The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-04 00:00:00

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I 'moil of 1.1,6 eihrieestee fee },ilex fig' the le- di Ste" '1
the cost of the patterns, which it appeared !dverete. 4.
from 63. to Bs., and their expense per piece s , t
only lei• to lid- per piece. Oae gentleman, a V
small producer, who was principally employed :
coping French pateerns, stated that he paid' .•
else that WC.3 the higheet seen known to have is -
paid. Now, for things of an little value in themse.ve,
and which were not original conceptions, he cou•
tended that it was quite unnecessary to int.:"
duce so great a change. One of the first corn...
quenees of the Bill would be, that it would produce
endless litigation. Under the law as it at Preteur-
st od, for a period of eigety years there Lad been only
one aetion at law to maintain a eepyeight in a design.
But the impossibility of ascertaining what a copy di
set at an original design was would throw the greatest
difficulties in the way, nod we'd 1 etc Ito :he greatest eat-
toirraasumet to the traCe. the of tl.e pidereipa! witnesses
in fay.stir of the Bill Och; asked, " 5,,0e1.1 you soy
that one of these is a copy of the other ?'' replied, ° I
sLould say that under ceitain circumstances was, ere;
under other circurnstenees it was not." Another gene
tlernan, Mr. Lee, a Magistrate of Manchester, vvei
produced alnuaily 700,000 pieces, measuring up-
wards of 11,000 milee stated thet he did net.
know what u copy Ras ; that the trade did net
know it, and waited to be inforated on that point
Another gentleman, M. Kershaw, who're productiote
amounted to one million of pieces a year, and telter
a ge ticman of high r: spectability, and
Magistrate of Mar, etieeer, expressed an opinite:
precisely in accordance wit's the gentlemen whom lie
(Mr. Williams) quoted. Mr. Ross, a practical de
signer, ald one of the Leat description of calico-printer:;
expressed a similar opinion, aed he further stated the'
there was very little real origiriality exiEting in patteree-
Now, although there was a law that gave three month►.
protection to those patterns, yet the producers iv
designs had never availed themsatts of that protest'
time and they had sta:el in their esidenee that they
believed the mejority of the se persons engage
in the calico printing trade had never proteetut
tbe:r patterns. That was the opinion of those (jet.
tlemen, and the inereated protection could tease no othe.
object in view, but an increase of profit and the sale
1 their productions to the put]. c at a higher price the
could now obtain for tte it. It was a most remade.
able circumstance that the gentlemen who were opposed
to this me ssurc—two of ti.earett least—stated that they
never copied any man'. pattern in their lives,
and another stated that he never copied any pat •
tern before the terns of the cope right hiti:
expired, and even then, not one in a hundred.
Several of these get tlernen who st ore in favour of the
Extension of the Copyright were copyists of French
patterns. What did these gent:el ee say as to the
exti nt of copying which new existed ? The Right hors.
Baronet the Member for 'Penmen:ll preselect'. s
pet tion from the C: nigher of Commerce io
Glasgow, Lefote a Committee of which several of the
largest calico-prieters of that city were examined
on this subject. Oar.., of those genii meet', a person)
great respectability, Mr. Galbre ahle who produce'
200,000 pieces aretmoly, in a ' veer to a question, said,
1 that ho had meet known of any patterns being copied.
—he had seen none, but he had le and of one or twee
Now that was strong evidence that Scotland, at any
rate, was almost enirely exempt from that syatemet
copying to which it was the ohjace of he B II to put
it re. Another gentLatan, who vas one of the prince
pal witnes es in favour of the measure, Mr. Lockett
meted that there was in general no advantage in copy
ing print:. He said that he engraved fifty patterns a weer.,
and that he could only mention one instance of those
patterns having been copied. 'Feat gentleman hest
also made the following reniarkaLle statement in It.
evideute ; he said that novelty was the grand attract •
tion, that it would at all tines command a preference
of &dee though not always of price. While the
House had such evidence ae that before them to dis
prove the existence of any extensive system of copying
such as could be injurious to the trade—coming, L),
from parties who were hivousatle t.) all extended copy-
right, he hoped they would pause before they sanctioned.
the Bill. It was the opinion of these gentlemen whit
Kett unfavourable to the passing of the measure, that
if it were to I e enforced there would Le no end to litd_
gation. Mr. Roe, an entitle .t Chancery barrister, wet-
one of die parties examined. lie sta e I that in one case
in which proceedings in Chancery had been instituted,
to obtain redress for the capying of a pattern, Lord
Chancellor Lyndhurst said, when the patterns were
shown to him, that he could not say which was tine
copy and which was the original ; and that he should
dismiss the case for the consideration of a Jury.
Mr. Roe also stated that, in a Cleo:eery case, it
would be two years before an answer could be put in.
