Copyright. tention of making it their sole object. They have, consequently, proceeded without a settled plan,-have arrived at no definite method until advanced in years, and have seldom, if ever, thought of drawing up instructions for the guidance of their successors. Observe in mercantile business, in public offices, and in the law, how labour is methodized and subdivided; in what manner the mechanical and uninstructive part is made to devolve on inferior assistants, and the time of the principal reserved for general views and important decisions. In literature, any thing of the kind that has yet been attempted, is in its infancy; yet the same plan is applicable; and were authors so far put at their ease as to be enabled to make an undisturbed apportionment of their time, they would soon learn to make great improvements in their mode of study.

Its Benefits

ers.

66

In the present situation of copyright, a booksellto Bookselling house generally keeps the property of a book till towards the end of the twenty-eight years, when a sale takes place on the plan of interesting the trade at large in the preservation of the property. The work is put up to auction at the Chapter coffeehouse, in sixteenth or thirty-second shares, and disposed of to a number of different purchasers, who all become interested in supporting each other, and in discouraging the sale of rival editions, printed at Edinburgh, Dublin, or elsewhere. In this manner the property of Cowper's Poems is said to have been sold in October 1812 for L. 4160. The shares of all our standard writers are thus vendible, and for sums which would surprise those who do not happen to be initiated in the mysteries of the trade. Hence the great cause of the indifference of booksellers to the question of prolongation, for they consider them selves as enabled, by this happy expedient, both to baffle the tyrannical limitation of the law, and to keep within bounds the demands of authors. "At present," say they, we are sure of having the power of purchasing shares in any valuable book property; our profits, indeed, are considerably lessened by the cheaper printing of booksellers residing out of the metropolis; but the extent of connection of us, the London traders, is such as to give a tolerable degree of certainty to the value of our shares. Were authors assured of a prolonged term, it is questionable whether we should so soon have the option of buying copyrights; at all events, we should pay dearer for them." This reasoning is plausible, but, like the general conclusions of most practical men, will be found to be drawn from a narrow circumference. Whatever be the duration of copyright, the property of it, in nineteen cases out of twenty, must be vested in the bookseller. How can authors have the means of running the risks, or waiting year after year, the tardy returns of sale? Must they not continue to exchange these formidable contingencies for a specific allowance in the shape of ready money? To write books is one thing; to sell and to hold the property of them is another. The one is the province of the retired and sedentary student, the other of the man of activity and capital. Again, as to augmentation of price, booksellers would, indeed, in the event of a prolongation, find it necessary to increase the remuneration of

good writers; but this increase would be repaid Copyright. them threefold in the augmented value of their editions, which would, in that case, embrace the circulation, in all probability, of the United States. Printing, at least the printing of English copyrights, cannot, in time of peace, continue in America, unless we persist in our present system. Give encouragement to our own writers, and the compositions offered to our booksellers will soon be of a stamp that will rival the impressions of France, where two or three thousand copies are struck off for one thousand in England. Observe the effect of such a change in facilitating the recovery of the drawback on paper; a drawback at present of little benefit to our exporting booksellers, because the books shipped to America are frequently in such petty lots as not to defray the expence of the debenture. These considerations are of the highest importance at a time when the re-establishment of peace and the commercial activity of the Continent of Europe, gives reason to apprehend the printing of rival editions of our standard books for the American market.

Cheapness is not to be sought by the inferiority of type and paper; but it would be the result of those progressive improvements, which would soon take place among us, were things left to their natural operation. An increase in the size of an edition, implies the practicability of reducing the price to the public. Of the various benefits arising from cheapness few of us are sufficiently aware, accustomed as we have been to progressive enhancement in this age of war and expenditure. It would enable us both to supply the foreign market and to increase greatly our circulation at home, by inducing individuals to buy books which they would otherwise borrow, and to have always at hand those to which they would otherwise only have occasional access.

