The Express.
London, England, 1864-04-23 00:00:00

THE ASSAULT ON DUPPEL

The Danish accounts of the aassult on Duppel
have at last arrived, and lead to the belief that the
details given by the Prussian journals were rather
under than beyond the truth. The government of
Copenhagen does not attempt to extenuate in any
way its defeat The conflict is admitted to have
been terrible.

Gen. Duplat and the other field officers who were
either killed or badly wounded, belonged to the left
wing of the Danes. That part of the defending
force being deprived of its chiefs, and opposed to
an enemy far superior in number, was obliged
to effect its retreat under a murderous fire
from the Prussian artillery. The right wing
was taken on the flank and overwhelmed by
the besiegers. It made ita retreat, but left in
the enemy's hands a great number of prisoners,
independently of the dead and wounded who
strewed the ground. At length the remnants
of the small Danish army succeeded in reaching the
tite-de-pont of Sonderborg. In that place was
renewed the sacrifice of Overlie. As time was
necessary for the different regiments to pass over
to the Island of Alsen, two or three battalions
hastily assembled and sustained the shock of the
enemy. The remains of the Danish army found
refuge in the Island, but with dreadful loss ; the
Copenhagen despatch, with terrible plainness,
declaring that the greater part of the Ist Brigade
has disappeared, and one-half of the Bth been
destroyed !
According to the information received from both
sides, there appears to be no doubt that the attack
was as skilfully organised as the defence was
courageous. The Prussians had appointed a force of
25,000 men for the assault ; 15,000 picked men from
the regimeuta of Brandeburg and Westphalia were
to form the attacking the party, the remaining
10,000 constituting the reserve. The Prussians
took their measures so well that their losses were
relatively smaller, being 60 officers wounded, 6 or 7
killed, and 800 rank and file put hors de combat.
Among the wounded are mentioned Generals de
Mannstein and de Raven, and Colonel de Cusel.

(LEUTIMI meow's.)
SPAIN.
MADRID, APRIL 23.
The Queen hu left for Aranjuez.
The Nowedades of to-day says :
"The Progreasist banquet will not disturb public
tranquillity, although more than 1,000 persons will
take part in it."

AMERICA.
(Per the North American, viii Oreenceatle),
NEW YORK, APRIL 9, APPIRROOK.
The army of the Potomac is preparing for an
early forward movement.

All surplus baggage has been sent to the rear,
and furloughs hare been stopped.

00XMERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.
NEW YORK, Aran, 9, Arnaxoo9.

Money tight. Gold, 70 prem. Exchange on
London, 1814. Stocks opened firm to-day, but
have since become very heavy. New York Centrals,
1431 ; Illinois, 149 k ; Erie, 1261. Cotton quiet.
Middling Upland, 74a. Breachituffs advancing.
Petroleum very firm. Crude, 35i ; refined, 52
to 52&.

The City of Manchester, from New York on the
9th inst., arrived at Queenstown at 7.30 a.m. She
brings 131 passengers and 276,270 dole. in specie.
She landed 10 sacks of mails and 12 passengers,
and proceeded at 7.40 a.m. Her news has been
anticipated.

EXPRESS FROM PARIS.

(racom ors Owl coutrarosorss.)

PARIS. FRIDAY Evionxa.

The English Shakespeare banquet is, after all, to
take place—at least, I suppose so, because I have
a letter from the secretary of the committee, telling
me that it is "all right again," and enclosing a
ticket. I observe, however, that this evening's
edition of Gutiguani done not contain the contra-
diction which appeared in this morning's number
of its announcement last night, that the banquet
had been prohibited. It is quite certain that the
banquet was interdicted on Wednesday, because I
was told so, not only at the Grand Hotel, but ty
the secretary and one of the leading members of
the committee. The French government, in think-
ing better of it, confirms, in the strongest manner,
all the strictures hitherto made.

