This same principle is embodied in the provisions of the law as to renewal of the copyright. The second term of protection must also start with the author, or if he be dead, with his natural heirs, his widow or children, but not with his assigns, the "proprietors." The right to the extension term is in the author if he be living at the period during which registration for the second term may take place, _viz._, within six months prior to the expiration of the first term of twenty-eight years. If the author be dead, the privilege of renewal rests with his widow or children. Whether the author may dispose of his right of renewal so that the transference may be effective for the second term, even though the author should have died before the date of the beginning of that term, is a question upon which the authorities differ. The language of the statute would seem to give to the author an inchoate right which reverts to his widow or children should he be married and die before the expiration of the first term of the copyright. 5. _International copyright._ The idea of nationality or citizenship governed our copyright legislation for more than a century, from the earliest American copyright statute of 1783 to July 1, 1891, so that until the latter date copyright protection in the United States was limited to the works of authors who were citizens or residents. By the Act of March 3, 1891, commonly called the international-copyright law, which went into effect on July 1 of that year, the privileges of copyright in this country were extended to the productions of authors who were citizens or subjects of other countries which by their laws permitted American citizens to obtain copyright upon substantially the same basis as their own subjects. The existence of these conditions is made known by presidential proclamation, and up to this time ten such proclamations have been issued extending copyright in the United States to the citizen authors of Belgium, Chile, Costa Rica, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain and her possessions (including India, Canada, the Australias, etc.), Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland. The privilege of copyright in the United States is extended only to authors who are subjects of some country in whose behalf a presidential proclamation as to copyright has been issued.