What is the ordinary course of the business of a great publishing house? A large proportion of the books they send forth pass unnoticed, and hardly defray the paper and print. What loads of unsaleable volumes encumber their warehouse! What a world of expence do they incur for unproductive advertising! The success of the house depends on the very few works of standard merit (perhaps one in forty) which obtain extensive sale, and form a counterpoise to their ill-starred brethren. Now, the effect of a prolongation of copyright would be to increase very considerably this select number, and to afford on a large, that benefit which is now enjoyed on a small scale. Booksellers have merely to look around them to see that those publications succeed best where the encouragement of the writer is most liberal. This has been strikingly exemplified in the prin. cipal Reviews and other conjunct compositions of the day; and how much greater would be the exertion in the case of a separate publication,-a case where the personal fame of a writer is so much more at issue? The expence of paper, print, and advertising, are as great on a bad as on a good manuscript, and it would in time become a rule with our leading booksellers to publish none but first-rate books:adhere to this, and you may safely dispense with repeated and expensive calls on the public attention,-

Copyright. the name of your house will do more than everything

else.

Another and by no means inconsiderable advantage of the command of a valuable manuscript, is the power of obtaining, either in money or other wise, an allowance from a French or a German bookseller for the use of the English sheets, for the purpose of translating,-a point hitherto little attempted, in consequence of the trifling nature of most of our publications.

Booksellers complain, and probably with truth, of the vanity and unreasonableness of authors; but the literary line has many attractions, and whenever you satisfy men that they will not doom themselves to a life of poverty by following it, you may be assured that you will soon have to transact with a very different class.

It is usual with booksellers, when treating with an author of reputation, to make their bargain with reference to successive editions, that is, they pay a certain sum for the first; a farther sum when a second is called for; and a final payment on the appearance of a third, generally completes the purchase of the copyright. This plan would be regularly acted upon, could the bookseller have confidence in his literary contractor. It reduces the risk of the former, while, to the author, it affords the gratification of prospect, and gives him the strongest motives to render his book worthy of permanent favour.

Such is the state of the case as regards the elder brethren of the trade,-the principal publishers; but we must address a few words likewise to a numerous and, in general, a respectable class, the printers and lesser booksellers. These persons may apprehend that a prolongation of copyright would prove a continued suspension of their power of coming forward with cheap editions; but we refer them to the clause in the above sketch of the proposed act, which might be so framed as to allow any bookseller who choose to make the speculation, to print an edi tion of a work on his obtaining the assent of the proprietor of the copyright, or, failing that assent, on his getting the sanction of the committee or jury authorized to settle disputed points. What sum should be paid to the copyright owner, is a point for farther consideration, depending on the nature of the work, its size, its popularity; but the custom of the trade would supply the proper rules, and the principle, once established, the arrangements would suffer no greater difficulty than other changes in business.

We are next to call on the lesser booksellers and printers to take a comprehensive view of their situation, and to mark that progressive change and extension of the bookselling business, which shows that there is no ground for keeping up ancient jealousies, or for considering the interest of one branch as different from that of the others. Look back to the history of the trade, and observe how it has gradually, and without the aid of interference, divided itself into a variety of distinct branches. Booksellers combined at first the sale of stationary with that of books; hence the Stationers' Company. In process of time they relinquished, in great towns at least, this unnecessary appendage, and, after a farther

lapse of years, divided the wholesale book business Copyright. from the retail. Progressive extension led next to a distinction between the publishing and the old book departments; and we have at present in one house (the house so well known as the publishers of Hume and Robertson) the example of an establishment avoiding all business, even wholesale, except what relates to books printed for their own account. These subdivisions tend exceedingly to facilitate business; they cause it to be done both better and to greater extent. The longer our experience, the more we are satisfied, that the repetition of employment is the only true road to success, and that we cannot more effectually clog our progress than by attempting the conjunction of dissimilar undertakings. The farther course of things, particularly under an extension of the term of copyright, would lead to the formation of establishments on a still more simple plan; some bookselling houses would confine themselves to the mere management of copyrights, and leave not only the printing, but the sale, to the trade at large. Such houses would merely stipulate a certain payment for leave to print an edition of a given size and form, and transfer all details of management to the undertaker of the speculation. this a prospect calculated to alarm either the printers or minor booksellers? Does it not tend to show, that things, when left to their natural course, fall invaribly into their true channel, and render superfluous both the care of the legislature and the bye-laws of corporations?

Is

We come next to consider the interest of the Benefit to public in the proposed regulations. We are not the Publicaware, that there exists at present complaints of books being capriciously withheld, or confined to expensive forms. In the case already quoted, Cowper's Poems, there were on sale at one time, and that before the expiration of the copyright, no less than five editions: viz.

One in 8vo, with plates, L. 1, 6s.
One in 8vo, without plates, L. 1, 18.
One foolscap Svo, 14s.

