had also a sinecure of £600 per annum in reward for his literary labors. Jeffry, of the Edinburgh Review, originally of obscure and lowly station, has now erected for himself a large fortune, which he has acquired from his critical and literary celebrity; and his contemporary of the opposite critical organ exhibits a close parallel with the features of his antagonist friend. Professor Wilson has not been without even the luxuries of life; "6 his deliciously eloquent passages,' to adopt the words of an appreciating and enthusiastic critic, have produced gushes of admiration and praise;" and an echo to the same pulse of feeling will not be found wanting on this side the Atlantic. Crabbe and Campbell, though dissimilar in many essentials, were alike as respects their pecuniary resources, which were sufficiently abundant to enable them to enjoy the otium cum dignitate; the latter is characteristically indolent, but he obtained 300 guineas for his last small poem of "The Pilgrim of Glencoe;" for his "Pleasures of Hope" he received a similar amount; and, after it had been published several years, he obtained 1000 guineas additional, and 1500 guineas for his "Gertrude." Then we might mention the name of Robert Southey-once laureate, now, we grieve to write, lunatic-as affording ample proof that the sons of genius are not always neglected by the smiles of worldly prosperity. Sotheby, the author of "Italy," was not of any note originally, but his successful debut in the world of letters, led to pecuniary results which enabled him to yield to the impulses of a generous heart, and which have enshrined his memory with the few who which allows those to laugh who win, for he has cleared a handsome annuity, we understand, by the series of his popular "Comic Annuals," "Whims and Oddities," &c. But it is quite time to pause, at least as it concerns the plaints of "poor poets," the enumeration of whom we will close with Samuel Rogers, of whose superabundant pecuniary as well as poetic resour ces, it is needless for us to speak. But what shall be said of the legion of prolific novelists which belong to our Own days? We commence with Scott, whose personal property, obtained solely by his pen, must have been worth £100,000, in addition to the title conferred on him and his family. The prodigious sums of money he received for his novels were beyond all precedent. As far as we can make out, he had been accustomed to derive about £15,000 per annum from his writings. His three Poems produced on the average 3000 guineas a-piece to their author; and for his "Life of Napoleon" he realized £12,000, being at the rate of £33 per diem for the time he occupied in its composition. If we remember correctly, James has been in the receipt of from £800 to £1000 for his historic fictions. Bulwer a still larger sum; his "Rienzi" yielded him £1600, and was the production of two months, as also his "Last Days of Pompeii." Marryatt derived from the sales of his "Peter Simple" over £2000; Lady Morgan had 2000 guineas for her "France in 1839;" and lastly, we might mention the celebrated Charles Dickens, who is reported to have accumulated, by his inimitable satiric fictions, full £30,000, independent of his recent "American Notes," which his liberal English publishers, we hear, cashed in full for £1000, "Do good by stealth, and blush to find it before they could even receive endorsefame." ment on this side the ocean. We shall not speak of the D'Israelis, Dr. Lever (Charles O'Malley), and a host of others, as our space is unavoidably prescribed. With respect to French and German authors, we can adduce but little, not having had opportunity for much inquiry in those quarters. Chateaubriand is reported to have received for the copyrights of his entire works, half a million of francs. M. Scribe, the celebrated French dramatic author, has, since 1812, written 315 pieces, which have produced him the sum of 2,400,000 francs. Each piece (generally in one or two acts) averages 7,619 francs. Among the most fecund writers of the age we may mention the name of the celebrated Dumas, who, it is stated, has actually produced, during the year before last, no less than twenty-two original volumes! his valuable and interesting work on "The Progress of Democracy in France," being among the number. Goethe received for his copyrights 30,000 crowns; but Germany, as well as Spain and Italy, cannot boast much in the way of literary remuneration, caused in the latter no doubt by the unfriendly influence of its severe literary censorship. We now approach nearer home, and although our facilities for information on this interesting point might be supposed to be increased, yet as such matters are usually considered cabinet secrets, we find our amount of statistics necessarily circumscribed on this account; and, much as we regret the fact, the reader will have to abide the disappointment. One of the earliest cases of any note that we know of, was Wirt's "Life of Patrick Henry,' which ran through about 15,000 copies, and for the copyright of which Mr. Webster, the publisher, paid $2000. Mumford's "Virginia Reports" averaged $1500 per volume. What Bancroft and Prescott have received from their popular Histories we have been unable to ascertain; the splendid success of these important works, coupled with the known liberality of their publishers, renders the question of their own emolument a matter of no great contingency or doubt. Col. Stone's "Life of Brant" was eminently popular, and the shrewd and worthy author could not have