March 5, 1886.] 



SCIENCE. 



219 



Preliminary description of a new species of 

 Aplodontia (A. major sp. nov., 'California 

 show'tl,' 1 mountain beaver '). 



I have received from one of my collectors eight 

 specimens of a new species of Aplodontia captured 

 in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, in Placer county, 

 Cal. It may be distinguished from the only pre- 

 viously known species of the family by the following 

 diagnosis : — 



Length, about 400 mm. ; hind-foot with claws, 

 about 60 mm. ; height of ear, about 8 mm. — Pelage, 

 comparatively coarse and harsh ; hairs of flanks, 

 elongated beyond those of the surrounding parts, 

 forming on each side a more or less pronounced oval 

 patch, from 60 to 80 mm. in length and from 40 to 

 60 mm. in breadth, which terminates abruptly about 

 opposite the hip joint, and which is most marked in 

 specimens not fully adult. Color: Whiskers, black ; 

 back, grizzled grayish-brown, the tint of the brown 

 being that of a dilate bistre ; hairs at base and under 

 fur, very dark plumbeous : rump and belly, grizzled 

 mouse-gray, sometimes faintly and superficially 

 washed with very dilute brown ; a distinct patch of 

 white in the anal region ; tip of nose, sooty-brown, 

 which color sometimes extends backwards in a nar- 

 row stripe almost to a point midway between the 

 eyes. Cranial characters : The skull is much larger 

 and heavier than that of A. rufa, and the occipital 

 •crest is more highly developed ; the zygomatic arches 

 are more bowed outward ; the nasal bones are 

 broadest at or near their anterior ends instead of 

 some distance posteriorly ; and the ratio of the 

 upper molar series of teeth to the basilar length is 

 decidedly less than in A. rufa. 



There are several other cranial differences which 

 will be discussed at length, together with the ani- 

 mal's affinities with ' var. Californicus ' of Peters, in 

 a paper soon to be published. , 



C. Hart Merriam. 



International copyright. 



While always an enthusiastic advocate of an in- 

 ternational copyright as a matter of abstract justice 

 to British authors, I have never been able to satisfy 

 myself of the constitutional right of congress to en- 

 act a separate bill for the purpose of effecting one. 



The constitution of the United States is a grant of 

 power. Among other powers granted by it to con- 

 gress is (art. I., sec. 8) that of promoting " the prog- 

 ress of science and useful arts by securing for limited 

 times to authors and inventors the right to their re- 

 spective writings and discoveries." This congress 

 has already done. The question now presented is, 

 therefore, 



1. Has congress exhausted such powers under the 

 constitution, and. if not, has it still power to legislate 

 as to the degree of protection accorded authors and 

 inventors, by enacting a statute to protect British 

 authors, which statute (let it be admitted) will indi- 

 rectly increase the profits of the American i author 

 and inventor ' ? 



This question being disposed of, nothing further 

 need be said as to the power ; but a word might be 

 added as to the merits of the question. 



2. It is one of the legal necessities of our imperfect 

 state that every individual, in selecting his vocation, 

 assumes and subjects himself to the risks and dan- 

 gers of that vocation ; as, for example, an employee 



of a railroad company, other things being equal, can- 

 not recover of the company for injuries received in 

 the course of his legitimate employment by it. Now. 

 the author, in selecting authorship as a vocation, ac- 

 cepts a risk which may, perhaps, be stated categori- 

 cally ; viz., while it is doubtless true that, 1°, an idea 

 is property, it is equally true that, 2°, the form of 

 words in which an idea is expressed is also property; 

 but it is absolutely impossible to protect the idea 

 when unclothed in words. The utmost the law can 

 do is to protect the expression of the idea. 



Now. the disability — the risk and danger of 

 authorship which the author accepts — arises from 

 the fact that it is possible to clothe an idea in any 

 number of different forms of words. Let us suppose 

 that A expresses an idea, absolutely original with 

 himself, as follows : ' The sun gives warmth to the 

 earth.' Let us suppose that B sees this in print, and 

 steals it deliberately, putting it thus : 1 The orb of 

 day diffuses its heat over our planet.' It is evident 

 enough that no statute or court can refuse protection 

 to either or both A and B : for no court could try the 

 question of priority of the abstract conception, and, 

 even if it could, it could not protect that abstract 

 conception separated from a statement of it in words ; 

 and B's statement is in words as well as A's. To ob- 

 tain a patent, an oath and a contract are necessary. 

 The applicant must first make oath to the originality 

 of his invention, and, secondly, make a contract with 

 the government ; viz.. that, on his part, he will fully 

 and frankly state in his specifications the methods 

 and processes by which he produces useful results, so 

 plainly that anyone understanding the language 

 could do the same, and that in exchange for these 

 specifications, the government, on its part, will ac- 

 cord him a limited protection in the use of them for 

 the inventor's sole profit. But the author of a 

 poem, novel, or treatise, makes no oath of originality, 

 and enters into no contract. He merely states the 

 name and makes profert of his production ; and the 

 government takes notice, and shifts the burden of 

 proof in his favor ; that is to say, provides, that, if 

 the author thereafter sue for an infringement, he 

 need only plead his copyright, while it is for the de- 

 fendant to attack. 



It was this course of reasoning which led me, ten 

 years ago (in a treatise on the laws of copyright), 

 to say, that, unless there could be devised a law 

 against paraphrase and plagiarism, copyright statutes 

 were of very little practical importance, since a para- 

 phrase of a work was fully as much entitled to copy- 

 right as the work itself. Is international legislation 

 expedient to protect property so practically publici 

 juris ? 



There is another phase of the question which I cer- 

 tainly do not care to press, but on which a consensus 

 of opinion might be unfavorable to a statute of inter- 

 national copyright with England (though not, of 

 course, with France, Germany, or other non-English 

 speaking nations). 



3. Is there any citizen of the United States, not at 

 present a writer of poems, novels, or other literary 

 matter, who would become one if there were an in- 

 ternational copyright with England ? Of course, if 

 we can demonstrate that the divine call to write 

 poems or novels is at present largely suppressed in 

 our people by fears that they will be obliged to pub- 

 lish at their own expense, or that publishers will 

 only pay them ten per cent ; if it can be proved that 

 this nation is suffering, and in extremis, for lack of 