When the cause had been s. t down tar be heard':
might be a year 'and a half before it would come on for
hearing. The same witoe,s, in unmet- to another
question, said that patties were prevented from apperd-
ing to the ltw on account of tee dilly and expense,
which he considered most unjust and disgrace-
ful to the law and diagreeeful to the Legisla-
ture.—(Hear, hear.) The lion M mher then read
an:extract from the evidence el a solicitor of Manchester
who was engaged in a cause of this kind in the Court
of Chancery. That eentleman said that Lis cliects
were worn out, and gave op their defence, although
they had sufficient evidence to prove that the pattern
against which an iejunetion had been obtained, was alto-
gether as original invention. Tire pattern was not worth
205., and the suit cost slit par ties upwards of 9001. eace.
Ile trusted that the House would take care not to in-
crease the litigation which was described in
those documents. A genii:man, manager for the
printing concern of Henry and Company, in
Dublin, had complained of tient- patterns being very ex-
tensively copied. Messrs. henry and Company had
been in business for twenty years, and it was ad-
mitted that during the past ten years they had
copied the patterns of cteer manufacturer!. Although
that gentleman stated that he got his engravings done
for live pounds, whilst tae original proprietor of the
patterns paid ten pounds, yet he had abandoned
copying altogether, although he could net be said to
have done wrong, as the Act did not extend to Ire.,
land. He stated that wl.ea they copied the
patterns they sold tlem at 40.,. a piece, ono
half the price obtained by the original producer, arid
yet they got at least 20-. profit. He (Mr. Wi liame)
thought this gentleman at least had very good
reason to be satisfied with the present
law. Those Gentlemen who were seeking this ex-
, t insion %sere only attuatad by cupidity, and by a
desire to get larger profit .. (Hear.) A great
number el pamphlets had appeared on this subject.
The %cry individuals who had denounced the present
system as piracy and robbery,. acknowledge that they
the e:5( lees had Lean in the habit of copying
French patterns. —( Hear, he sr; hear.) Was
it not as much piracy and robbery to copy a French-
man's pettern as it was of one of their own countrymen.
One of the gentlemen who lied given evidence
fit- our of the extension, Mr. Pieter, state 1 that he
had frequently copied French patterns, and afterwards
claimed them as his own property, and threatened to
prosecute any one who should infringe them, and this
practice was very commonly adopted. But what
he (Mr. W.) conside eel the meat serious and import-
ant consequence of this Bill was the area which :t
would have upon the foreign t a'e of this country.
S sine gent omen had state I that it would be a great
advantage to foreigners to have the Bill passed. Mr.
Lee's, one of the largest m inufacturers in this
country, had stated that it the copyright were
t) be extended, he would not v.:uturc to execute or-
ders ; that lie would give up the trade rather than be
under the ban of a law that would pile', his
1 transactions in jeopardy and danger. Mr. Kershawo_
I slid that the extension of the copyright would hi/
create high prices and large
and five or
in-
jure the foreign trade of this
country;t.ed that opinion.
six ether witnesses had corroborated
felt that he ought
( C rite of " Di% ide, divide.") He
1-I"isct but it was a question of
profits, and materially
troubling it so long
to apologise to tile
upongbmeeoernel
~:
sinstuaicactnichp:loicalaot,:n.
um:flac:ce:ncsl. un
bi
e ' t.sw' ere a'svarc• of. oflt .11 el
ur?oefilt:n7etnn jueee that the progress now
. a national point view
ntrunahlle:oaat;sknt:ti,coincorgNtoEti:ini.rnunaontrioisochltrpddemein
inaiw:n3,e
scene
i,rnien:nieyo,
levt.ei ell
r, before the Committee Laos,
Ge r t.unlndaeris:
s in different parts of •
kies Frante, -"g 'inst:ipna(h,clse-o'criti-:l.o'smpct rig United St atof
with
and the d
alniutpeow a s America,wasof a
r.l:ultti:l.rst.:lndenoinattnhi-ye
la, aad the
auritlited
Stet e,
tuelily
trade, anti had beet
Furore that were
the last 18 years,.
pwr.ot,lisuaelelrsthcor fotrheiigsnaretoiculreerdieusni-ogf
had stt tol tile so great was the proeress now making
in these different countries that he looked forward:with
the greet St apprehension to the resu't of the competition
t'-.ey v. owl I be able to v wee in the course of a short
time against this country. Ile (Mr. W.) hoped the
virtu n!taleas he had stated
would have some weight
with the House '
, and would induce Hon. Members to
pause before they sanctioped the Bi I. He held in his
hand a decement which showed the progress this
branch of the trade had made. In die United States,
tweety-five years ago, the trade was unknown.
In the 3e ir 1839 they produced upwards of
100,000,000 yards of calico of the value of very
nearly 2,500,000/. sterling. They had increased
their own productions year after year, at a
rapid rate. Our exportations to that country
had been diminished year after year, till they were re-
duced, in the year 1839, to between 8 or 900,000
pieces. One point which he (Mr. Williams)
svished, to observe upon, and upon which a great deal
bud
r teen
enjoyed by the French in their pro-
duction of this article. That superiority was
attributed to the French having a long term
for the copyright of designs. Now he believed that
yn before the Committee, was the supe-
riority now said
Out circumstance had no influence whatever in producing
the superiority which the French now enjoyed.
His opinion was that it was entirely owing to their
having established schools of design at the public ex-
, pease in all the departments of manufacture, which