The Temps has received a warning on account of
a capital article by M. Floquet in its number of
April 21, entitled "Pais et Liberte, " which
graphically, and without exaggeration, sets forth
various instances of an illiberal and reactionary
policy of the departmest of the interior which
grieves and astonishes the most sincere friends of
the empire. The corpus delicti is thus described in
the warning :
Coosiderieg that is distorting recast sots of the adminis-
tration and giving them a false interpretatioe, the author
of the article endeavours to excite to hatred and contempt
of the government.

MM. Carnet, Garnier-Pages, Glais-Bizoin, Pelle-
tau, Planat, and Jules Simon have proposed as an
amendment to the complicated law on coalitions
now before the chamber the simple repeal of
three articles (No. 414, 415, and 416) of the penal
code—the effect of which would be to assimilate the
French law to that of the English, which, recog-
nising the right of a nian co his labour as the most
sacred of all property, knows no such thing
as penalties against strikes and coalitions so long
as no breach of the peace is committed. Many of
the liberal members are grieved and surprised to
find that Emile 011ivier has waived the true prin-
ciple and consented to a compromise with govern-
ment in this matter.

P.B.—Up to this moment I do not know whether
the English banquet will take place or not. I in-
cline to think not. Although, u above stated, the
secretary sends me a ticket, two members of the
committee send me messages that there will be no
dinner.

ClRCAMlA.—TheLevalit Herald, of the 13th inst.,
considers that the Circassian war of independence
is at an end. The reverse sustained by the Lrbykh
tribe, the most warlike and renowned of the Cir-
cassian', on the Ist, is described as crushing and
final. The chiefs and foreign officers have escaped
to Trebizonde, and the people are swarming to the
coast, endeavouring to treat with the Rani= au-
thorities for the means of reaching Turkey. The
Ottoman government has sent five steamers to
bring them off, and is negotiating with the Russian
Steam Navigation Company for the same purpose.
The Morinsento of Genoa of the 19th contains the
following :—" A serenade to the English round was given
last sight u an acknowledgment of the reception given to
Garibaldi in England. An immense erowd raised cheers
for the English, and applauded the airs executed by the
band of the National Girard, which played three times
' God Save the Queen' altentately with Garibaldi's hymn.
The unmade lasted from 11 to lis the morning. The arise
raised the mast frequently were, ' Viva l'lnglialtsma!
' Viva Garibaldi !' and Viva Bimini ! ' An address is to
be presented to the British consul this day."
. . _

The price of butter is 2s. Gd. per 11; in the city of
New York.

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14. I
,
TILE SITAXESPEARE TERCENtENAR

