ore
revenue than the cereals. This, at least, is what the official handbook
of the garden says. It may be that the famous "fever-plant" has lost
some of the faith accorded to it at first.

At the end of this great greenhouse there is a beautiful grotto where a
little brook loses itself playing hide-and-seek among the fronds of the
maiden-hair and other lovely ferns. At the right of this grotto is a
reading-room where visitors may find all the current periodicals--on the
left, the library of the society, rich in works upon agriculture,
_zootechnie_, natural history, travels, industrial and domestic economy,
etc., in several languages. The remarkable thing about this great
greenhouse is the ever-flourishing, ever-perfect condition of its
vegetation. Of course this effect must be secured by succursal
hothouses, not always open to visitors. No tree, no plant, ever appears
there in a sickly condition, but this may be said also of the animals in
the gardens. I shall not soon forget a great wire canary cage some
sixteen or more feet square, enclosing considerable shrubbery and scores
of birds. There I received my first notion of the natural brilliancy of
the plumage of these birds: its golden sheen literally dazzled the eyes.

The garden does excellent work for the French people besides furnishing
a popular school and an inimitable pleasure resort: it assures the
preservation of approved varieties of fruits, grains, animals. Whoever
questions the absolute purity of his stock, from a garden herb up to an
Arabian steed, can place this beyond question by substituting those
furnished by the Society of Acclimatation. Eggs of birds packed in its
garden have safely crossed the Atlantic, seventy-five per cent. hatching
on their arrival. So immensely has the business of the society increased
that more ground has had to be secured for nursery and seed-raising
purposes, and the whole vast Zoological Gardens of Marseilles have been
secured and turned into a "tender," as it were, to the Jardin
d'Acclimatation at Paris. This was a very important acquisition.
Marseilles, the great Mediterranean sea-port of France, is necessarily
the spot where treasures from Africa, Asia and the South Sea Islands
have to be landed, and they arrive often in a critical condition and
need rest and careful nursing before continuing their journey.

One of the functions of the garden is to restock parks with game when
the pheasants, hares, wild-boars, deer, etc.