for by this Convention, on the part of the authorities of any one of the States forming the Union, and to communicate the facts and reasons to the Government of the country of origin and to interested parties.

9. To cooperate as agents for each one of the Governments of the signatory States before the respective authorities for the better performance of any act tending to promote or accomplish the ends of this Convention.

ART. XIII. The bureau established in the city of Habana, Cuba, shall have charge of the registration of trade-marks coming from the United States of America, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Panama.

The bureau established in the city of Rio de Janeiro shall have charge of the registration of trade-marks coming from Brazil, Uruguay, the Argentine Republic, Paraguay, Bolivia, Chili, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Colombia.

ART. XIV. The two International Bureaus shall be considered as one, and for the purpose of the unification of the registrations it is provided:

(a) Both shall have the same books and the same accounts, kept. under an identical system.

(b) Copies shall be reciprocally transmitted weekly from one to the other of all applications, registrations, communications, and other documents affecting the recognition of the rights of owners of trade-marks.

ART. XV. The International Bureaus shall be governed by identical regulations, formed with the concurrence of the Governments of the Republic of Cuba and of the United States of Brazil and approved by all the other signatory States.

Their budgets, after being sanctioned by the said Governments, shall be defrayed by all the signatory States in the same proportion as that established for the International Bureau of the American Republics at Washington, and in this particular they shall be placed under the control of those Governments within whose territories they are established.

The International Bureaus may establish such rules of practice and procedure, not inconsistent with the terms of this Convention, as they may deem necessary and proper to give effect to its provisions.

ART. XVI. The Governments of the Republic of Cuba and of the United States of Brazil shall proceed with the organization of the Bureaus of the International Union as herein provided, upon the ratification of this Convention by at least two-thirds of the nations belonging to each group.

The simultaneous establishment of both bureaus shall not be necessary; one only may be established if there be the number of adherent Governments provided for above.

ART. XVII. The treaties on trade-marks previously concluded by and between the signatory States shall be substituted by the present Convention from the date of its ratification, as far as the relations between the signatory States are concerned.

ART. XVIII. The ratifications or adhesion of the American States to the present Convention shall be communicated to the Government of the Argentine Republic, which shall lay them before the other. States of the Union. These communications shall take the place of an exchange of ratifications.

ART. XIX. Any signatory State that may see fit to withdraw from the present Convention shall so notify the Government of the Argentine Republic, which shall communicate this fact to the other States of the Union, and one year after the receipt of such communication this Convention shall cease with regard to the State that shall have withdrawn.

In witness whereof the plenipotentiaries and delegates sign this convention and affix to it the seal of the Fourth International American Conference.

Made and signed in the city of Buenos Ayres on the 20th day of August, in the year 1910, in Spanish, English, Portuguese, and French, and filed in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Argentine Republic in order that certified copies may be made, to be forwarded through appropriate diplomatic channels to each one of the signatory nations.

(The signatures follow.)

AUSTRIA.

[Law of the 11th of January, 1897, for the Protection of Inventions (Patent Law).]

With the consent of both Houses of the Imperial Parliament I decree as follows:

I. GENERAL PROVISIONS.

INVENTIONS EXCLUDED FROM PROTECTION BY PATENT.

SECTION 1. New inventions which allow of industrial application shall be protected under this law.

Patents shall be granted for the same upon application.

INVENTIONS EXCLUDED FROM PROTECTION BY PATENT.

SEC. 2. Patents shall not be granted:

1. For inventions the object or use of which is contrary to law or morality or injurious to health, or which are obviously intended to mislead the public.

2. For scientific doctrines or principles as such.

3. For inventions the subject of which is reserved for a State monopoly.

4. For inventions concerning

(a) Articles for human food and consumption,

(b) Preparations for medicine or disinfection,

(c) Products which are obtained by chemical methods,

in so far as the inventions mentioned in paragraph 4, (a) to (c), do not relate to a definite technical process for the production of such articles.

