mistake as to his rights, used the invention without authority, to be harassed by a multiplicity of suits instead of one, and to successive recoveries of damages by different persons holding different portions of the patent right in the same place. Unquestionably, a contract for the purchase of any portion of the patent right may be good as between the parties as a license, and enforced as such in the courts of justice. But the legal right in the monopoly remains in the patentee, and he alone can maintain an action against a third party who commits an infringement upon it." As the assignment was neither of an undivided interest in the whole patent, nor of an exclusive right within a certain territory, it was held to be a mere license. name. In Waterman v. Mackenzie, 138 U. S. 252, an agreement by which the owner of a patent granted to another "the sole and exclusive right and license to manufacture and sell" a patented article throughout the United States, (not expressly authorizing him to use it,) was held not to be an assignment, but a license, and to give the licensee no right to sue in his own The language used by the court in this case was a reaffirmance of that employed by Chief Justice Taney in Gayler v. Wilder, to the effect that the monopoly granted by the patent laws is one entire thing, and cannot be divided into parts, except as authorized by those laws; and that the right of the patentee to assign his monopoly was limited, either, first, to the whole patent, comprising the exclusive right to make, use and vend the invention throughout the United States; or, second, to an undivided part or share of that exclusive right; or, third, to the exclusive right under the patent within and throughout a specified territory. Rev. Stat. 4898. "A transfer," said the court, "of either of these three kinds of interests is an assignment, properly speaking, and vests in the assignee a title in so |