M. de Voltaire has just terminated his long career amid the honours paid to him by Parisian enthusiasm. He was crowned at the Theatre Français, at the close of the representation of his Irene, a tragedy which savours strongly of the chilled age when he wrote it. On quitting the theatre, he was surrounded by the minor poets, who demanded, on their knees, the honour of kissing his hands. This excess of enthusiasm, which was very ridiculous, became still more absurd on his reaching the house of Mr Franklin, who fell on his knees, and asked a blessing of him for his young nephew. The excruciating pains felt by M. de Voltaire led him to ask remedy of his friend M. D. Richelieu, who laboured under the same complaint. The latter sent him opium, the remedy to which he had himself had recourse; and by its abuse he was poisoned. In his latest moments, he expressed a wish to consult M. Tronchin, of whom, however, he did not entertain the most favourable opinion, and treated him as a quack, his art as imposture, &c. Exasperated at these insults, M. Tronchin told him, with much gravity, that, at the most, he had not more than two hours to live, and that therefore it behoved him to see to his affairs. On this observation he was desired to withdraw.

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M. de Voltaire now raised himself on his bed, with the help of his nurse and of his notary. The latter having handled him somewhat roughly, received a cuff, the force of which led him to enter his protest against the prognostic of the doctor. As soon as he was recovered from the disorder into which the awkwardness of the notary had thrown him, he said to himself, "At length I am to die.Be it so; but let my end be conformable to my life. It is more than probable that my body will be deposited in the Chantier (timber-yard) of Maurapas, where the ashes of La Couvreur repose. Forty years ago she would not permit me to sleep with her, but she will now be constrained

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to endure me at her side." He was not allowed to be interred in Paris; and the church in which he was buried at Troyes en Champagne, has been interdicted. His punishment was well merited by him, seeing that he protested, until his latest hour, against the divinity of Jesus Christ. He even composed the following epigram, if it may be so named, against religion, and repeated it to his friends, when the agonies of death were fast approaching.

Adicu, mes amis,
Adieu, la compagnie,
Dans une heure d'ici,
Mon ame, anéantie,

Sera ce qu'elle était une heure avant ma vie.

I have not heard that he has as yet had an epitaph bestowed on him, unless the ines which have been handed about, and which are quite in the epigrammatic style, are to be considered as such. De Voltaire admirez la bizarre planette : Il naquit chez Ninon, et mourut chez Villette,

The latter is a young Swiss lady, of whom he was greatly enamoured, and whom he had married to M. de Villette.*

Jean Jacques Rousseau has rendered his end singularly interesting by the memoirs of his life, in which he has made an exact avowal of all his actions. These memoirs are comprised in an octavo volume, which sells at a most extravagant price. It is even said that copies have been purchased at as high a rate as eighty livres, (more than three guineas,) and from that to twenty-five. The dearness of the book arises from the vigilance of the police, and from its interest-for M. Rousseau has developed in it the intrigue of his novel. It is as follows: His Julie is Mademoiselle de Montmorency, married to a French nobleman, whose name I have not been able to learn, and whom he styles Madame Wolmar. This unfortunate female has been long dead; and it is said by several persons who were acquainted with Rousseau, that from that time he became unsocial and mis

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anthropic. He acknowledges that he had carried on, during three months, an illicit intercourse with Madame de Montmorency, the mother of his Julie; and that this lady, conceiving herself to be the only object of his homage, had confided to him the education of her daughter, whom he seduced: That a nobleman had demanded her in marriage-and that he, Rousseau, having had satisfactory proofs of the probity of this nobleman, had beseeched him not to entail misery on the young lady and on himself. To this he consented, and retired to his country seat. This personage is his Milord Edouard. That the Viscount de Montmorency, who is still living,* on his return from the war in Hanover, having perceived that intrigues were carrying on under his roof, dismissed M. Rousseau, and married his daughter to the nobleman known by the name of WolHe also says, that having become desperately enamoured of Madame de Montmorency's female attendant, his passion carried him to such a length as to instigate him to steal a gold trinket belonging to her mistress, with a view to criminate her: That having thrown out suspicions against this unfortunate girl, he caused her to be sent to prison, to the end that, as her deliverer, he might acquire certain rights over her person; and that, if she had not yielded to his passion, he would have had the courage to see her hanged, and to despatch himself afterwards with a poignard: That being in extreme distress, a doctor of the Sorbonne, whom he names, proposed to him to write against religion. This offer he accepted, and took care to fulfil his engagement. He names a dozen women of quality, still living, from whom he received favours, at times and under circumstances, which carry with them a great air of probability. His mistress is the daughter of M. le Vasseur, a director of imposts at Dijon. By his persuasives she was led to elope with him. Having brought together, at a dinner party, Messrs Diderot, d'Alembert, and

VOL. VII.

others, he presented to them this female, saying, " I call God and my friends to witness that I acknowledge no other wife beside Mademoiselle le Vasseur." By this woman he had four children, three of whom are, agreeably to his testimony, in the foundling hospital. With the destiny of the other he professes to be unacquainted.

(Here is introduced an extract from the preface to "THE CONFESSIONS," already before the public. What follows, as referring to the manner of Rousseau's death, is not so well known. A loose hint is thrown out by Madame de Staël, in her memoirs of this extraordinary character, that a suspicion was entertained of his having been taken off by poison. The particulars are these.)

The mausoleum of Jean Jacques Rousseau is at Ermenonville, where he died, in the house of his friend the Marquis de Girardin. The cause of his death has been disguised, by ascribing it to an attack of apoplexy. He died of poison, because his memoirs had appeared before the time he had prescribed; and it was the infidelity of his mistress, who had stolen them from him, which led him to have recourse to poison. He is buried in a small island formed by a lake, in the centre of a sombre group of trees, in which he took particular delight. On one side of his tomb, which is a square of six feet, surmounted by a cornucopia, M. Girardin has inscribed the following lines. Ici, sous ces ombres paisibles, Pour les restes de Jean Jacques Rousseau, L'amitié posa ce tombeau : Mais c'est dans tous les cœurs sensibles Que cet homme divin, qui fut tout sentiment, Doit trouver du respect l'eternal monument.

The other side of the tomb has a musical trophy for his operatic piece, "LE DEVIN DE VILLAGE." Behind is a woman in tears, giving her breast to an infant, who holds in his hands "L'EMILE." The third side represents two doves billing, as an emblem of the "NOUVELLE HELOISE."