forfeited his share of the ample reward. Stephens, it is confidently rumored, had $10,000 from the sale of his " Egypt," &c.; while, for his work on Central America, he is said to have received double that amount! Irving always retained an interest in his books, which have been richly profitable to him. The highest price for a novel by Cooper has been $5000. His English copyrights were formerly vastly more lucrative. The English copyrights of both these leading writers have been incredibly great. Willis received about £500 for his "Inklings of Adventure," and as many dollars on account of his copyright in the United States. Webster, the great lexicographer, has devoted the morning, noon, and evening of a busy life to the compilation of his Dictionary, and which has been called, like the first Arabic dictionary, "an ocean of words," containing over seventy thousand separate terms, with their significations; but what pecuniary return this veteran philologist has yet received for his fifty years' labor we know not, but at any rate we learn that from one of the copyrights of his Spelling Book (of which there are about thirty in different parts of the Union), the author's receipts are something like $5000 per annum. It is not to be supposed that all the editions printed, are equally prolific. It all depends upon the machinery employed in their manufacture, which, as in one instance we are acquainted with, miraculously transmutes, by a most summary process, a mass of paper shavings into books of the most immaculate description. Anthon's edition of the Classics" yields the editor a handsome annuity. We have not spoken, from want of space, more at length, on the enormous pecuniary results which have accrued from school books, such as Vyse's "Speller," in England, and others in our own country. But, for example, in 1836, we learn from good authority, that the sale of "Olney's Geography" amounted to the prodigious extent of one hundred and thirty thousand copies, which, allowing a profit of 40 per cent., must have netted to the author and publisher $52,000! Are, then, the above illustrations, we ask in conclusion, significant of the misery and penury of members of the literary profession? For aught we can learn to the contrary, they are not a degree behind those of either the other liberal pursuits-law, medicine, or theology. Without staying to enter into detail, we venture to assert that the tendency to whine about the poor rewards of literature,-"the doom of indigence and starvation," which hangs over the heads of all who devote themselves to literary labor, is as unjust as it is needless. How can we assign the lowest pecuniary position to the author, when the half-starved lawyer, and the poverty-stricken curate, are epithets as characteristic as they are colloquial? If, therefore, these complaints on behalf of authors, are seen to be so groundless, what will be said of a further attempt to show that the booksellers, instead of having battened upon the labor of their brains, have in many instances become the victims of the cupidity of the former? D'Israeli, it will be remembered, has a chapter on this very point; and in later times, the Rev. Thomas Scott supplies us with no less convincing evidence of the fact, that booksellers have been ruined by their authors. How few comparatively of the publishing community amass any considerable wealth, caused mainly by the great risks they incur, and their frequent losses; and how many are to be seen, contenting themselves in a quiet mediocrity, while their authors are not unfrequently among the last to requite their former liberality? There have been many hapless individuals belonging to the craft, who, had they enjoyed a near acquaintance with some such friendly hand would have inscribed as a memorial upon their last resting-place something like the following melancholy memento of one of former times: "Here lies poor Ned Purdy, from misery He long was a bookseller's hack; The extreme liberality and enterprise of publishers is a matter little understood, and we shall probably hereafter invite the reader to a few recitals on this subject; meanwhile, we may just allude to the fact of Rees's Cyclopedia, which cost in its publication the unparalleled sum of £300,000. What should we think of his prudence in these utilitarian times were a publisher to embark even a tithe of this vast sum on any single work? We should unanimously deem him a confirmed case of lunacy. And as evidence of the importance of booksellers as accessary to the interests of literature, as well as authors, we extract the following passage from the "Memoirs of Mrs. Hannah More," who, speaking on this subject, makes the following observations:-"Cadel and Davis have sent me my account. The expenses of printing, paper, &c., are exorbitantly increased, and I had near £5,000 to pay for expenses, besides all the booksellers' profits, partly in consequence of my having given more for the money than any book that had lately appeared. As you know, books do not sell in proportion to their intrinsic value, but to their size. I was vexed to see Miss Smith's Fragments, excellent as they are, and Mrs. Montagu's Letters, two shillings a set more than Calebs, though there is not much above half the paper and letterpress. I do comfort myself that I have sold an honest, if not a good, book. Notwithstanding these disadvantages, you will be glad to hear that I cleared within the year £2,000, to be paid by instalments, £500 a quarter. I have had the first quarter. That Walter Scott's