WHAT LED TO PATENTS BEING GRANTED.

Evening Post, Volume LXX, Issue 13, 15 July 1905, Page 9

WHAT LED TO PATENTS BEING GRANTED.

Among t-he powers possessed by the King is one termed his prerogative. It has always been the King's prerogative to make rules for tho protection of trade, only of course in a sense .beneficial to the people. This power has not always been exercised in a manner beneficial to the people, as some of tho early Tudor Kings went so far as to grant monopolies to some of 'their favourites for the sole making and vending of' articles in daily use, such aa soap, salt, etc. To check the abuses ana injustice- thus caused, Parliament in the reign of James bhe First passed what has .been termed the Statute of .(Monopolies, which put a stop to the grant of all monopolies save for the term of fourteen years for the sols working or making of any- manner of new manufactures within tho -realm to •feho .true and fiist inventor. This Statute as still 'in force and is tho one upon which all Patent Laws havo been based, and which governs tho granting of patents for inventions to-day. The firm of Henry Hughes, Patent Agents, Queen's Chambers (opposite Post Office), Wellington, havo lot th* past quarter of 4, century been engaged in the procuring of these patents an all countries, and are therefore prepared to adviso inventors in any manner required.— Aavt.

Protests are being made concerning alleged "libels on Queensland," contained in the new Aushalkin school series- of Readers. The text books of , the New South Wales public and private schools, pages 283, 284, and 285, Fourth Reader; referring to the climatic conditions of Queensland, contain the statement that tho QueeneXmd rivers and lagoons are haunted by ferocious alligators, which lio in wait for cattle and incautious bathers ; also that (he far north is a land of fierce heat and occasional cyclones and siroccos, that on the treeless plains to the west of the Dividing Range the temperature of the sun rists at "times almost to boiling point, eggs having been cooked by simply 'tinning them over on the sand, which is so hot as to make bathers hop about like cats on hot bricks. The books also refer to "raging torrenta, which sweep all before them," and to "withering siroccos and devastating cyclones, in which houses are unroofed, whole townships dismantled, and ships drivon ashore or out to the wind-swept sea." The Minister for Public Instruction docs not think anything can bo done. It was improbable, he said, that the authorities vould withdraw the books.