4114 The Zoologist — August, 1874. 



declined to afford us any information without being paid for it, 

 a proposition to which we were not disposed to accede; but from 

 the size and elaborate character of the building, it is evident that 

 the capital is large.* Assuming that an}' proposition for the founda- 

 tion of an aquarium in Birmingham must be of a much more modest 

 character, we find that the only existing institutions of the kind, the 

 financial bases of which we need examine, are those of Paris, Ham- 

 burg and Sydenham, and it is important to observe that these differ 

 essentially from the English establishments which we have men- 

 tioned above (except posaibly that of Manchester) in being truly 

 genuine aquariums, standing or falling on their zoological merits 

 alone, instead of being mere adjuncts to a musical lounge, as at 

 Brighton; or depending for success upon rental of restaurants, 

 croquet-lawns, billiard-rooms, American bowling-alleys, ozone- 

 baths, &c., as at Great Yarmouth and Ramsgate ; or upon " an 

 almost daily succession of concerts and light entertainments," and 

 " bijou shops for articles de luxe," which will be, as we learn from the 

 prospectus, sources of revenue at Liverpool. For this reason the 

 analysis of the financial elements of these three aquaria deserves our 

 special attention. We find, then, that the aquarium of the Jardin 

 d'Acclimatation is an integral part of the " Compagnie du Jardin 

 Zoologique ;" that the shares (the number of which is unfortunately 

 not staled) are of 250 francs, all paid up ; that their present market 

 value is 125 francs, and that no dividend has been paid since its 

 establishment in 1862. The average attendance is 450,000 annually, 

 but the entrance fee to the Jardin d'Acclimatation includes also 

 admission to the Aquarium. The cost of buildings and tanks was 

 100,000 francs (£4,166), and the tanks are fourteen in number, 

 each containing about one cubic metre. The Hamburg Aquarium 

 was opened in 1864, and had the immense advantage of the early 

 popularity of the recently established gardens in which it is 

 situated ; the still greater one of being under the management of 

 Mr. W. A. Lloyd, whose zeal and self-sacrifice reduced the total 

 current expenditure to £600 per annum on a capital of £3000. As 

 a consequence, capital and profits balanced each other in six years. 

 But this was accomplished through a fortunate combination of 

 exceptionally favourable circumstances; for, as Mr. Lloyd himself 



* I have since received from Manchester a statement of the exact cost of the 

 aquarium there, namely ill, 971 : the opening of this institution is described as 

 eminently successful. — E. N. 



