O! Ginnee was a bony lasse, Which maks the world to woonder How ever it should com to passe That wee did part a sunder. The driven snow, the rose so rare, The glorious sunne above thee, Can not with my Ginnee compare, She was so wonderous lovely. Her merry lookes, her forhead high, Her hayre like golden-wyer, Her hand and foote, her lipe or eye, Would set a saint on fyre. And for to give Giunee her due, Thers no ill part about her; The turtle-dove's not half so true; Then whoe can live without her? King Solomon, where ere he lay, Did nere unbrace a kinder; O! why should Ginnee gang away, And I be left behind her? Then will I search each place and roome From London to Virginny, From Dover-peere to Scanderoone, But I will finde my Ginny. But Ginny's turned back I feare, When that I did not mind her; Then back to England will I steare, To see where I can find her. And haveing Ginnee once againe, If sheed doe her indeavour, The world shall never make us twaine— Weel live and dye together.

SONG BY KING CHARLES II

On the Duchess of Portsmouth leaving England

(For the Mirror.)

Bright was the morning, cool the air, Serene was all the skies; When on the waves I left my dear, The center of my joys; Heav'n and nature smiling were. And nothing sad but I. Each rosy field their odours spread, All fragrant was the shore; Each river God rose from his bed, And sighing own'd her pow'r; Curling the waves they deck'd their heads, As proud of what they bore. Glide on ye waves, bear these lines, And tell her my distress; Bear all these sighs, ye gentle winds, And waft them to her breast; Tell her if e'er she prove unkind, I never shall have rest.

The Anecdote Gallery

VOLTAIRE

(From various Authorities.)

The Chateau of Ferney, the celebrated residence of Voltaire, six miles from Geneva, is a place of very little picturesque beauty: its broad front is turned to the high road, without any regard to the prospect, and the garden is adorned with cut trees, parapet walls with flower-pots, jets d'eaux, &c. Voltaire's bed-room is shown in its pristine state, just as he left it in 1777, when, after a residence of twenty years, he went to Paris to enjoy a short triumph and die. Time and travellers have much impaired the furniture of light-blue silk, and the Austrians, quartered in the house during the late war, have not improved it; the bed-curtains especially, which for the last forty years have supplied each traveller with a precious little bit, hastily torn off, are of course in tatters. The bedstead is of common deal, coarsely put together; a miserable portrait of Le Kain, in crayons, hangs inside of the bed, and two others, equally bad, on each side, Frederic and Voltaire himself. Round the room are bad prints of Washington, Franklin, Sir Isaac Newton, and several other celebrated personages; the ante-chamber is decorated with naked figures, in bad taste; each of these rooms may be 12 feet by 15.

Such is the narrative of an intelligent traveller, who recently visited Ferney. "Very few," says he, "remain alive, of those who saw the poet: a gardener who conducted us about the grounds had that advantage; he showed us the place where the theatre stood, filling the space on the left-hand side in entering, between the chateau and the chapel, but the inscription on the last, Voltaire à Dieu, was removed during the reign of terror. The old gardener spoke favourably of his old master, who was, he said, bon homme tout-a-fait, bien charitable, and took an airing every morning in his coach and four."

In the sitting-room, adjoining the bedroom, which he was accustomed to occupy, besides some good ancient paintings, is a very singular picture, which was painted according to Voltaire's direction. The principal personages are Voltaire, holding in his hand a roll of paper inscribed La Henriade; next him is a female personification of this favourite poem, whom he is presenting to Apollo crowned with rays of glory; Louis XIV. with his queen and court, are observing these chief figures. In another part, the Muses are crowning the burst of Voltaire with wreaths of flowers, and proposing to place it with those of other immortal authors in the Temple of Fame. The bottom of the picture is occupied by his enemies, who are being torn to pieces by wild beasts, or burning in flames of fire.

In the bed-room is a marble cenotaph, on which is an urn that formerly contained the heart of Voltaire, which was removed several years ago, and placed in the church of Les Invalides at Paris. In this room also is an engraving of Voltaire's monument in the church-yard of Ferney. In this, four figures, representing the four quarters of the world, are preparing to honour his bust with wreaths of laurel and palms. Ignorance, meanwhile, with the wings of a fiend, armed with rods, is driving them away in the midst of their pacific employment, and extinguishing a lamp which burns above the tomb. It is a singular circumstance that Voltaire caused the church of Ferney to be built, as well as several houses in the village, and on an iron vane on the top of the former is inscribed, "Deo erexit Voltaire."

After his escape from the court of Frederic, Voltaire went first to Lausanne, were he resided some years, and where he fitted up a private theatre; his acquaintances there supplied him with performers, of whom it seems he was proud, and who acted for him Zaire, Alzira, and several other plays. Some spirited drawings of Huber represent him behind the scene teaching, scolding, encouraging the actors; you might have thought you heard his loud bravo! The part of Lusignan was frequently filled by the poet himself, who was so much taken with it as to be seen in the morning at the door of his house already dressed for the stage. Voltaire had a hollow wooden voice, and his declamation had more pomp in it than nature; yet in the part of Trissotin, in the Femmes Savantes, he performed very well.

From Lausanne, where he quarrelled with several persons, he went, in 1755, to St. Jean, close to Geneva, and gave to the house he occupied the name of Les Dèlices, which it retains to this day. Ferney, which he bought soon after, became his permanent residence for twenty years.

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The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 12, No. 324, July 26, 1828

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Retrospective Gleanings

SONNET

BY HENRY TEONOE, A SEA CHAPLAIN IN THE REIGN OF CHARLES II

SONG BY KING CHARLES II

On the Duchess of Portsmouth leaving England

The Anecdote Gallery

VOLTAIRE

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