12 SIR DANIEL WILSON ON THE 



growing number of Canadian authors may find it worth their while to look at the question 

 from another point of view. It is notorious that American publishers have made large 

 fortunes by their systematic appropriation of the fruits of English authorship. But 

 American authors have come to realize some idea of their own share in the inevitable 

 fruits of such injustice. American publishers naturally looked askance at the productions 

 of native authors, with le^al rights, and a claim for adequate payment, when they could 

 put to press the " copy " furnished free of cost by a host of popular English writers. Self 

 interest has accordingly tended to enlist the American author on the side of his Engli.-h 

 confrère. But, altogether apart from any mere personal motives or interests, the British 

 author could not fail to command the sympathy of ihe men of high intellectual rank and 

 moral worth whose names adorn American letters, and some of whom still prize the 

 kinship of blood, as well as of genius, which tempts them to claim their rights in the 

 common Valhalla of the English race, and to covet a shrine in the poats' corner of West- 

 minster Abbey. Nor has the honourable treatment which the American author has 

 received at the hands of English publishers been without its legitimate influence in 

 quickening such sentiment. A persistent pressure has accordingly been brought to bear 

 upon public opinion in the United States until the Washington Legislature has been 

 shamed into the grudging concession of certain very limited terms of copyright, in which 

 the interests of the American printer and publisher still occupy the foremost place ; and 

 which, as now appears, commends itself to the Canadian trader as a fit and proper model 

 for Canadian imitation. 



It is accordingly provided by the Canadian Copyright Act, that — 



" Any per.son domiciled in Canada or in any part of the British posse.ssions, or any citizen 

 of any country which has an international copyright treaty with the United Kingdom, in 

 which Canada is included, who is the author of any book, map, chart or musical or literary 

 composition, and the legal representatives of such person or citizen, shall have the sole and 

 exclusive right and liberty of printing, reprinting, publishing, reproducing and vending 

 such literary works, in whole or in part, and of allowing translations to be printed or re- 

 printed and sold of such literary works, from one language into other languages, for the 

 term of twenty-eight years from the timeof recording the copyright thereof in the manner 

 and on the conditions, and subject to the restrictions hereinafter set forth. 



" The conditions for obtaining such copyright shall be that the said literary work 

 shall, before publication or production elsewhere, or simultaneously with the first publi- 

 cation or production thereof elsewhere, be registered in the office of the Minister of 

 Agriculture, by the author or his legal representatives ; and further that such work shall 

 be printed and published in Canada, within one month after publication elsewhere ; but 

 in no case shall the sole and exclusive right and privilege in Canada continue to exist 

 after it has expired in the country of origin." 



Then, after sundry provisions as to reprints already in the hands of the trade ; or of 

 contracts entered into before the new law was passed, it is next provided that — 



" If the person entitled to copyright under the said Act as hereby amended fails to 

 take advantage of its provisions, any person or persons domiciled in Canada may obtain 

 from the Minister of Agriculture a license or licenses to print and publish the work for 

 which copyright, but for such neglect or iailure, might have been obtained ; but no such 

 license shall convey exclusive rights to print and publish or produce any work: 



