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Original Papers: Occasianal Chapters on Copyright in Designs.   91 
to another is readily ascertained, and one department assists another. Thus
beauty and originality in one thing begets, by its passage through intelligent
minds, its like in other things. The expositions of France have done much
for 
the manuficturers of that country, and even English opponents of exhibitions
flock to see them. The 6clat attendant upon successful efforts, the ideas
suggested by the great variety of objects concentrated into one focus, the
ready 
manner in which the public is enabled to find where purchases may be made,
and, above all, that earnest esprit de corps which distinguishes our neighbours,
and ought to distinguish us too in manufactures, have all had a most beneficial
influence. Good seed has already been sown in England, and we do not doubt
that if London, Manchester, and Birmingham, will agree to unite, the intention
of a national quinquennial exhibition, promulgated and partly matured by
the 
London Society of Arts already, will become a successful naturalised reality.
OCCASIONAL CHAPTERS ON COPYRIGHT IN DESIGNS. 
Chapter IL-Perpetuity in Copyright. 
ON a previous occasion we briefly detailed some of the anomalies which 
at present exist in the duration of Copyright in Design (vide p. 19); we
will 
now look at the question as one of principle. There is a perpetual right
in land 
and all physical substances,-why not in intellect and metaphysical discoveries
? 
Politicians and economists are all unanimous in giving a property to 
invention and design, but it is of limited duration. The improver of the
steam- 
engine and the ornamental designer have been regarded each as a national
benefactor in his way, worthy to have something for their trouble. Something
accordingly they have by law, that is, if they have money enough to speculate
in a patent or a registration, and courage enough to maintain their rights
at 
law, and luck enough to escape the quibbles of the counsel and the blunders
of 
the jury; provided always, that no one succeeds in digging up something 
approximating to the invention from the ruins of Nineveh or the unfathomable
strata of descriptions and specifications in the British Museum or the Public
Record Offices.  Subject to all this, the inventor obtains his "Grant,"
ex 
mero motu et speciali grati; and as one must not look a gift-horse in the
mouth, 
he takes such time as he can get, one, three, or fourteen years, as the case
may be. 
For this gift, like an Oriental present, the public expects a return; society
lends the right to get it back with interest, and making sure of the reversion,
binds the inventor or designer to specify, register, and record in full,
any 
omission or defect, being at his peril. The validity of the protection, fate
will 
determine, but the public make sure of their part of the transaction. 
It is indeed satisfactory to observe that the inventor's share is gradually
waxing bigger-a patent, "if a very strong case of hardship" is
made out, is 
extensible. An ornamental shawl, a candlestick, a wood-carving, has of late
years become registrable; not long ago it was destitute of any protection.
The 
analogous right of an author has been prolonged: society is finding it useful
to 
offer more liberal terms to obtain more valuable disclosures. The secret
must 
be published before the world can avail themselves of it; without an equivalent,
the proprietor will keep it locked up. In some cases this barter between
the 
nation and the individual takes another shape; the rate of profit under the
pa- 
tent is restricted, conditions are imposed; such as the practice of the art,
and the 
supply, at their own prices, of the patented article to government establishments.
This is only another mode of exhibiting the general principle that the inventor
of a novelty has no intrinsic property in its use, but merely an artificial
right 
created by a contract with the public. 
That such has been the practice, and the theory, all jurists, from Coke down-
wards, accord. Lord Eldon's explanation of a patent, as being a contract,
is 
well known, and has been unanimously adopted. Economists have held similar
doctrines, from Adam Smith, who assimilates these privileges to exclusive
mono- 
polies of trade, allowable only to rear and foster an infant trade,-down
to James 
Mill, who views the transaction as an equitable one, and mutually advantageous
to the parties concerned. So that the advocate of perpetual copyright, absolute