two-guinea poem should produce £2,000 is not strange; but that a trumpery twelve shilling one, so cavilled at, and abused, too, should produce the same sum so soon, was what I had no reason to expect. The copy-right is still in my hands." And again, in a letter to Miss Seward, Sir Walter Scott observes, "Though the account between an individual bookseller and such a man as Southey may be iniquitous enough, yet I apprehend that, upon the whole, the account between the trade and the authors at large is pretty fairly balanced; what these gentlemen gain at the expense of one class of writers is lavished, in many cases, in bringing forward other works of little value. I do not know but this, on the whole, is favorable to the cause of literature. A bookseller publishes twenty books, in hope of hitting upon one good speculation, as a person buys a parcel of shares in a lottery in hope of gaining a prize. Thus the road is open to all; and if the successful candidate is a little fleeced in order to form petty prizes to console the losing adventurer, still the cause of literature is benefited." Booksellers, therefore, are not only often indispensable to the success of an author, but there have been some whose fostering care and patronage extended even to their latest hour. Barker the publisher, who died in 1741, left Lord Bolingbroke £300, Swift £200, and Pope £100, and yet he does not appear to have been excessively wealthy. Another feature of character in the booksellers' fraternity of London with which we will conclude this somewhat desultory chapter, is their establishment of a Literary Fund for poor authors; and also a Provident Institution for poor assistants, who may have become superannuated and other wise reduced in circumstances; a noble example which might be worthily adopted among us. If booksellers have done so nobly for the cause of literature and the literary profession under the restrictive influence of the existing laws regarding the rights of authors, what would they not achieve, were the prescriptive property of a writer properly recognized? All that has yet been done in the way of legislation on this subject, has been to grant protection for a given term merely; thereby, in fact, virtually implying the non-existence of the very principle it is proposed to defend. If an author have any claim at all to the results of his intellectual labor, it must assuredly be intrinsic, inalienable and abiding: and what is once ascertained to be such cannot of course be affected by the accident of country or clime; thence the absolute justice of international legislation on this important subject, and till such legisla tive enactments shall have been effected in its behalf, it is hopelessly vain to raise the hue and cry about the poverty of writers; and the much abused though favorite term, "republic of letters" will continue a misnomer, and copyright must be written copywrong. The idea that the grant of a copyright involves a monopoly is a mere sophism; and it is full time our legislators were influenced by higher and more ingenuous motives, than those of mere conventional interest; and instead of urging the question of cheapness as the paramount motive, they should be actuated by the nobler one, "fiat justitia, ruat cœlum !”• THE DEATH OF THE PROPHET. TO THE MEMORY OF CHANNING. BY MISS ANN C. LYNCH. THOSE Spirits God-ordained, To stand the watchmen on the outer wall, They who reveal the Ideal, the unattained, When dust to dust returns, And the freed spirit seeks again its God, To those with whom the blessed ones have trod, While Hope and Virtue live. It is scarcely necessary for us to remark, after the article on the subject of international Copyright in our last number, that we dissent from this concluding remark of our correspondent, which, however, we are content to allow to stand as written by the author.-ED. D. R. The land-marks of their age, High-Prie ts, Kings of the realm of mind are they, The hopeful future is their heritage; Their words of truth, of love and faith sublime, Such kindling words are thine, Thou o'er whose tomb the requiem soundeth still, Thy reverent eye could see, Though sinful, weak, and wedded to the clod, Heir of His love, born to high destiny; Great teachers formed thy youth,* Nature and God spoke with thee, and the truth That o'er thy spirit then in radiance streamed, Ages agone, like thee, The famed Greek with kindling aspect stood "In this town I pursued my theological studies. I had no professor to guide me, but I had two noble places of study. One was yonder beautiful edifice now so frequented as a public library, the other was the beach, the roar of which has so often mingled with the worship of this place, my daily resort, dear to me in the sunshine, still more attractive in the storm. Seldom do I visit it now without thinking of the work, which there, in the sight of that beauty, in the sound of those waves, was carried on in my soul. No spot on earth has helped to form me so much as that beach. There I lifted up my voice in praise amidst the tempest. There, softened by beauty, I poured out my thanksgiving and contrite confessions. There, in reverential sympathy with the mighty power around me, I became conscious of the power within. There, struggling thoughts and emotions broke forth, as if moved to utterance by nature's eloquence of winds and waves. There began a happiness surpassing all worldly pleasures, all gifts of fortune-the happiness of communing with the work of God."— Dr. Channing's Discourse at Newport, R. I. |