hrewdly invited
to dinner, he was not deterred from presenting his bill at the table.
The slight misunderstanding to which such a manoeuvre very naturally
gave rise, may have seemed to justify his doubts, as they did to check
the good intentions of his entertainers, with regard to the speedy
adjustment of grievances; yet I think I am not mistaken in believing
that popular sentiment in this country is just now setting strongly in
favour of a community of copyright between America and Great Britain.

As a mere question of ethics, it can hardly be expected that while
doctors disagree, the popular conscience should be much disturbed by
the flagrancy of the present laws; yet it is only justice to the tone
of moral feeling which characterises what may fairly be called society
in America, to say that it is correct, if not even generous. The
leading periodicals, which may be taken as an index of the opinions of
educated men in general, have always been true to principle in the
discussion of this matter. The _New York Review_, which, during a
brief but honourable career was regarded as speaking the high-toned
sentiments of American churchmen, contained an elaborate article, as
early as in 1839, in which the conduct of Congress, reference to the
famous "British Authors' petition," was severely rebuked, and
criticised as scandalously unprincipled and disgraceful. About the
same time, under cover of its provincial blue and yellow, the _North
American_, or, as Mr Cooper calls it, the _East American_ came out in
defence of justice as toweringly as even Maga herself. The "British
Authors' petition" had been fiercely opposed by a "Boston booksellers'
memorial," which, among other things addressed to the lowest passions
of the mob, argued against a copyright law, that it would prevent them
from altering and interpolating English books, to accommodate
republican tastes! Hear then how the Boston reviewers--who in spite of
that snobbish sectarian air of perkiness and pretension which is
usually ascribed to them, can now and then do things very
handsomely--pounce upon their townsmen's morality. "We cannot help
expressing our surprise," say they,[2] "that the strange and
dishonourable ground assumed in that memorial, has not been more
pointedly reprobated. We can only account for the adoption of such a
document at all, by a body of respectable men, on the supposition that
its piratical doctrine, respecting literary property, escaped the
not