(Fr. Genève, Ger. Genf; Ital. Ginevra), the most populous and industrious city of Switzerland, capital of the canton of the same name, stands on the Rhone, at the western extremity of the Lake of Geneva, in Lat. 46° 12' N., Long. 6° 9' 30" E. It is divided into three portions by the river, part being on an island and part on either bank. The largest portion stands on the left bank of the river, and is built partly on an eminence rising to nearly 100 feet above the level of the lake. It consists almost entirely of the large and handsome mansions of the burgher aristocracy. On the right bank is the Quartier St Gervais, or lower town, the seat of the trade and commerce. The streets are here narrow and the houses lofty, something in the style of the old town of Edinburgh. The island is upwards of a furlong in length by about 200 feet in breadth, and is connected with the other portions of the town by several bridges. Geneva has been much improved within the last quarter of a century. An entirely new quarter has started up on the right bank of the Rhone, called Quartier des Bergues, displaying a handsome front of tall houses, among which is the Hôtel des Bergues, and lined with a broad quay towards the lake. On the opposite bank the unsightly houses that lined the margin of the lake have been repaired and beautified, and a broad belt of land has been gained from the water and formed into a quay. This is connected with the Quai des Bergues by means of two bridges thrown across the river, and united with a small island planted with trees, and containing a bronze statue of Rousseau. Geneva is surrounded landward by ramparts and bastions, erected in the middle of the last century, but of little use as fortifications, the city being commanded by some adjacent heights. The principal public building is the cathedral or church of St Pierre, an interesting specimen of Gothic architecture of the eleventh century. Its effect, however, has been injured by the addition of a fine Corinthian portico. This church contains monuments of Agrippa d'Aubigny, the friend of Henri IV., and of the Count Henri de Rohan, a leader of the French revolution in the reign of Louis XIII. The town-hall is an old and massive-looking building. The Musée Rath, so named from its founder General Rath, is a neat edifice, containing a collection of paintings and other works of art, chiefly by native artists. The museum of natural history contains principally native productions of Switzerland, and is chiefly interesting as having the geological collections of Saussure, Brongniart, and Decandolle, and the collections of M. Necker. The house in which Calvin is said to have lived and died is still pointed out in the Rue des Chanoines, and also the house in which J. J. Rousseau was born. The general hospital is an extensive and spacious building. The academy or university founded by Calvin has faculties of theology, law, science, and belles-lettres, and forty professors. The public library attached to it contains about 50,000 volumes, including many valuable MSS. Geneva has numerous literary and scientific societies, an observatory, botanic garden, lunatic and deaf-mute asylums, and other charitable institutions. The town is supplied with water from the Rhone by means of a hydraulic machine. The chief manufactures of Geneva are watches and jewellery: about 100,000 watches, chiefly gold, are made annually, employing about 3000 workmen. Its other industrial products are musical boxes, chronometers, mathematical and musical instruments, cutlery, fire-arms, &c. It also carries on an active transit trade by means of steamers with the various towns on the lake. Geneva was in the time of Caesar one of the chief towns of the Allobroges, and it continued subject to the Romans till the beginning of the fifth century, when it was taken by the Burgundians, and made their capital. Towards the end of the fifth century it became the seat of a bishop; and in 534 came into the possession of the Franks. Charlemagne conferred upon it certain important privileges, subordinate however to the bishop, who was styled Prince of Geneva, and was an immediate feudatory of the empire. It afterwards came to form a part of the second kingdom of Burgundy; on the fall of which it became entirely subject to its bishops, between whom and the counts of Genevois in Savoy there existed incessant contests for its possession. The line of the counts of Genevois becoming extinct in the fourteenth century, their inheritance reverted to the house of Savoy, and hence are derived the claims of the dukes of Savoy over Geneva; claims, however, never completely enforced. At the Reformation the bishop was expelled, and the town, with its territory, became an independent republic. Calvin was in 1536 induced to settle here, and was soon afterwards raised to the highest rank in the state; and Geneva became the metropolis of Protestantism. The dukes of Savoy made several fruitless attempts to possess Geneva by force or by fraud; but, in 1603, by the mediation of Berne, Zurich, and Henri IV. of France, acknowledged its independence. In the eighteenth century the peace of the town was frequently disturbed by internal feuds. In 1798 it was taken by the French revolutionary forces, and became the capital of the department of Leman. In 1814 it was restored by the allied powers to its independence as a canton of the Swiss Confederation. Among the many eminent men that Geneva has produced may be mentioned Isaac Casaubon, Rousseau, Lefort the friend of Peter the Great, Necker the father of Madame de Staël, the naturalists Saussure, Bonnet, and De Luc, Decandolle, Huber, Dumont, the friend and editor of some of the works of Jeremy Bentham, and Sionandi the historian. In the beginning of the fifteenth century Geneva contained about 10,000 inhabitants, and in 1550 they had increased to about 20,000. In 1715 they numbered only 18,500, but in 1789 they had risen to 26,140. In 1830 the population was 27,000, and in 1850 31,238. The Canton of Geneva is, with the exception of Zug, the smallest of the Swiss Cantons, having an area of only 91 English square miles. It is bounded on the N. by the Canton of Vaud and the Lake of Geneva, E. and S. by Savoy, and W. by France. More than one-fourth of the canton is arable, about one-fifth is meadow land, one-tenth in wood, and one-twentieth in vineyards. The agricultural products of the canton are not equal to the wants of the inhabitants, so that considerable quantities are imported. The language of the city and canton is the French. Pop. of the canton (1850) 63,932, of whom 34,212 were Protestants and 29,764 Roman Catholics.

Lake of. See SWITZERLAND.

a town in Ontario county, state of New York, North America, beautifully situated at the north end of Seneca Lake, on the Auburn and Rochester railway, 50 miles E.S.E. of Rochester. It is handsomely built, and has several fine churches and a medical college. Steamboats ply daily between it and Jefferson at the head of the lake. Pop. 6000. There are several other towns and villages of this name in the United States.

or Gin, a malt spirit, distilled a second time, with the addition of juniper berries. The name geneva is a corruption of the French genièvre, a juniper berry. The method of making this kind of spirit is described under Distillation, vol. viii. p. 51.