The Sun.
London, England, 1866-08-07 00:00:00

—viz., when commenting upon the Chevalier's
successive and successful versions in French now
of " Macbeth," now of " Hamlet." Following
up those two really surprising adventures of
his with another quite as remarkable in its
way, this most indefatigable of all poetic trans-
lators from English into French, has now given us
a companion version of a tragedy of Shakspere's
much more readily harmonizing with the words, the
fashion, the manner of the rhyming couplet of the
French Drama than either the Scotch tragedy of
Macbeth, or the Danish tragedy of Hamlet--that
grand and classic tragedy, namely, of Julius CEesar,
the scheme of which might (had not such a
notion been confuted absolutely by the original)
have seemed far more suited intrinsically to the
genius of Corneille than to that of Shakspere.
Everything considered, however, we cannot but
eagerly accept each of these two most recent efforts
at the translation of Shakspere into French, for
what it is worth. Doing otherwise, we should be at
once ungracious and ungrateful—in the one instance
to a youthful and adventurous, in the other to a
veteran and most industrious man-of-letters, both
of them sojourning here in exile amongst us.
The former, meaning M. Francois-Victor Hugo,
on one of those Channel Islands, which his
illustrious father's genius is fast rendering
classic ground by the splendour of its later
manifestations. The latter, meaning, of course,
the Chevalier de Chatelain, in one of our London
suburbs, where he has for years been interpreting
the Poets of :England, the least as well as the
grandest amongst them, to those among his own
lettered countrymen who can only enjoy the luxury of
reading them through the medium of his many
elegant translations. Curiously enough, by-the-
way, there is a kindred error of judgment evi-
denced, here by M. Francois-Victor Hugo, here, in
his turn, by the Chevalier de Chatelain, in the
issue from the press of these their Shaksperian
Translations. And it is an error of judgment in
each instance so flagrant in its way, as—we cannot
call it by any milder term—a desecration
of the very shrine each of them is bent
upon honouring, that we cannot but protest
against it, in the homage to the memory of Shak-
spere, even, let us say, in the interests at once
of high art and of literature. Upon the very
pediment, as it were, of a monument to Shakspere,
for example, M. Francois-Victor Hugo has (in a
manner, to our thinking, wonderfully out of place)
inscribed the words " A Guiseppe Garibaldi."
Prefixed to his translation into French of Shak-
spere's Julius Caesar, the Chevalier de Cfiatelain,
with a yet more daring violation of
good taste, as it appears to us, has
written a " Dedicate," addressed, we give his own
words, "A Mes Compatriotes Les Francais de
l'An de Disgrace, 1866." One syllable of comment
upon this would, surely, be superfluous. It is the
scrawl of Pasquin's pencil upon the pedestal of a
glorious national and historical monument.. We
regret it, in each instance—nay, more, we reprobate
it as an indecorum outraging—nothing less than
outraging—the majesty of the genius and the
memory of Shakspere.

LATEST INTELLIGENCE.

(REUTER'S TELEGRAMS.)

RUSSIA.
ST. PRTERSBURG, Aug. 6.

Great enthusiasm prevails in reference to the
approaching visit of the American squadron. The
Russian fleet has gone to Helsingfors to meet it.
The principal bankers of this city have subscribed
fifty millions of francs for completing the railway
from Kozlov to Morschansk.

The cholera has considerably diminished.
ST. PETERSBURG, Aug. 7.

The South German States have renewed their
endeavours to obtain the intervention of Russia at
the Court of Berlin, but the Imperial Governnient
has not hitherto made any engagement to that
effect.

The old Russian party is very active in the
defence of Russian interests in the Danubian Prin-

cipalities.
The Czarewitch will set out at the end of the
week on a visit to Moscow, Novgorod, Kazan, the
Cossack territory, and other parts of Russia.

PRUSSIA AND SAXONY.

DRESDEN, Aug. 7

The Dresden Journal of to-day says :—" Nothing
is known in well-informed quarters respecting any
intention on the part of Prussia to impose contri-
butiois upon Saxon towns as, as alleged by several
German papers."

The same journal announces that special negocia-
tions for peace are about to be opened between
Prussia and Saxony.