The writer of the above communication gives a very clear statement of our original premises. He sees as we do the difficulty, every year on the increase, of making satisfactory searches in the matter of novelty. But his deductions vary from ours. To us it appears on its face an impossibility for satisfactory searches to be made in the case of every individual patent by the Patent Office. The examinations have repeatedly been proved valueless. We know by our own and others' experience that the searches as at present conducted are of comparatively little accuracy. Patents are declared to be anticipated continually by our courts. The awarding of a patent in fact weighs for nothing in a judge's mind as proving its originality. The Commissioner of Patents is really exhausting the energies of the Office employees over a multitude of searches that have no standing whatever in court, and that no lawyer would accept as any guarantee of novelty of invention. If every inventor would search the records for his own benefit, we should then have twenty thousand examiners instead of the present small number. This would be something. But if it be advanced that the inventor is not a competent searcher, then he can engage an expert to do it for him. Every day, searches of equal value to the Patent Office ones are executed for but a fraction of the government fees on granting a patent. Our correspondent speaks of an evil that he thinks would be incidental to the system we proposed in our article criticised by him, namely, that were the Patent Office to make no search an inventor would "run every risk of being beaten in the courts should any one essay to contest his claims." The fact is that in spite of the Office examination for novelty this risk always has to be encountered, and forms a criterion by which to judge of the exact value of that examination. Furthermore, we take decided issue with our correspondent when he says that the present is the only feasible way of executing these searches thoroughly. They are not so executed as a matter of fact, and could be done better and cheaper by private individuals, experts, or lawyers, engaged for the purpose by inventors. We agree that all money received by the Patent Office should be applied to its legitimate end. It seems to us a great injustice to make one generation of patentees accumulate money in the Treasury for the benefit of some coming generation. Application of the whole of each year's fees to the expediting of that year's business would be simple justice. But we do not lose sight of our main point, that were the inventor unable to make a satisfactory search, it could be done for him by private parties better and cheaper than it is now done in the Office.