THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY. 203 when the subject-matter for which protection is invoked is not even in the form of intellectual property, but has the attributes of ordinary tangible property. Suppose a man has a col- lection of gems or curiosities which he keeps private : it would hardly be contended that any person could publish a catalogue of them, and yet the articles enumerated are certainly not intel- lectual property in the legal sense, any more than a, collection of stoves or of chairs.^ The belief that the idea of property in its narrow sense was the basis of the protection of unpublished manuscripts led an able court to refuse, in several cases, injunctions against the publication of private letters, on the ground that "letters not possessing the attributes of literary compositions are not property entitled to protection ; " and that it was "evident the plaintiff could not have considered the letters as of any value whatever as literary productions, for a letter cannot be considered of value to the author which he never would consent to have published." ^ But 1 "The defendants' counsel say, that a man acquiring a knowledge of another's prop- erty without his consent is not by any rule or principle whkh a court of justice can apply (however secretly he may have kept or endeavored to keep it) forbidden without his consent to communicate and publish that knowledge to the world, to inform the world what the property is, or to describe it publicly, whether orally, or in print or writing. " I claim, however, leave to doubt whether, as to property of a private nature, which the owner, without infringing on the right of any other, may and does retain in a state of privacy, it is certain that a person who, without the owner's consent, express or implied, acquires a knowledge of it, can lawfully avail himself of the knowledge so acquired to publish without his consent a description of the property.
- ' It is probably true that such a publication may be in a mani>er or relate to property
of a kind rendering a question concerning the lawfulness of the act too slight to deserve attention, I can conceive cases, however, in which an act of the sort may be so circum- stanced or relate to property such, that the matter may weightily affect the owner's interest or feelings, or both. For instance, the nature and intention of an unfinished work of an artist, prematurely made known to the world, may be painful and deeply prejudicial against him; nor would it be difficult to suggest other examples. . . .
- ' It was suggested that, to publish a catalogue of a collector's gems, coins, antiquities,
or other such curiosities, for instance, without his consent, would be to make use of his property without his consent; audit is true, certainly, that a proceeding of that kind may not only as much embitter one collector's life as it would flatter another, — may be not only an ideal calamity, — but may do the owner damage in the most vulgar sense. Such catalogues, even when not descriptive, are often sought after, and sometimes obtain very substantial prices. These, therefore, and the like instances, are not necessarily examples merely of pain inflicted in point of sentiment or imagination; they may be that, and something else beside." Knight Bruce, V. C, in Prince Albert v. Strange, 2 DeGex & Sm. 652, 689, 690. ' Hoyt V. Mackenzie, 3 Barb. Ch. 320, 324 (1848); Wetmore v. Scovell, 3 Edw. Ch. 515 (1842). See Sir Thomas Plumer in 2 Ves. & B. 19 (1813).
