The obtaining of copyright protection by a compliance with the United States statutory requirements as to registration of title, deposit of copies, and printing of notice of copyright, does not secure extension of this protection in the territory of any foreign country, the United States not being a member of the International Copyright Union. An American author must comply with the requirements of the copyright laws of a foreign country, just as if he were a citizen or subject of that country, in order to obtain copyright protection within its borders. Presumably, however, the obtaining of valid copyright protection in one of the countries of the International Copyright Union, England for example, would secure protection throughout the various countries of that Union. 4. _Who may obtain copyright._ It is the _author_ of the work who is privileged to obtain copyright protection for it. As I have already pointed out, the constitutional provision enacts that Congress is to legislate to secure to _authors_ the exclusive right to their _writings_. When, therefore, the law states that the author "or proprietor" of any book may obtain a copyright for it, the term "proprietor" must be construed to mean the author's assignee, _i.e._, the person to whom he has legally transferred his copyright privilege. It is not necessarily transferred by the sale of the book, _i.e._, the manuscript of the author's work, as the purchase alone of an author's manuscript does not secure to the proprietor of the manuscript copyright privileges. Prior to July 1, 1891, no foreign author could obtain copyright protection in the United States, hence the purchase by a publisher of one of Dickens's novels in manuscript, for example, would not enable the buyer to obtain copyright on the book in this country. No author who has not the privilege of copyright in the United States can transfer to another either a copyright or the right to obtain one. He cannot sell what he does not himself possess. Under the United States law copyright comes through _authorship_ only. It is not a right attaching to the thing--the book--but is a right vested in the creator of the literary production, hence does not pass to a second person by the transference of the material thing, the book, and evidence must be offered showing that the transference of the book carried with it the author's consent to a conveyance of the privilege of copyright.