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Clarendon Press, Oxford.—Comments on a passage about copyright.

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Transcript

The Clarendon Press, Oxford
29 December, 1926.

Slips 40-1. Copyright.

The “trade” doctrine of perpetual copyright, in the 18C, is of some importance. Tonson claimed perpetual copyright in Shakespeare, and actually stopped the edition for which Johnson issued Proposals in 1745. (The documents are extant.) He did not prosecute the University of Oxford (1744) but I think he undersold us.

The Scottish courts in 1774 decided that there was no such thing as “literary property”. They argued that it arose out of printing, and therefore could not have inhered in Adam and Eve; also that if it had been perpetual (even in England) the Act of Queen Anne (14 years) would have been useless. There was also litigation in England. Injunctions had been obtained by publishers against what they called piracy; but the doctrine came to grief finally in the House of Lords (see Boswell) and thereafter statutory copyright was the only right recognised (except for Clarendon and other picturesque survivals!). I am afraid I am rather vague about it all. Johnson was opposed to perpetual copyright.

RWC

R. B. McKerrow, Esq.

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Typed, except Chapman’s initials and some corrections. At the head is the reference ‘Pkt. 428/R.F.’ A pencil line has been drawn through the text.

A, as one of the representatives of Anne Moseley, daughter of Humphrey Moseley, late citizen and stationer of London, has an interest in the copyrights of ‘Priamus and Thisbe’, ‘Spencers Shepherds Calendar’, and other works, as recorded in the register of the Stationers’ Company and a transcript thereof; and also (formerly) claimed an interest in the copyright of ‘Cowleys Poems, Donns Poems, Davenants Works, Crashaws Poems, Carews Poems Ben Johnsons Works, 3d Vol, Pastor Fido, Sucklings Poems Denhams Poems Wallers Poems & Miltons Poems in Latin & English, with many others’, which all belong to B and C or one of them. For the consideration of £10 A assigns to C his interest in the copyrights of the books in the first group, and releases to B and C his claim to the copyrights of the books in the second group. Witnessed by Robert Knaplock, John Baker, and Marmaduke Horsley. (The witnesses to the receipt are the same.) Signed by ‘Dorman Newman Junior’.

A having made some progress in translating the Memoires of the Cardinal de Retz, and B having purchased a complete translation of the same from another hand, B obliges himself to deliver to A fifty copies of the said translation in quires as soon as it is printed, in consideration whereof A agrees not to publish a translation of the same work and will pay for twenty-five of the books he receives ‘after the rate of paper and print’.

(i) Agrees to give Philips forty guineas for his poem Cyder, together with a certain number of copies of the book, and agrees terms for subsequent editions.

(ii) Acknowledges the receipt of ten guineas ‘in full of this note and all demands’.

Endorsed ‘Mr Tonson’s Promissory Note’.

20 Aug. 1718. All accounts relating to the paper, print, etc., of the second volume in folio of Prideaux’s Connection and the second edition of the first volume in folio are today stated, and what was left of the former was equally divided. What was left of the latter remains undivided in the hands of Mr Watts, and £488 6s. 1d. in notes was also left in Knaplock’s hands to pay Mr Bowyer and Mr Watts for printing and Mr Baskett, Mr Hyde, and Mr Hoole for paper. The remaining notes relating to the volumes were equally divided between Knaplock and Tonson.

11 Sept. 1718. The remainder of the second edition of the first volume of Prideaux’s Connection was equally divided between Knaplock and Tonson.

21 Feb. 1719. All accounts relating to to all impressions of Prideaux’s Connection, both folio and octavo, are today stated and evened between Knaplock and Tonson, the printers and stationers having been paid and notes and books divided.

A agrees to translate ‘with all the convenient speed from the Latin into English verse all the Eclogues Georgics and Eneid of Virgil and prepare them for the press with such notes preface or dedication as he shall think most fitting’. He agrees not to write, translate, or publish anything else until he has finished this work, except for the translation of ‘a little French Book of painting’ which he has agreed to make for ‘some Gentlemen Virtuoso’s and Painters’; the writing of any new original poem or book of prose not exceeding the price of 1s. when printed; and the publication of a comedy by his son John Dryden (The Husband his Own Cuckold), and the writing of the prologue, epilogue, or songs for that play. B will have the copyright in the translation of Virgil, and will pay A in return £200 in instalments when specified parts of it are complete. B will provide at his own costs all the brass cuts or plates formerly printed with Ogilby’s translation of Virgil in folio which can be obtained, buy so many more as are wanting to complete the number of one hundred (excluding Ogilby’s portrait and the frontispiece), and print them as directed by A. B agrees that he will endeavour to find as many people as there are cuts in the book to subscribe 5 guineas each (payable in instal-ments, as specified), to be paid to (A) for each of the books delivered to these persons. The names and arms of the subscribers will be engraved on their respective plates. Any money paid to B by any person over the said 5 guineas shall be paid to A, and A will give B a receipt for it, and B agrees to make oath before a Master in Chancery how much subscription money he has received, and to pay these sums to A on request. B will deliver to A as many books as he wants of the same, size, volume, letter, and paper, as the aforementioned hundred volumes, and including the same prints, for which A will pay as much above the selling price of the said books on common paper as the charge of printing on the best paper amounts to. Any difference between the parties on this point is to be left to the determination in writing of three persons to be chosen by them. There shall be no more copies printed on fine paper than those which are subscribed for, and B shall not make any proposals for printing a second edition until A has disposed of the books which are to be subscribed for. When A has completed the translation as far as Book VI of the Aeneid he may publish advertisements in the Gazette or elsewhere, giving notice that only subscribers can have books on fine paper, and advising the date on which subscriptions are to be received, and when A has completed his translation he will declare the number of books to be printed on fine paper, which B will print accordingly. If one hundred subscribers are not found by the time the translation of Book VI of the Aeneid is completed, A will return to B the subscription money he has received, and A shall be free to make a new agreement with B or any other person for the translation, and B will return to A as much of the translation as he has received. For the performance of this agreement the parties mutually bind themselves in £200.

(Transcript in an unidentified hand.)

The parties have undertaken to print ‘A Complete Collection of State Tryal Proceedings upon Impeachments, etc., for High Treason and other Crimes and Misdemenours from the Beginning of the Reign of King James the first to the End of the Reign of Queen Ann’, and have published proposals for doing so by subscription. Some of the trials intended to be printed have never previously been published; others have been printed, but their proprietors are unknown; and the rights in the residue are owned by the parties. The parties therefore agree that, when the book is printed, the copyrights to trials in the first two groups shall be equally divided between them, and the rights in the residue shall remain to their present owners. The printing costs shall be apportioned among the parties according to their rights in it. If anyone claiming a right in any of the trials proves that right to the satisfaction of a majority of the parties, that person shall given a proportional share in the copyright of the book, provided they pay a propor-tional share of the printing costs. If any of the parties should obstruct such a claim, and the claim is subsequently proved in court, the obstructing party must pay the legal costs of the other parties. If any of the parties should purchase a right in any of the trials intended to be printed from someone who is not a party to this agreement, he must, within a month of the purchase being known, sell a seventh share in it to any of the other parties who want to buy it, for a seventh of the price he paid for the whole. No right of survivorship shall take effect against any of the parties, but all may bequeath by will their respective shares in the book. Any of the parties who obtain any subscriptions for the book shall only account for such sums after the rate at which the parties agree to sell the book to booksellers. If there are not enough subscribers, or if the par-ties decide not to proceed with the undertaking for some other reason, the costs incurred to that point shall be evenly distributed among them.