Some time since, you figured two specimens of these from a work brought home by Mr. Mosely. It so happens that I have a Japanese pupil attending my lectures, and who has been a frequent visitor at my house for the last five years. With the help of this gentleman - Mr. Nagai - I have inspected two of the volumes which Mr. Mosely has been so good as to send me. These books were described as a "Treatise on Miniature Gardens," but they are descriptive of aquaria which are introduced from China. According to Mr. Nagai, the Japanese (at least at this time) are inferior in their art to the Chinese. Pekin is to the Japanese what Paris is to the Germans, and, indeed, to the other nations of Europe. As we look to Paris for the height of good taste and fashion, so the ladies of Japan dress themselves after the fashion of the Chinese nobility.

These Japanese aquaria differ from ours in many particulars. Ours are for the most part formed of curiously-shaped limestone or slag under water, or with only the upper part above the surface, and they are placed under a glass frame or in a large glass jar; but in Japan a hard stone in rock-form is used and placed in an earthen vessel full of sand. We use delicate water plants, lizards, molluses, etc., which live in the water, while other people plant gay leaves, Begonias, etc., on the top of the rock above water. The Japanese use, as already said, dry rocks; on the sand around the rocks lie cleverly made boats, as the sand is intended to represent water. The miniature plants which are placed in various parts of the rocks are planted by the Japanese very skilfully. Many Conifers, especially Sciadopitys verti-cillata, Pinus Massoniana, and certain Thujas, play a prominent part. The rocks, which are scarcely 1 - 1 1/2 foot high, are often like large barren rocks, for they are generally formed according to one regular rule, pierced with holes, and filled up with water, as if they were mountain lakes. In the large aquaria rocks are used, and water also flows at their feet, as the rocks represent islands.

Little ships sail on the water, and various tall plants, such as Bamboos, Palms, and the like, or small plants are planted at the water's edge. Sometimes the rock is' done away with, and an old rugged tree, often a Conifer, occupies most of the space, or the aquarium represents a whole landscape, with rocks, trees, and little houses. The rock may also represent a landscape, with houses and little villages placed at the foot or at a certain height on it, and planted with groves or single large trees. It will also be understood that, all things being on a small scale, little figures of men are also used. A great variety is to be seen on these rockworks, as the form of natural rocks is exactly imitated. As we recognize in nature the form of the rocks, so also is it in these clever miniatures. The various limestones, slates, stones are easily recognized as tufa, stalactites, and rocks full of water.

In the beginning of one of these books I find a plate with Chinese in various attitudes, stags, etc, to be imitated in clay. This shows that not only the Japanese, but the Chinese, are reproduced in these aquariums. The next plate gives various designs of buildings and temples, bridges with men on them, boats and ships in the distance. These also are Chinese, not Japanese, so that the Chinese origin may be easily observed.

Finally, 1 must state that I have given the name of aquaria to these rockworks, only in consequence of the custom of placing them in rooms; they are not aquaria, according to the generally recognized sense of the word. The Japanese term is untranslatable, the nearest approach to it is "miniature rock gardens for rooms." They arc just at ent so much the fashion in Japan that they are to be found in the dwellings even of the poorest classes. - Karl Koch, Berlin, in Gar. Chronicle.