NOVELTY.

SEC. 3. An invention shall not be regarded as new if before the date of its application under this law it already

(1) Have been so described in public prints that its use appears to be thereby rendered possible by persons versed in the art; or

(2) Have been so openly used, openly exhibited or produced in the country that its use by persons versed in the art appears thereby possible; or

(3) Have formed the subject of a patent that has been in force in the purview of this law and has become common property.

The Government shall be empowered to grant to foreign States the favor (to be notified in the Patent Journal, [sec. 44]) that the patent specifications officially published by them shall not be considered equivalent to public prints in the sense of this law from the date of their publication, but only after a term of at most six months.

CLAIM TO A PATENT.

SEC. 4. The author of an invention, or his legal successors, shall alone have a claim to the grant of a patent. Until the contrary be shown, the first applicant shall be regarded as the author of the invention. A later application shall give no claim to a patent if the invention have already been the subject of a patent or privilege or the subject of a prior application under consideration which eventuates in the grant of a patent or privilege. If these assumptions be only partially substantiated the later applicant shall only have the right to the grant of a correspondingly restricted patent.

If the improvement or other further development of an invention already protected by patent, or for which application for a patent has been made which leads to the grant of the same, be applied for by the owner of the mother patent or his legal successors, it shall be open to him to obtain for the improvement either an original patent or a patent of addition dependent on the mother patent.

If it appear that the industrial use of an invention for which at patent has been applied for presupposes the entire or partial use of an already patented invention, the patent applied for shall be granted with the condition that it is dependent on another patent to be definitely designated (declaration of dependency). This condition shall also be inserted in the notice concerning the grant of the patent, and in the patent document.

SEC. 5. The first applicant shall, however, have no claim to the grant of a patent if he be not the author of the invention applied for, or his legal successor, or if the essential contents of his application have been taken without consent from the description, drawings, models, tools, or apparatus of another, or from a process used by him, and if, in the former case, a claim be raised by the author or his legal successor, and, in the latter, by the party prejudiced.

If the invention have come into the possession of a person in succession to another who obtained it without permission, then in case of contest the earlier possessor shall rank before the later.

Workmen, officials, and Government servants shall be deemed the originators of the inventions made by them in service, unless otherwise determined by a deed of agreement or the rules of the service.

Conditions of contract or service by which it is sought to withhold an official or servant in an industrial undertaking from the due benefit of the invention made by him in service shall have no legal validity.

PROTECTION OF INVENTIONS IN EXHIBITIONS.

SEC. 6. Inventions which are placed on view in native exhibitions may, from the date of their admittance to the exhibition until three months after the close of the exhibition, be granted provisional protection by patent under easier conditions.

The grant, as also the settling of the conditions of this protection. shall be determined by the regulating powers of the Minister of Commerce.

REPRESENTATIVE.

SEC. 7. Any person not residing in the country may only claim the grant of a patent and the rights resulting therefrom if he have a representative residing in the country.

The name and residence of this representative, and also every change in the representation, shall, together with the power of attorney, be lodged at the Patent Office for entry in the register of patents.

It shall be determined by regulations what the power to be deposited at the Patent Office shall contain.

The place at which the representative has his residence, and in default of the same the place at which the Patent Office has its seat, shall serve for the business concerning the patent as residence of a patentee not residing in the country.

Delivery to the representative shall have the same legal effect as if it had been to the patentee himself.

EFFECT OF THE PATENT.

SEC. 8. The patent has the effect that the patentee shall exclusively be entitled to commercially produce, bring into the market, expose for sale, or use the subject of the invention.

If the patent be granted for a process, the effect shall extend also to the articles made directly by this process.

SEC. 9. The patent shall have no effect against those who already, at the date of the application, have in good faith used the invention in the country, or who have made the necessary preparations for such use (previous user).

Such persons shall be authorized to use the invention for the needs of their own trade in their own or other works.

This right shall only be transferred or inherited together with the business.