The Sun.
London, England, 1838-05-22 00:00:00

By C. B. COURTENAY,

J 42,
Great Marlborough-street.
Sold by J. Hill, Medical Bookseller, 55, Great Winamill-street,
Haymarket ; Simpkin and Marshall, Stationers-court ; Onwhyn,
Catherine-street, Strand ; Templeman, Regent-street ; Cappell,
9, Cornhill ; and all Booksellers in Town or Country.

PRICE sd.

BANK OF IRELAND CHARTER.

(From the Drogheda Journal.)
The notice which appears in our advertising columns, most
respectably signed, calling upon the inhabitants of this town to
meet on Monday next, for the purpose of petitioning the Hoire
of Commons on the important subject of Banking, has our
most cordial approbation. The situation in which Drogheda,
Dundalk and Newry are placed by that clause in the Bank of
Ireland Charter, which excludes these ports from the neces-
sary establishment of Banks, for the commerce and accommo-
dation of their Merchants, Shipowners, Manufacturers, Shop.
keepers, &c. &c., is most extraordinary, and has long proved
disastrous to their prosperity, it behoves the inhabitants of all
classes in these towns to arouse themselves on this occasion,
and seize upon this favourable opportunity to remind the House
of Commons, that in the present enlightened state of the pub. lie mind in regard to the principles of free trade, it cannot be
any longer tolerated, that the few individuals who constitute
the Directory of the Bank'of Ireland shall, without responsi-
bility or controul, and under the protection of an exclusive
Charter, draw a magic circle 50 miles round Dublin, and say—
" Within this limit no person or persons shall be permitted to
associate together for the purpose of forming a Banking Es.
tablishment." We are not disposed in the present state of
this important question to enter minutely into the various ex-
clusive clauses in the Bank of Ireland Charter ; suffice it to
say, in reference to Drogheda, Dundalk and Newry, three very
important towns, that they are prohibited from establishing
Joint Stockßanks, and that this prohibition will be continued
for many years, unless the efforts of their Merchants, Manu-
facturers, &c., be most zealously directed to the proceedings of
Parliament, which has already appointed a Committee to collect
facts, and to report the result of their proceedings to the House,
preparatoryto the renewal of the Bank of Ireland Charter. We
are therefore compelled by an imperative sense of duty to the
public to call upon them to come fsrward on this occasion,
and convince the House of Commons by the energy of their
resolutions, and the independent spirit of their petition on Mon-
day next, that although they have patiently submitted to the
exclusive monopoly of the Bank of Ireland for so many years,
yet that they have keenly felt the evils of this exclusion from
the privileges of Banking, and that no efforts shall be wanting
on their part to prevent a continuance of this unjustifiable mo-
nopoly; then may we calculate on the rapid prosperity of Dun-
dalk, Newry, and Drogheda, when we have Banking establish-
ments, planned and matured by resident Merchants, whose
local knowledge of the districts they reside in will qualify them
to render their plans effective to meet the demands of an in-
creasing commerce.

MR. SERGEANT TALFOURD'S NEW
COPYRIGHT BILL.

