works of reputation ; and in short, tliat there are indivi- 

 duals who, under the name of publishing booksellers, open 

 shops for no other purpose than that of becoming receivers 

 of pirated goods of a particular description. If these persons 

 committed such offences against what are termed the crimi- 

 nal laws of England, they would be speedily transferred t-o 

 our penal settlements as felons ; but as they cunningly con- 

 fine their practice to acts, which, whatever may be the moral 

 delinquency of the perpetrator, the law refers to the class 

 of civil offences, they cannot be brought to the bar of 

 the Old Bailey, but are amenable to higher courts, and 

 subject to pecuniary punishment only. By the opera- 

 tions of depredators of this kind, we have long been 

 seriously injured. The principal part, if not the whole of 

 certain cheap periodicals, have been prepared by pirating 

 the letter-press and plates of this work ; that such pro- 

 ceedings should take place without acknowledgment is only 

 human nature, for when will the thief acknoAvledge from 

 what purse he has purloined his gains ; that they should go 

 unpunished would be to offer a premium to roguery at the 

 expense of honesty. We have therefore at length deter- 

 mined to put down, if we can, the practice of literary piracy, 

 so far as we are interested, by an appeal, first to the laws of 

 the country, and secondly to the good feeling of the public, 

 wdio we are persuaded would be as much ashamed of encou- 

 raging book-robbery by the purchase of publications supplied 

 by it, as they would feel themselves disgraced by being seen 

 to enter the shop of a notorious housebreaker, for the sake 

 of the cheap bargains his plunder might enable him to offer. 



To our appeal to the law, the Bench has promptly and 

 efficiently responded by the above injunction. To our appeal 

 to the public we are confident that a similar answer will be 

 made, and that the high moral feeling which is the peculiar 

 boast of this country, v/ill be quite sufficient to put down 

 such practices. 



We therefore warn all those whom it may concern, 

 that we shall immediately proceed in the courts of justice 

 against all future piratical offenders, until the nuisance is 

 abated ; and that we shall take efficient means of another 

 kind, to expose the parties to whom these observations more 

 particularly apply, if we shall see occasion to do so. 



