The law student entered into the mother’s sorrow with much sympathy, but after he had in some degree calmed her mind he informed her that a breach of law had been committed. “Your child,” he remarked, “has never been patented, but she is marked ‘Patented, 1872.’ This is an infringement of the statute. You falsely represent by that brand that a child for whom no patent was issued is patented. This false representation is forgery, and subjects you to penalty made and provided for that crime.” Mrs. Smith was, as may be supposed, greatly alarmed at learning this statement, and her first impulse was to beg the young man to save her from a convict’s cell. With a gravity suited to the occasion, he explained the whole law of patents. He told her that had she desired to patent the child, she should have either constructed a model of it or prepared accurate drawings, with specifications showing distinctly what parts of the child she claimed to have invented. This model or these drawings she should have forwarded to the Patent Office, and she would then have received in due time a patent—provided, of course, the child was really patentable—and would have been authorised to label it “Patented.” “Unfortunately,” he pursued, “it is now too late to take this course, and we must boldly claim that a patent was issued, but that the record was destroyed during the recent fire in the Patent Office.” This suggestion cheered the spirits of Mrs. Smith, but they were again dashed by the further remarks of the young man. He reminded her that the child might find it very inconvenient to be patented. “If we claim,” he went on to say, “that she has been regularly patented, it follows that the ownership of the patent, including the child herself, belongs to you, and will pass at your death into the possession of your heirs. Holding the patent, they can prevent any husband taking possession of the girl by marriage, and they can sell, assign, transfer, and set over the patent right and the accompanying girl to any purchaser. If she is sold to a speculator or to a joint-stock company, she will find her position a most unpleasant one; and to sum up the case, madam, either your child is patented or she is not. If she is not patented, you are guilty of forgery. If she is patented, she is an object of barter and sale, or in other words a chattel.”