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author. The French and English copyright act, howeverbinding enough as regards books-has no effect in preventing the piratical translation and unauthorized production of dramatic works; owing chiefly to an absurd provision, by which it is stipulated that, to have any sort of right over the foreign version of his piece, it is necessary the author should cause it to be brought out within three months of the production of the original. The clause, too, which legitimatizes bonâ fide imitations, without showing in what respect they differ from loosely executed translations, renders it difficult, if not impossible, for a dramatic author or his representative to enforce a claim under this law. Nevertheless, on the strength of it Mr. Reade ventured to purchase the right of translating two French pieces, one of which, after being rejected in the form of a drama, was converted by him into a novel, and published under the title of "White Lies." Out of the other, all that came to Mr. Reade was an action at law, which he lost.

For some time Mr. Reade did not seem to admit that he was indebted to the Château de Grantier (from which he had borrowed a certain amount of dialogue, and substantially the plot) for his story of "White Lies." Now he explains to us that he was in no way indebted to M. Maquet for what he transferred from that writer's Château de Grantier to his own novel, for the simple reason that he had purchased from him the right to Anglicize the piece. This is like a gentleman affirming loudly that he wears his own hair, and afterwards proving the truth of his statement by showing his wig bill duly receipted. However, Mr. Reade occupies a considerable portion of his "Eighth Commandment" with an account of M. Maquet, and of his dealings with him, from which it appears (what every one taking an interest in the matter knew long ago) that by far the greater part of White Lies belongs, in an intellectual and not merely in a commercial sense, and by conception as well as by execution, to Mr. Reade.

1 With the exception of burlesques, pantomimes, and other pieces written for special occasions, not one dramatic work in five hundred is brought out within three months of its acceptance; and to invite an author to produce a version of his piece in a foreign land under any such conditions, is a stupid and insulting joke.

We think, too, most people were aware that our dramatists have long been in the habit of translating pieces from the French, and passing them off as their own. Mr. Reade not only expatiates on the dishonesty of this practice, but shows that it has necessarily the effect of driving original authors as a class from the theatre. We regret this result far more than the real or apparent injustice done to French dramatists by withholding from them all share in the profits derived from the English versions of their pieces, inasmuch as French dramatists are themselves ready and willing to adapt from the English whenever they have a chance. Mr. Reade mentions that Dumas's Alchimiste is founded on Milman's Fazio ; so also is Soulié's Clotilde- the plot of Fazio itself, by the way, being taken from a story in the Annual Register. Numbers of our older pieces-for instance the Gambler among dramas, and the Devil to Pay among farces-have been translated or imitated by the French. Versions of Bulwer's Duchess de la Vallière and Money, of the Flowers of the Forest, and of Twice Killed, have been played in Paris; and if France, during these latter days, has taken so few of our plays, it is because our dramatists are so terribly barren, not because theirs are so admirably honest.

However, an enforcement of the international copyright act, in the sense in which it was intended, would doubtless have the effect of freeing our original authors from the competition of pirates, who at present have the English stage almost entirely to themselves. But dramatic authorship in England would derive greater advantages by far from the introduction of a regular system of droits d'auteur; a system which has worked well in France for authors, managers, and the stage generally.

SUMMARY OF LITERATURE OF THE QUARTER.

THE publications of the past three months have been as copious as usual, but more than usually characterless. The books are many, but few or none of merit. Towards the close of the year, the current of literary, or rather of publishing enterprise, runs strongly towards the decorative and polychromatic branch of book-making. Multitudes of volumes then issue forth upon the public like the Assyrian cohorts," gleaming with purple and gold," and bearing the generic designation of "giftbooks," but not seldom partaking the proverbial character of gifthorses, in that they must not be looked in the mouth-id est, in the inside but taken thankfully upon the faith of a showy exterior. We are glad to notice, however, a considerable improvement in this department of production-the embellishments are richer and more varied in colour, and rise to a higher level of art than heretofore. The old chintz-pattern borders, which used to cover the "meadows of margin" around the printed text, have given place to ornaments that may often lay claim to no small degree of tastefulness and grace; while in the more ambitious designs and coloured engravings, the mechanical difficulties of chromo-lithography have, in many instances, been very tolerably mastered, though much still remains to be done in that way. Of the engravings themselves, we need say no more than that the best contemporary artists in that line-we believe without a single exception-have been engaged in their production. As to mere externals, it is a rather curious fact that the Christmas books of the present season have practically repeated the wonderful feat of old Bishop Berkeley, in evolving an intellectual and æsthetic result from tar water. The covers of most of them actually glow with the brilliant hues of Mauve, Magenta, Solferino, and other varieties of colour derived from the pigment, which modern science has made available for fashion and art in the polychromatous products of gas tar. The literary matter, which is made the groundwork and pretext for all this decoration, is as usual nearly all selected from well-known works. The subjects range through a wide diversity of theme, morality,