'G, AP

L'•,i

ON this day, three hundred years ago, when a
young mother lay with her new-born infant by
her side, what an overwhelming thing it would
have been to her to hear that the birth of that
child would be commemorated three centurie',
later as • national blessing—not only all over
England, but wherever Englishmen are living,
on any part of the globe ! How amazing it would
have been to her to be told that his fame—
' noble and endeared in his own day—would,
after a prosaic period, grow and spread
till it should surpass that of any other
man since the days of tradition, till, in
three hundred years, Old England would care
more for the 23rd of April for WILLIAM SHAKE-
SPEAREN sake than for ST. GBOROE of ENGLAND
himself. What an astonishing thought to parents
living in an age when the Patron Saint of England
was so proudly honoured, that their child should be,
in English hearts and minds, even greater than he !
How they would have looked into that infant face,
and tried to fancy how Much • thing could come to
pass ! Yet hen it is—before our eyes on this
memorable day. Our forefathers sang good old
songs and prayed good old prayers in honour of
ST. GEORGE of ENGLAND, and boasted that all.
Russia was doing the same thing, and that the
Turks themselves tried to claim him for a Milian'.
man hero ; our grandfathers went forth to eft the
day kept in the reign of the last of the Gaoaora by
that procession of mail coaches which has gone by,
never to return ; and now the Saint and Hero him-
self is eclipsed and forgotten by the glory of the child
born on his day ! And OUr SHAKESPEARE'S fame
will not give way in its turn to any other. Cham-
pionship by the stout heart and the strong arm
may be rivalled in any age, and finally discredited
or forgotten ; but intellectual creations of the
highest order are a gift to the whole race,
inestimable and imperishable, and, by a law
of Nature, more prized as time passes, and the
human mind advances. We need but look back
into the interval between SHAKESPEARE'S birth
and this day to see how true this is in the cue of
the greatest of intellectual creators. Look
at the pastimes of the reign of Criaatz• 11.,
a hundred years after SHAKESPEARE'S birth,
and compare them with the scenery and action
of his dramas. Great as his name was then, how
much had his countrymen to learn of him and his
works. A hundred years later there had been
partial awakening, to a sense of the value of our
inheritance ; but how partial it was ! JOHNSON
was accepted as a commentator who conferred
honour on his author ; and at Stratford itself
GARRICK was associated as an equal with SHAKE-
SPEARE; and the absence of Dr. JOHNSON from the
celebration in 1769 was regarded as a misfortune
for both. No doubt there were students of
SHAKESPEARE all over the country by that time—
young men and maidens, old men, and even chil-
dren (as in our day), who had discovered the prize
for themselves, and were poring over one play or
another in the book-closet or the garret, among the
sedges of clauic rivers or under the sycamores in
summer, or in the easy chair by the fireside in
winter. But to the great public SHAKESPEARE
was little more than a name ; and small wits and
their shallow readers knew no better than to dis-
parage or patronise him.

How great is the advance in our day on the
coming round of the third centenary ! How many
editions of the plays have been absorbed by the
classes before supposed to be far below " the
" reading public !" What a competition there is
among working men and women for any copy in
their reading-rooms or libraries ! How frequent
is now the quotation from this author in the
humblest addresses uttered to any audience !
And, better than this, how instant is the response
of the popular intelligence to any allusion to any
of SHAKESPEARE'S characters—how universal the
conception of the Imogen, the Portia, the Hotspur
and the Hamlet, which are the beet treasures
of the most cultivated minds of our own and
every other country. Much as remains to be
done to render these works practically the inheri-
tance of the whole nation, the progress made is
such as to ensure this result.

The rejoicings of this day will be a long step
towards it. Our children's grandchildren may see
the next centenary, and will inherit the tradition of
the present, in its local aspect ; and we have every
reason for believing that they will have become
more worthy of the day than our generation is, as
we are worthier than some of our forefathers.
We shall be quizzed in that day as we now quiz
the former generation who tried to honour SHAKE-
SPEARE. They saw Brutus and Prospero in peri-
wigs and knee-buckles on the stage ; and at
fancy balls in various towns to-day there will be
Ophelias and Rosalind. in tight stays and artificial
ringlets, and Miranda. and witches in crinolines.
These things happen still, as we still meet with
complacent gentlemen and ladies who smile at
SHAKESPEARE being so much overrated. But the
II bad taste, the indifference, the cynical irreverence
are giving way, not only from generation to gene-
ration, but from year to year. Though Stratford
is the central point of interest to-day, it is only
one among very many scenes of homage
and enjoyment. The holiday-making is very
widely spread ; but a hundred years hence
it will not have, as now, to be achieved by manage-
ment from above, but will be spontaneous among
the people, from the highest to the lowest. It is
well that English men and women should honour
their SH•EESPEAEE in any way which seems to
them worthy—by statue, or obelisk ; by a scho-
larship, an institute, an annual festiv►l, or any
other mode of permanent record. But amidst all
such diversities of worship it should be remem•
bered that there is one, indisputably supreme,
which is open to us all—a monument as immortal
as the man—to which we can all put a hand—the
bringing the mind of SHAKESPEARE into communi-
cation with every other now living to learn of him.
When every mind in the empire has tasted the
relish of that diet of the gods which our consum-
mate poet has spread for the whole world, his
birthday will he worthily kept; and we may hasten
that time by the heartiness with which we are seen
by the young and the humble to honour and enjoy
this day.