REMAUKS ON THE ARTIFICIAL LAKES OF THE CHINESE. 



281 



the nursery line, profiting by these hints, will raise these plants in such 

 quantity as to enable all who take an interest in fine plants to possess 

 themselves of ones so very desirable. 



REMARKS ON THE ARTIFICIAL LAKES IN THE PLEA 

 SURE GARDENS OF THE CHINESE. 

 BY A rouR years' resident in china. 

 I HWE been pleased to observe remarks in late Numbers of this 

 Maoazine upon the flowers and gardens of China ; and as nothing has 

 appeared of a very interesting feature in their gardening ornaments, I 

 send some particulars of the artificial lakes they construct with admi- 



Tciblc cficct. 



Some of these are very small, sufficient only to contain one or two 

 weepino- willows, birch, larch, laburnum, or some other pendant plants, 

 whose branches hang over the water ; but others are large, iughly 

 cultivated, and enriched with lawns, shrubberies, thickets, and build- 

 inn^s : or they are rugged, mountainous, and surrounded with rocks 

 and shoals being covered with fern, high grass, and some straggling 

 large trees, planted in the valleys; amongst which are often seen 

 stalking along the elephant, tlie tin hyung or man-bear, the rhino- 

 ceros, the dromedary, the ostrich, and the sin-sin or black giant 



baboon. , • , . , 



Tiiere are other islands, raised to a considerable heigiit, by a suc- 

 cession of terraces, communicating with each other by various flights 

 of magnificent steps. At the angles of all these terraces, as well as 

 upon the sides of the steps, are placed many brazen tripods, that smoke 

 with incense ; and upon the uppermost platform is generally erected a 

 lofty tower for astronomical observations ; an elegant temple, hned 

 with idols, the colossal statue of a god, or some other consiilerable 

 work : serving, at the same time, as an ornament to the garden, and as 

 an object to the whole country. , -i^ ^ 



Tli'ey also introduce in their lakes large artificial rocks, built ot a 

 particular fine coloured stone, found on the sea-coast of China, and 

 designed with much taste. These are pierced with many openings, 

 through which you discover distant prospects: they have in them 

 caverns for the reception of tortoises, crocodiles, enormous water- 

 serpents, and other monsters; with cages for rare aquatic birds ; and 

 grottos, divided into many shining apartments, adorned with marine 

 productions, and gems of various sorts. They plant upon tliese rocks 

 all kinds of grass, creepers, and shrubs, which thrive m such situations, 

 as moss, ground-ivy, fern, stone-crop, common house-leek, and various 

 other sorts of the seduin, crane's-bill, dwarf box, rock roses, and 

 broom ; with some trees rooted into the crevices ; and they place on 

 their summits, hermitages and idol temples, to which you ascend, by 

 many rugged, winding steps, cut in tlie rock. _ 



But far tlie most extraordinary, as well as the most pleasing of their 

 aquatic constructions, are the Iloei-ta, or submerged habitations, con- 



Vol. XV. No. U.— iV.i'. ^ 



