e alms of
the admirers of her father, if the right of authors had been better
protected; his own "Paradise Lost" had then been her better portion
and her most honourable inheritance. The children of BURNS would have
required no subscriptions; that annual tribute which the public pay
to the genius of their parent was their due, and would have been their
fortune.

Authors now submit to have a shorter life than their own celebrity.
While the book markets of Europe are supplied with the writings of
English authors, and they have a wider diffusion in America than at
home, it seems a national ingratitude to limit the existence of works
for their authors to a short number of years, and then to seize on
their possession for ever.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] The following facts will show the value of _literary property_;
immense profits and cheap purchases! The manuscript of
"Robinson Crusoe" ran through the whole trade, and no one
would print it; the bookseller who did purchase it, who, it is
said, was not remarkable for his discernment, but for a
speculative turn, got a thousand guineas by it. How many have
the booksellers since accumulated? Burn's "Justice" was
disposed of by its author for a trifle, as well as Buchan's
"Domestic Medicine;" these works yield annual incomes.
Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield" was sold in the hour of
distress, with little distinction from any other work in that
class of composition; and "Evelina" produced five guineas from
the niggardly trader. Dr. Johnson fixed the price of his
"Biography of the Poets" at two hundred guineas; and Mr.
Malone observes, the booksellers in the course of twenty-five
years have probably got five thousand. I could add a great
number of facts of this nature which relate to living writers;
the profits of their own works for two or three years would
rescue them from the horrors and humiliation of pauperism. It
is, perhaps, useful to record, that, while the compositions of
genius are but slightly remunerated, though sometimes as
productive as "the household stuff" of literature, the latter
is rewarded with princely magnificence. At the sale of the
Robinsons, the copyright of "Vyse's Spelling-book" was sold at
the enormous price of 2200_l._, with an _annuity_ of fifty
guineas t