412 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



stamps for each copy of Lis work, and any- 

 body who chooses to publish it is to obtain 

 the number of stumps required for his edi- 

 tion, on paying ten per cent of the publishing 

 price to the author or his representatives. It 

 appears to me that there are serious — not to 

 Bay fatal — objections to this project from the 

 point of view both of the author and of the 

 publisher. 



Prom that of the author, because unless 

 the stamps are executed with the care and 

 cost of a bank-note, they may be counter- 

 feited with the most tempting eagerness. 

 Suppose that I had the good fortune to be the 

 author of a popular novel, and that I found 

 that some scamp of a bookseller was issuing 

 an edition with forged stamps at Chicago, and 

 another playing the same game at Toronto. 

 Unless I happened to have a few thousands 

 of which I desired to make ducks and drakes, 

 is it conceivable that I sliould be so foolish as 

 to take action against my defrauders in the 

 civil courts of tliese two cities, when, in all 

 probability, the judge would have a copy of 

 the pirated edition in his pocket, while bar 

 and jury were equally well provided ? How 

 shall Angelo condemn Claudio without many 

 qualms? Suppose I succeeded and obtained 

 the award of live times the retail price of the 

 cheap edition — which is the maximum fine 

 proposed — to what extent would that recoup 

 me for law expenses, worry, and loss of time ? 

 Legal administration is comparatively cheap 

 and swift in Scotland ; but an eminent Scotch 

 judge once told me that if he were riding 

 along Leith Walk, and somebody preferred a 

 claim to his horse and took it away, ho should 

 think it, on the whole, better to put up with 

 the loss of the horse, than to go to law with 

 the spoliator. Certainly it would be better 

 for the English author to sell all he had and 

 give it to the poor, than to undertake a copy- 

 right process in the United States or Canada 

 in the face of the existing feeling that " our 

 people " have a right to " nourish them- 

 selves and their children," as Sir C. Trcvel- 

 yan put it, on cheap books. The former pro- 

 cess, at any rate, would not leave him in 

 debt. 



And now as to the position of the publish- 

 er under the proposed arrangement. My ex- 

 perience of publishers, both in England and 

 America, has been such as to lead me to ditfer 

 somewhat from the estimate which many of 

 my brethren seem to fonn of them. So far 

 as my observation has gone, they have as 

 much claim to the possession of souls as other 

 people ; and I have not been able to convince 

 myself that the portion of inherited depravity 

 in the average publisher is greater than that 



implanted in the average author. I have fre- 

 quently asked myself whether, for any possi- 

 ble benefit which my publishers get out of my 

 books, I would or could submit to the worry, 

 loss of time, and pecuniary risk of bringing 

 them out on my own account ; and I have 

 had no difficulty in answering this question 

 in the negative. But there are publishers and 

 publishers, and there are various fashions C'f 

 bringing out books. 



As our transatlantic readers admit that 

 an author has some right of property in his 

 work, I am a little perplexed to understand 

 why they deny his right to appoint the agent * 

 on to whose shoulders he desires to throw all 

 the burden and risk of giving that work a 

 pi-actical existence, and to decide in accord- 

 ance with him tlie form of their joint produce 

 and the remuneration they may ask for it. 

 The farmer, the miller, and the baker decide 

 the price at which they can afford that the 

 loaf which they have jointly produced shall 

 be sold. In revolutionary times, starving 

 mobs, desiring to have the sixpenny loaf for 

 twopence, call the baker a monopolist, and 

 proceed to hang him a la lanterne. The 

 transatlantic people, impelled, as it appears, 

 by their spiritual cravings after the intellect- 

 ual and moral elevation imparted by the 

 works of English authors, call the publisher, 

 who stands in the same relation to the author 

 as the baker to the fanner, a " monopolist." 

 Heaven forbid that I should suggest that my 

 excellent friends, the Messrs. Appleton, may 

 stand in danger now or hereafter of the lan- 

 terne. Not at all ! The sixpenny loaf can 

 be got not merely for twopence, but for noth- 

 ing, without any such violence, by simply 

 continuing the present practice of piracy, 

 checked only by the underselling power of 

 the strong houses. 



Grant, however, that the appointment by 

 the man who possesses a property of an agent 

 to administer that property, according to such 

 terms as they may mutually agree to, is an 

 offensive act of monoply on the part of the 

 owner — what will be the practical working of 

 the scheme wliich it is proposed to substitute 

 for this old-world expres?ion of rights of 

 ownership? 



I suppose myself an American or Cana- 

 dian publisher. I hear that the celebrated 

 English author A. B. is about to produce a 

 work which is certain to be greatly in demand 

 on my side of tlie Atlantic. As things are, 



♦ I see no reason for demurring: to the require- 

 ment that the apent should be a native of the coun- 

 try In which the sale is to tike place, if, as is assert- 

 ed, there are strong practical grounds of objection 

 to any other arrangement. 



