FOREIGN LITERATURE.

FOR the substance of the following notices we are indebted to the intelligent and interesting pages of the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 5, which was published this morning.

English poetry is in high favour in Russia; and translations of the minor poems of Byron, Moore, Southey, &c. are constantly appearing there.

The poet Pushkin has received 3000 roubles for one of his compositions, consisting of six hundred verses-: this is at the rate of five roubles a line— pretty good pay for poetry in St. Petersburgh. The rage for literary Almanacks, or " Annuals," has penetrated to Moscow. The author of a Review of Russian Literature for 1827, in the Moscow Mes- senger, complains that these Annuals divert the attention of literary people from more important studies.

The University of Abo has been transferred to Helsingsfors, the chief town of Finland. It is to bear the name of "Alexander," in honour of the late Emperor.

By the Russian law of copyright, promulgated in June last in the Gazette of St. Petersburgh, every author or translator has the exclusive copy-right of his work during his life-time, and his heirs enjoy the same privilege for

twenty-five years after his death ; after which it becomes common property, and every person is at liberty to print, publish, and sell it, without molesta-

tion. No printed or manuscript work belonging to an author can be sold for the

payment of his debts. Dramatic works are divided into five classes,—the first class including original tragedies or comedies in five or in four acts' and in verse;

and the musical compositions of grand operas ; and the fifth, or lowest, trans- lations of minor pieces in prose, and of vaudevilles in one act. The authors of such works accepted, shall receive, during their whole lives, the following shares of the receipts of the Imperial theatres of the two capitals on the days when their pieces are performed--for a piece of the first class, one tenth ; second class, one fifteenth ; third class, one twentieth ; fourth class, one thir- tieth. The shares to be calculated on two thirds of the gross receipts. By mutual consent of the authors and the superior board of administration of the theatres, the pieces may be purchased for a sum paid down, but of which the maximum is fixed never to exceed, for the first class,4000 roubles (about 160 guineas) ; for the second class, 2500 (100 guineas) ; for the third class 2000 (80 guineas) ; for the fourth class, 1000 (40 guineas) ; and for the fifth class, 500 (20 guineas).

A tragedy, entitled La Pistale, has been acted at Rome witn extraordi- nary success as to alarm the ecclesiastical police ; the performance was for- bidden ; and the Cardinal-vicar, Zurla, who had sanctioned its appearance, has been censured for permitting it. What seemed particularly to excite the wrath of the inquisitors, were some passages on the Pagan priests, which the public seemed to apply to the Catholic clergy. The author, M. Sterbini, was not allowed to print it at Rome. Some time after, he read, at the Academia Tiberina, an Ode on the Battle of Navarino, in which supplica- tions were offered up for the deliverance of Greece, and high eulogiums be- stowed on the allied Sovereigns who have the charge of this generous enter- prise. This manifestation of philanthropic enthusiasm was deemed an un- pardonable crime by the Papal Government; which accordingly banished the author from Rome, and confined him with his family in a small country- house in the environs.

From a general table at the end of M. Soulier's " Statistique des Eglises Reformees de France," we collect, that for the Refcrmed Churches in France, there are ninety-six consistories or oratories ; three hundred and five pastors or ministers ; four hundred and thirty-eight edifices consecrated to divine wor- ship; four hundred and fifty-one Bible societies or associations ; one hundred and twenty-four missionary societies or associations ; fifty-nine societies or de- positories of religious tracts ; eight provident societies ; seventy-nine Sunday schools, and three hundred and ninety-two elementary and boarding schools. Prosperous as these data represent the state of the Reformed Churches to be, the number of churches and ministers is by no means equal to the wants of the Protestant population. In many places they are obliged to assemble for divine service in sheep-folds, barns, or even in the open air. In the single department of the Gard, there are upwards of fifty places where this is the case : in the commune of Monoblet, in particular, there is no church, al- though out of a population of 1040 persons there are nine hundred and fifty Protestants. In many places, also, one minister has the charge of several churches, which are frequently at a considerable distance from one another, so that divine service can only be performed in each at distant intervals.

Don Andres Muriel, one of the highly-gifted exiles from Spain, has, in the French translation of Archdeacon Coxe's " Memoirs of the Spanish Kings of the House of Bourbon," added very considerably to the value of that work by numerous notes, corrections of the author's errors, and by a whole volume of additional matter relating to the reign of Charles III. There is, in particular, a remarkable historical document, which Don A. Muriel has first published entire, a memorial of Count d'Aranda, the Spanish minister at Paris, ad- dressed to his own Sovereign immediately after putting his signature to the treaty of Paris in 1783, which reconized the independence of the revolted English colonies. Count d'Aranda, after anticipating in the most sagacious and prophetic spirit the inevitable results to his country from the impolitic step into which she had been dragged by France of favouring this revolt, proposed for immediate adoption, a plan for obviating the loss of her colonies, with which Spain was threatened. "Your Majesty (says the minister) ought to give up all your possessions on the continent of the two Americas,

retaining only the islands of Cuba and Porto Rico. In order to accom- plish this great idea in a manner suitable to Spain, three infants must be

established ip Atonal, one as King of Mexico, the second as King of Peru,

and the third as King of Terra Firma. Your Majesty will take the title of Emperor. The conditions of this great cession might be, that the three new kings and their successors should acknowledge your Majesty, and the princes who shall fill the Spanish throne after you, for the supreme heads of the family. That the King of Mexico should pay every year, as an acknow- ledgment fordhe cession of that kingdom, a contribution in silver of-- The King of Peru to do the same for his possessions. The King of Terra Firma should send annually his contribution in colonnial produce, especially in tobacco, to supply the entrepOts in the kingdom."

Goethe, in the last number of his periodical work, expresses himself ex- ceedingly gratified with Mr. Moir's translation of Schiller's " 1Vallenstein " into the language of Shakspeare. The peculiar pleasure which an author, especially a poet, experiences from the skilful resuscitation of his works by an adequate translator, is illustrated by the venerable critic in some verses, of which the following is an humble attempt to convey the sense to the English reader.

" A meadow-garland once I sought, And home with me rejoicing brought : Within my hand too closely prest, Droop'd every flower its budding crest; But in a liquid goblet rear'd, What scene of wonder soon appear'd I The buds their pristine bloom disclose,— E ach stem in lovely verdure glows,— And all as fair and sweetly smile As when they graced their native soil. Such change and charm came over me, My songs in foreign tongues to see."