_Seventeenth_, to E. M. Chaffee, Roxbury, Mass., May 31, 1836, for India-rubber application to cloth. Mr. Chaffee obtained another patent in August, 1836, for softening India-rubber and applying it to cloth, without dissolving it, by pressing it between heated rollers. This was and is, a very important patent. It is not reported in the United States Patent Reports, and the reason for its _suppression_ is variously accounted for. _Eighteenth_. Specification of a Patent for divesting caoutchouc or India-rubber of its adhesive qualities, and also of bleaching the same, and thereby adapting it to various useful purposes. Granted to CHARLES GOODYEAR, New York City, June 17th, 1837. Mr. Goodyear claims the discovery of a new and improved mode or process of divesting caoutchouc, gum elastic, or India-rubber, of its adhesive properties. I employ the various acid solutions of the metals, and with such metallic solution I wash over the surface of the caoutchouc, of which I mean to destroy the adhesive property; or instead of washing the surface of the caoutchouc, I dip it, or the article coated with it, into such a solution. * * * The metallic solutions are not, by any means, equally effective in destroying the adhesiveness of the caoutchouc; the stronger acids being in all cases preferred, as being perfect in their action, nor is it indifferent what kind of metal is employed. The strong nitric acid, undiluted, is that which I in general prefer; and among the metals, I prefer either copper or bismuth, forming a nitrate of copper, or a nitrate of bismuth, as the full effect is produced by these solutions in from one to five minutes. After the action is thought to be complete, the article acted upon is to be washed with water, so as to remove the whole of the acid solution, and it will be found that not only the surface of the caoutchouc will resemble that of a soft cloth, but that the surface may be worn off to a considerable depth, and the new surface not manifest the slightest tendency to adhesiveness; it is indeed so far altered in its properties as to resist, to a considerable extent, the action of those menstrua by which it is ordinarily dissolved. It may, for example, be washed in spirits of turpentine, or in the oil of sassafras, without being rendered sticky; and it will equally resist the action of solar or of artificial heat, under all ordinary temperatures.