e no unfair advantage of the
non-execution of that deed." A possible explanation of this situation
may be found in Ebbw Vale's activities in connection with Martien and
Bessemer, as well as with an Austrian inventor, Uchatius.

[32] _Ibid._, p. 770.

[33] _Ibid._, p. 823.

Ebbw Vale and the Bessemer Process

After his British Association address in August 1856, Bessemer had
received applications from several ironmasters for licenses, which were
issued in return for a down payment and a nominal royalty of 25 pence
per ton. Among those who started negotiations was Mr. Thomas Brown of
Ebbw Vale Iron Works, one of the largest of the South Wales plants. He
proposed, however, instead of a license, an outright purchase of
Bessemer's patents for L50,000. Bessemer refused to sell, and according
to his[34] account--

intense disappointment and anger quite got the better of [Brown]
and for the moment he could not realize the fact of my refusal....
[He then] left me very abruptly, saying in an irritated tone ...
"I'll make you see the matter differently yet" and slammed the door
after him.

[34] Bessemer, _op. cit._ (footnote 7), p. 169.

David Mushet's advocacy of Martien's claim to priority over Bessemer
has already been noticed (p. 33). From him we learn[35] that Martien's
experiments leading to his patent of September 15, 1855, had been
carried out at the Ebbw Vale Works in South Wales, where he engaged in
"perfecting the Renton process."[36] Martien's own process consisted in
passing air through metal as it was run in a trough from the furnace
and before it passed into the puddling furnace.

[35] _Mining Journal_, 1856, vol. 26, p. 631.

[36] James Renton's process (U.S. patent 8613, December 23, 1851)
had been developed at Newark, New Jersey, in 1854. It was a
modification of the puddling furnace, in which the ore and carbon
were heated in tubs, utilizing the waste heat of the
reverberatory furnace (see the _Mechanics' Magazine_, vol. 62, p.
246, 1855). Renton died at Newark in September 1856 (_Mechanics'
Magazine_, 1856, vol. 65, p. 422).

It is known that Martien's patent was in the hands of the Ebbw Vale
Iron Works by March 1857.[37] This fact must be added to our knowledge
that Mushet's patent of September 22, 1856 was drawn up with a specific
reference to the application of his "triple compound" to "iron ...
purified by t