Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1891 — He Perfumed the Patent Office. [ARTICLE]

He Perfumed the Patent Office.

The officers of the Patent Office, who are accustomed to all kinds of queer inventions and who think themselves oasehardened against cranks and surprises of qyery kind, had an experience the other day which was a novelty to them. A pale-faced, thoughtful-look-ing stranger walked into the chief clerk’s office and said he had invented a process for distilling musk from coal oil, which produced a perfume a hundred times more powerful than the natural essence, ana at less than onehundredth part of the cost. He wanted to know whether the process was patentable. The chief clerk, who was at the time assorting his mail for distribution among the different divisions, looked up with a slightly incredulous smile and remarked: “You’ve got a good thing if you have an invention like that.” “You don’t believe me ?” remarked the applicant. “I will prove it. ” Quick as a flash he pulled a small phial from his pocket and scattered the contents over the papers lying on the chief clerk’s desk. The odor of 50,000 muskrats immediately filled the office. It was all in vain that doors and windows were opened, the powerful scent could not be got rid of. Worse still, it was carried into half the other’divisions of the building by the distributed mail. Two days after the incident the chief clerk said that he had inadvertently shaken hands with the inventor, ami though he washed his hands at every available opportunity the scent of musk clung to them still. A week has passed, but the odor of musk is plainly perceptible in the Patent Office. The clerks carry it home in their clothes and begin to think they are scented for life. That man’s application will be acted upon one way or another without a moment’s unnecessary delay and without calling upon him for another nasal demonstration.