One do. of inferior print and paper, 7s.
One 12mo, stereotype, 9s.

Nothing, moreover, can be clearer to a man of business, than that the dearer an edition, the fewer the purchasers; and that the true plan is to meet the demand of all classes with as little delay as possible. This we see repeatedly exemplified in the case of new books, where an 8vo edition is brought forward before the sale of the 4to is completed; but as all booksellers might not be equally accommodating, the plain alternative is to invest a commission with explicit powers to interfere. This will form a full and conclusive answer to those arguments which Judge Yates on the bench, Lord Kaimes in the Court of Session, and Lord Camden in the House of Peers, so strongly urged against giving what they termed the "continued monopoly of a book." These distinguished persons were not aware of the difference between the preservation of property and the continuance of control; they could not see by intuition what it has taken no small share of time and reflection to discover.

The existing restrictions as to the term of copyright, tend only to open a door to abuse, by inducing an author to make his work less perfect in the first instance, on the plan of affording him an easy method of renewing the exclusive property. Gibbon did not scruple to write to his publisher, that a thorough revisal of his history would form "a valuable renewal of the copyright at the end of the term."* Booksellers follow this plan avowedly and habitually; and it is the remark of a very intelligent writer on the subject of copyright, that, unless a change take place, our purest and best authors will become so disfigured by annotation, and increased in price by increased bulk, that the early editions will be called for. t

We by no means assert, that the proposed change would stop the appearance of trifling works, since every man must be allowed to waste his time and his property as he chooses; but it would surprisingly increase the number of good books, prompting many, who are at present entirely discouraged, to become authors, and inducing others who labour, but labour with haste, to give a finish and attraction to their performances.

66

It is long since Dr Johnson pronounced us a nation of readers," yet we are still extremely deficient in standard works, and on subjects too where we ought to have been long since amply supplied. Have we a good general history of Ireland or Scotland, or even of England? No wonder that we should still be deprived of such works when we calculate the time, labour, and expence required in their composition. Now, that public records have become so voluminous, and the transactions of nations so complicated, whoever undertakes to do justice to such topics will find himself subjected to a variety of expences; he must set apart two, perhaps three, years for what apparently requires one; he must have his residence in the vicinity of great libraries; he must carry on an extensive correspondence; he must employ clerks in making copies of official documents and family papers. The same observations are applicable to scientific labours. At present, no bookseller can afford to indemnify a writer for the years he would be disposed to bestow on a favourite but insulated branch-he must have a work on a subject of general interest; that is, one which will take in a number of topics, without going to the bottom of any. But prolong the term, and afford a prospect that a well written book, even in a limited department, will make its way, and the bookseller will find himself justified in offering to the author a sum which will enable the latter to indulge in his predilection for the branch in question. This point is of great consequence, for almost every author has a favourite subject, which he would cultivate with great zeal, did not necessity oblige him to turn aside to popular topics, for the sake of a livelihood. We have known works that might have been completed in two or three years, postponed from interval to in

terval, so as to occupy seven, eight, or nine, in con- Copyright sequence of those unwelcome avocations.

The more a man of taste and judgment studies the true nature of composition, the more he becomes attached to simplicity; he loses all relish for flowery diction; he learns to chasten his early predilection for ambitious passages: for point and antithesis he substitutes the plain language of the Grecian and Roman models. Such a style is calculated to be permanent, but may not for sometime be popular, perverted as the public taste is by a habitual tone of exaggeration and inflation. The reward of such writers is thus to be found only in length of time. Grant but this, and you will accomplish a total change in the character of new books, rendering the wiiters indifferent to whatever may be called tricks of composition, and directing their attention to the plain, the solid, the permanent. What a prospect is here opened both of improving our national style and of diffusing useful information! This is one of the many things which show that the benefit of one part of the community is the benefit of all; and that, whenever we are enabled to sift a subject to the bottom, and to view a question in all its bearings, we find, that the existing evils are the result of our own prejudices or mistaken regulations. We have treated this subject with reference to four distinct parties;-authors; publishing booksellers; the lesser booksellers with the printers; and, finally, the public; yet we challenge any opponent to produce a single point in which the advantage of the one is not found to coincide with and promote the advantage of the others.

How has it then happened that a case calling so strongly for amendment has not hitherto been fully brought before the public? The reasons are the fol lowing:

Publishing booksellers have been, and still are, unconscious of the improvement which it would produce in literary composition.

