e patent, allowing the
agent a liberal commission upon the price, and encouraging the agent by
allowing him a certain percentage of all he may be able to get over and
above the price named. This will encourage the agent to work for the
highest price obtainable. The inventor should make every effort to be
able to personally attend to the details of selling, and keep the
business under his personal supervision.

[Sidenote: Methods of Selling Patents.]

There are a number of plausible methods to which the patentee may resort
in disposing of his patent without the aid of questionable selling
agents, and it is the purpose of the following pages and succeeding
chapter to set forth such methods as have in the past proved beneficial
to patentees; those along which success have been achieved, and such as
are employed by the most successful inventors of the present time in
handling their patents.

It is true that no definite method or system can be given that will
apply to all patents alike, as the method in each case will depend more
or less upon the character of the invention, and to the particular art
to which it belongs; however, from the following pages the patentee
should be able to judge what particular methods will best apply to his
individual case, and proceed along these lines.

There are many patents issued which the patentees thereof can as
successfully dispose of from the smallest hamlet in the United States as
from New York, Chicago, or any of our larger cities, while, of course,
there are others which only those directly connected with the largest
and wealthiest corporations can hope to dispose of successfully. The
main thing is not to become discouraged or give up until one succeeds
in making a sale.

[Sidenote: About Advertising.]

To make the merits and importance of an invention publicly known is, in
many cases, one of the best ways of bringing about the introduction and
sale of a patent. If the inventor has a patent on an invention that
manufacturers or others want, and can make its merits and superior
qualities known to them, negotiations will soon follow. There is no way
for patentees to place themselves in communication with prospective
investors quite equal to an advertisement in the proper medium. Here it
may be well to state that patentees who decide to advertise their
patents for sale or otherwise should place their advertisements in
publications of known standing, such as the leading daily newsp