and date. One of the handsomest volumes in the present series is an illustrated edition of Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," and the poetical contributions are gathered from divers ages, from Chaucer to living ballad-makers.

Upon other departments of literature there is nothing special to remark, unless it is worth mention that the recently-acquired popularity of natural history topics appears still in full flow, as attested by the curious monographs on the " Honey Bee," and on British "Fungology," noticed in a subsequent page, and which have been accompanied by a numerous series of reprints or abridgments of other works belonging to the same class.

HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY.

Filippo Strozzi; a History of the Last Days of the Old Italian Liberty; by J. Adolphus Trollope. (Chapman & Hall.) -Mr. Trollope has already given to the world proof of his intricate acquaintance with the springs of modern Italian society. He publishes the present volume, in the face of the promised dawn of the new Italian liberty, as an illustration of the old. Strozzi stands forth as one of the models of the Machiavelian Italian, who raised the country to a greatness the most singular and the most unsound in history, for which it has paid a heavy penalty ever since. Mean, crafty, designing, yet not without grand ideas and great aims, Strozzi was for a time the rival of kings, and the arbiter of Italy. Mr. Trollope could not have chosen a better hero to illustrate the statecraft which supported the tottering system of the last days of Italian liberty. The characters of Strozzi, and of his chief contemporaries, are drawn with ability; but the chief merit of the book is the descriptive powers which it exhibits of the miseries and misfortunes of the population in those days, in which cruelty was a jest, and even a profession. The process of the enslavement of one after another of the old free cities, is most ably traced. We cannot say that the lesson is very encouraging for the future. The innate viciousness of the Italian mind requires something more than centuries of oppression to correct it; whether that correction will be applied, by the enthusiasm of the new situation of the

people, remains to be seen. Apart from its moral, this book is one of the most striking narratives we have of the civil history of a people giving up its liberties before a vast aristocratic conspiracy-itself crushed ere it had learned to triumph before a foreign despotism. The latter, we fear, was not worse than the former. Italy never found more cruel enemies than among her own sons, as is testified by almost every page of this interesting and instructing volume, in which we find every abuse and tyranny now laid to the charge of Austria, commenced by some Italian noble, and sanctioned by some Italian priest. No wonder, with such a study before him, that Mr. Trollope doubts the success of the great experiment on which the world is now. gazing so earnestly.

(Bentley.)—

Autobiography of Lord Dundonald. Vol. II. We have already noticed the first volume of this valuable work, which the death of the gallant autobiographer has now surrounded with still greater interest. In this volume, Lord Dundonald carries on his narrative through those memorable portions of his career, in which occurred the attack on the French fleet in the Basque Roads, resulting in the court-martial on Lord Gambier, and his own trial on the charge of complicity in a stock-jobbing conspiracy. On both points the author enters at considerable length, giving a variety of explanatory and justificatory details. Many of the circumstances he mentions have never been told in a coherent form before. The result, as a vindication of his honour from every stigma, is complete. But universal opinion, both among the profession he adorned, and of the general public, had long since proclaimed his innocence, and acknowledged his eminent services. Lord Dundonald suffered for many years under a load of obloquy, but he lived to see his name and fame cleared, to be restored to his professional rank, and to be recognised as a brother among that select band of heroes whose renown adds lustre to the history of their country.

The Life of George Fox, the Founder of the Quakers; by the Rev. J. Selby Watson, M.A. (Saunders, Otley, & Co.)-The Quakers as a subject are difficult to deal with. They would seem

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