The lesser booksellers and printers were not aware of the practicability of combining prolongation of copyright with freedom of composition.

The parliamentary opponents of the measure, such as the late Lord Camden, were equally unaware of the possibility of the provision in question.

And as to literary men, their error has been partly in want of co-operation, partly in asking too much, by urging at once a claim to perpetuity.

But is there now any prospect of the adoption of such a measure? The progress of improvement is slow; our legislators have not leisure to study such matters to the bottom, and our practical men are, in general, wedded to ancient usage. At the same time, there are strong reasons to hope, that the question, if taken up by a spirited and persevering mem ber of Parliament, will eventually be carried. The universities afford an encouraging example. They have long possessed copyright without abusing it. Booksellers are beginning, particularly since the

CORALLINIADE. Under this head we propose to treat of these marine substances, named by Linné Corallina, whose situation in the system of nature has not been satisfactorily ascertained by naturalists, some having referred them to the animal, and others to the vegetable kingdom. The more recent writers, Bosc, Duméril, Lamouroux, Desmarets, Lamarck, and Le Sueur, for the most part, place them with the zoopbytes without hesitation; and even Cuvier, who has not fully satisfied himself as to their nature, treats of them amongst the zoophytes in his Règne Animal, which indicates the bias of his mind on the subject.

Pallas, Robert Brown, and Blainville, are inclined to refer them to vegetables; indeed, Brown has little if any doubt on the matter; and since they have not been observed to contain polypes, we are very unwilling to treat of them as animals, and therefore give an account of them under the head Coralliniada, a patronymic title derived from the most prominent genus of the group.

We shall give the characters of the Genera, and under each shall mention the opinions of different

authors.

All the above genera are placed in the order Coralline by Lamouroux, and under the title Corallina by Cuvier. They resemble plants, are generally jointed, and are formed of two substances, the one internal, the other external. The central part is fistulose, fibrose, or compact, and is surrounded by the cortical substance, which is calcareous. From this structure, Cuvier seems to have determined to place them near the Gorgonia, whose inhabitants are very well known to be zoophytes.

Gen. 1. ACETABULARIA. Lamouroux.
OLIVIA. Bertolini.

ACETABULUM, Lamarck, Cuvier.

Stalk distinct, long, filiform, simple, fistulose, terminated by a striated-radiated umbell.

Sp. 1. Crenulata. Plate LXVI.

Tubularia acetabulum, B. Gmelin, Syst. Nat. 3833. Acetabularia crenulata. Lamor. Hist. Polyp. Corall. Flex. 249.

Acetabulum Caribæum. Lamarck, Hist. Nat. des An. s. Vert. 151.

This species is found in the West Indian seas, where it is very common. There is another species, A. Mediterranea, that is not uncommon in the Mediterranean, the supposed animal of which has been described by Donati, who mistook some parasite for the tentacula. Cuv.

Genera. 1. Acetabularia.

2. Polyphysa.

3. Udotea.

4. Nesea.

5. Galaxura.

6. Jania.

7. Corallina.

8. Cymopolia.

9. Amphiroa. 10. Halimeda. 11. Melobesia.

Gen. 2. POLYPHYSA. Lamarck, Cuvier, Lamou

roux.

Stalk distinct, long, filiform, fistulose, composed of confluent joints, terminated by eight or twelve pear-shaped processes, attached by their bases.

Lamarck has referred this and the preceding genus to his vaginiform polypes, along with sertularia, &c. and mentions tubes and cells, which we cannot perceive in our specimens.

Sp. 1. Aspergillosa, Plate LXVI.

Polyphysa australis. Lamarck, Hist. Nat. des A. s. V. 152.

Polyphysa aspergillosa. Lamouroux, 252. Fucus peniculus. Turner, Hist. Fac. iv. 77. t. 228. f. a-e.

Inhabits the New Holland seas, and is the only species known.

Gen. 3. UDOTEA, Lamouroux.
FLABELLARIA, Lamarck, Cuvier.

Flabelliform, with an abrupt, distinct, simple stalk; root fibrous; the sides of the flabellum marked with curved, concentric, transverse, regular lines.

This genus inhabits the hotter parts of the American ocean, and is sometimes found in great abundance attached to calcareous rocks, or thrown on the shore after heavy gales of wind.