M. Alfred Villefort has published at Paris a treatise on literary and artistic property in an international point of view. It not only discusses the question as a matter of principle, but gives the history of the negotiations and treaties which France has made in that respect with the nations.
Among the pleasant books recently published in France is Arsene Houssaye's volume of stories, Les Filles d'Eve, very piquant and French in its treatment. A translation is announced in this city by Redfield.
The literary event of the month at Paris is the publication of the third volume of Louis Blanc's History of the French Revolution. Of all the works written upon that memorable epoch, none is more marked by originality of thought and power of treatment than this, and we can only hope that the present volume, which we have not yet seen, may prove equal to its predecessors. Its table of contents is as follows: Attitude of Property toward the Revolution, Attitude of the Gospel toward the Revolution, Tableau of the Constituent Assembly, First Labors of the Constituent Assembly, Administration of Necker, People Starving, Treasury Empty, A New Power, Journalism, Faction of the Count de Provence, The Fifteen Complots, The Women of Versailles, The King brought to Paris, The Court at the Tuileries, Municipal and Military Organization of the Bourgeoisie, The Wealth of the Clergy Denounced, War of the Bourgeoisie on the Clergy, The Authority of the Parliaments Discussed, War of the Bourgeoisie on the Parliaments, The Ambition of Mirabeau, Complots of the Luxembourg, New Organization of the Kingdom. The Leader mentions that Mr. Blanc undertakes to prove that Egalité was not at the bottom of those conspiracies with which his name has been associated, but that the real culprit was the Comte de Provence, afterwards Louis XVIII.
M. Edmond Texier, one of the most fresh and agreeable of that race of literary butterflies, the feuilletonists of Paris, is publishing a large work upon that great capital, which promises to be as readable as its exterior is splendid. It is to be ornamented with some two thousand engravings on wood, representing all the prominent and famous public edifices and places which not only figure so largely in history, but are so splendid in themselves. The title of M. Texier's work is the Tableau de Paris. It appears in parts.
The publication of the magnificent work, the Catacombs de Rome, for which the French National Assembly voted $40,000, will shortly commence, under the direction of a commission nominated by the Government, consisting of Messrs. Ampere (now in the United States), Ingres, Prosper, Merinice, and Vitel, all members of the Institute. The work will contain exact copies of the architecture, mural paintings, inscriptions, figures, symbols, sepulchres, lamps, vases, rings, instruments, in a word, of every thing belonging to, or connected with, the primitive Christians, which by the most diligent search, exercised during many years, have been brought to light in the catacombs of ancient Rome. Its enormous price, between $250 and $300, will, however, keep it out of the hands of all but the wealthy. Another work on the same subject and of similar character is announced in Rome, under the direction of the ecclesiastical government.