emacs 23 - german characters - babel/rdictcc

[Hadron]

I can now type german characters just fine in emacs 23.

But when I invoke certain programs which talk to external processes such
as rdictcc, I get escaped characters back in the reply. e.g highlighting
"bridges" and invoking  rdictcc gives a buffer like:

,----
| DE-EN Translations:
| ===================
| 
| EN-DE Translations:
| ===================
| bridges:
|     - Brücken {pl}
|     - überbrückt
| Don't cross your bridges before you come to them.:
|     - Kümmere dich nicht um ungelegte Eier.
`----

Can anyone suggest to why this is?I am rather confused about emacs
localisation. I can type DE  chars  in the *scratch* buffer with no
problems.


-- 
I'd horsewhip you if I had a horse.
                -- Groucho Marx