A DECISION REVERSED

Otago Witness, Issue 2805, 18 December 1907, Page 28

A DECISION REVERSED

■■ ♦ ' LONDON, December 12. The Court of Appeal decided that the Carthusian monks are exclusively entitled to the use of the word "Chartreuse" for their trade mark outside France, thus reversing Mr Justice Joyce's decision. The action brought by the Order of Carthusian Monk«, in defence of their celebrated liqueur, to restrain M. Henri Leconturier (an officer of the French Government) and others (including George Idle, Chapman, and Co., Limited, of England) from using the word "Chartreuse" in connection with the sale of liqueurs in this country, was dismissed with costs in the Chancery Division on August •1. It was in the middle of the eighteenth century that the monks began the manufacture of their famous liqueurs. At first they only drank them themselves or gave them to visitors and the sick and poor, ' but the fame of the liqueurs -got abroad, ' and about 1850 they began to manufacture !on a commercial basis. The seven stars i on the bottles represent the seven stars J which St. Bruno (who founded the order I in 1066) saw when he arrived at Grenoble, and thought they were a eign from heaven that this was the place for hie retreat. In 1903 the monks were expelled from Franoe, and M. Leconturier was appointed sequestrator of their monastery, distillery, and other assets at La Grande, Chartreuse. The monks then established themselves at Tarragona, in Spain, where they have continued to manufacture the liqueurs according to their secret process. Mr Justice Joyce was unable to see that M. Leconturier bad done anything be was not entitled to do.