Messrs. Longman and Co. beg respectfully to solicit atten-
tion to the following statement :
Mr. Sergeant Talfourd's Copyright Bill, now before the
House of Commons, has been introduced with the avowed ob-
ject of benefiting authors and promoting the interests of litera-
ture. The subscribers presume to give no opinion as to the
probable operation of the proposed measure in the latter point
of view ; and certainly they would be the last to evince any
hostility to any proposal for benefiting authors, provided it in-
volved no injustice to others. This, however, will be the effect
of Mr. Sergeant Talfourd's Bill, should it pass into a law as
it now stands. The subscribers do not complain of its pro:.
spective, but of its retrospective, clauses. It may, perhaps, be
doubted whether the interests of literary men and of literature
will be better secured by substituting for the present copyright
term of 28 years certain, with the life of the author, the term
of 60 years certain ; but if Parliament be of opinion that this
prolongation will be advantageous, the subscribers will cheer-
fully
acquiesce in its decision. But they feel convinced that,
in conferring a boon on one class, however deserving, Parlia-
ment cannot intend that it should be accompanied by an act
of injustice to others, and by an invasion of rights hitherto
held sacred. Such, however, will certainly be the effect of
enacting the retrospective clause in the proposed Bill.
In common with most other extensive publishers, your sub-
scribers have expended large sums in the purchase of copy-
rights; and they beg to call your especial attention to the
fact, that the assignments to such copyrights have uniformly
conveyed to them all right, contingent and future, as well as
certain and immediate. that their authors either had or might
afterwards acquire. The usual words are—" The author dis-'
poses of all and every the entire copyright, and all reversion,
renewal, and extension of copyright, as well present as future,
vested as contingent, for the term of 28 years, and all such
further and other term as the author then had or should at any
time thereafter have or acquire."
Surely it is unnecessary to dwell on the obvious injustice of
passing a law authorising individuals to take back property
sold under such stipulations. Is it not really to insult authors
to propose to promote their interests by giving their families
the option of committing fraud, by reclaiming that which their
progenitors had unreservedly sold and been paid for?
The loss that would be entailed on the publishers, and the
injury that would be done to literature, by the passing of such
a retrospective enactment are as evident as its injustice.
Publishers who purchase the copyright of works frequently
employ literal), men at an immense expense to revise and
improve them, and make them more in accordance with the
advancing knowledge of the age. But should the copyright
revert to the family of the original author at the end of twenty-
eight years from its publication, or at his death, two parties
would have conflicting claims to the work in its improved
state ; and unless the publisher were able to repurchase from
the family of the original author that part of the work which
he had already purchased from their father, it might he pulled
to pieces, and the publisher lose the whole value of the im-
provements he had effected upon it.
The case now stated will, should the proposed Bill pass into
a law, be of very frequent occurrence. A very large class of
the most useful works, including all descriptions of works on
practical politics, law, science, and art, and all school books,
are necessarily in a state of progressive and continuous im-
provement. The passing of a new law, or a new discovery in
science, may make what was perfect to-day imperfect to-mo--
Yin! ; and the publishers, if they would prevent their books
being driven out of the market, must take care to have them
improved accordingly. In consequence of the changes that
are thus perpetually occurring, it very frequently happens
that at the end of 28 years, or at the death of the original
authors of legal and scientific works, little remains of their
primary contributions except the title. That, however, being
the designation by which books are known, is of great import-
ance ; and if the families of the original authors arc to be en-
titled to claim it, and any other fragment of the original work
that may remain, notwithstanding the sale of every existing
and contingent right to it by their fathers, the value of the ad-
ditions
proved state, ditior,s made by the publishers, that is, of the work inits im-
• d will be totally destroyed. The subscriberss are
satisfied that, were there nothing else to object to in it, the
least consideration of the influence that the retrospective
clause must have in the case of all legal and scientific works
would be enough to make it be rejected.
There are other important considerations connected with
this matter which are entirely overlooked in Mr. Sergeant
Talfourd's Bill. Some of the most important and valuable
works in the English language have been wholly projected
and planned by publishers, who have employed literary men,
and paid them large sums to furnish contributions to these
works, according to a plan laid down for their guidance.
Above 100,0001. has been paid for contributions to some single
works of the class now alluded to; and surely it cannot ,
be the intention of the Legislature to give the families of
the authors who supplied portions of such works a right at
their deaths, or at the termination of 28 years, to claim the
property of those portions. This would be the climax of in-
justice, and would occasion a destruction of literary property
unparalleled in the annals of literature. The projector and
publisher of an Encyclopaedia, a review, or other literary work
supplied by numerous individuals, should be looked upon in
the same light as a contractor who purchases contributions for
any great work in architecture, civil-engineering, &c. But
what would become of such works, were those who furnished
a brick or a column, a sluice or a drawbridge, to be allowed,
at the end of 28 years, to come and carry it away ? If Parlia-
ment be desirous to subvert one of the most valuable branches
of the national literature, and that which supplies a greater,
revenue to literary men than all the rest put together, they
may permit an injustice of this sort to be consummated, but
not otherwise.

Within the last few years many valuable works that had
been long out of print, and inaccessible to the public, have
been reprinted by enterprising individuals, and sold at a very
low price. A most valuable addition has, in consequence,.
been made to the available literature of the day. It is•cer-
tain, however, that very little profit has been made by these
republications, and that in many instances they have been
productive of a loss. But the passing of Mr. Sergeant Tal-
fourd's Bill will go far to put an end to such undertakings ;'
for if the families of authors may come forward and exact a
second price for works that would, but for this Act, have been
public property, there is not one case in ten in which a
publisher would under such circumstances attempt their re-
publication.
It may probably be true, that the enactment of the retro-
spective clause in Mr. Sergeant Talfourd's Bill would be ad-
vantageous to a few authors; but the subscribers feel satisfied'
that it will be in the last degree injurious to the real interests
of literature and of the great body of literary men. They
hold no opinion in common with those who object to copy
right in any shape, and they have already stated, that they
have not the slightest objection to any extension of the exist-
ing, term of copyright Parliament may think proper to give
to authors. But they humbly submit, that this addition'al
term should be prospective, and not retrospective, or that it
should apply only to copyrights not yet sold; that Parliament
cannot, without committing manifest injustice, restore that
property to the families of authors to which their fathers sold
every claim and title, present, contingent, and future; and
that justice requires, that if the existing term of copyright be
prolonged, the holders of purchased copyrights, as well as the
authors in possession, should enjoy the benefit of the extended
term.

The subscribers beg also to submit, that justice and a re-
gard for the interests of literature alike require that publishers
should be held to have the exclusive copyright of all works