in their manufactories. The camphor tree is of great value here, and lives to a great age. Siebold visited one which Kampfor described as having been seen by him 135 years before. It was healthy and covered with foliage, and had a circumference of fifty feet. The country people make the camphor from a decoction of the root and stems, cut into small pieces. Chestnut and walnut trees are both found. Among the fruit trees are the orange, lemon, fig, plum, apple, cherry and apricot.

(Homans.)

As agriculturists the Japanese are fully equal to the Chinese; in fact, using all the methods of irrigation, rotation of crops, the use of manures, so much in vogue in the older country. They are experts in the handling of the silk-worm, turning its cocoon into all the forms of valuable silk; while in the growth and cultivation of the tea-plant they are unsurpassed.

INHABITANTS.

They are far advanced in horticulture as well, and far ahead of other nations in their methods of urging on or retarding the growth of plants. Thus the Camellia Japonica may be seen from a very diminutive growth to a tree forty feet in height, while the pine, cedar, and fruit, are represented in trees of mature growth, from two inches in height up to the natural growth common in other countries.

The Japanese are bold and daring mariners, and the only race in these regions who pursue the whale. They make many voyages to Kamptchatka and the Aleutian isles, making light of heat and cold, or hardships of any kind. It has only been through the re

straint placed upon them by the severest of laws, that has prevented these people from being known to the maritime world centuries ago, and taking their place amongst the most enterprising and boldest of navigators.

The many bays and inlets indenting the island shores, swarm with shoals of fish, and they, with the lakes and rivers, are covered by aquatic birds, affording an easy living to the poorer classes. Pearls of great value abound along the shores; while the shell, much valued here, is worked up in a thousand ways as ornaments and inlaid work.

The people are an active, vigorous race, and very intelligent; and although shut up for so many centuries, isolated from the outer world, they are kind and hospitable to strangers, carrying their courtesy and politeness to the greatest extreme. Since the American treaty in 1854 they have steadily improved in shipping and manufactures, freely admitting all our arts of peace and war to be introduced among them. At the present time, young Japanese of the better classes are to be found traveling in all parts of the world or attending the colleges and academies of the most advanced nations, diligently and intelligently seeking all that may advance or benefit their native land.

TEA PLANT.

A brief description of the tea plant, so assiduously and profitably cultivated by the Asiatic races, may interest the general reader.

The tea plant (Thea Sinensis), in a wild state, is a bushy shrub, often reaching to the dignity of a tree in size and foliage. In the cultivated state, in China

and Japan, the plants are held back, being pruned down and not allowed to grow higher than three to five feet. Botanists of to-day rank it as Cammellia Thea genus, same as the Cammellia Japonica; also bearing a close resemblance to the Cammellia Sasanqua, introduced in Europe and America from China in 1811.

The plant resembles the japonica somewhat in its buds and flowers, the leaves differing in being longer, narrower and less shiny. It is an evergreen, and affords from three to four crops a year, the second picking being considered the best. The leaves are picked altogether by hand, when they are conveyed to drying floors, the green varieties being dried on copper plates over slow fires, which results (not, however, without the assistance of being rolled between the hands of the laborers) in the closely-curled form found in nearly all teas. It has been stated that the green variety owes its color to the chemical action of the copper on the leaves. This is erroneous, as the black varieties are picked from the same plant, and receive their color from being allowed to go through a slow fermenting process, which changes the leaves of the same plant from green to black. From the dry-houses the tea is packed in lead-lined cases, or put up in paper packages, as we see it in the markets of the world.

Tea was first discovered in China, growing in a wild state, in the eighth century. In the fourteenth year of the reign of the Emperor Te-Tsong, corresponding to the year 783 of our era, we find an impost levied on tea. Japanese writers state that the plant was first brought to their country from China in the ninth century.

Of Europeans, the Portuguese were probably the first to discover its uses-in 1517. An Englishman—

one of the officers of the East India Company-speaks of it in a letter to his company in 1615.

In the years 1870, '71, '72 and '73, the imports of tea into Great Britain were about sixty thousand tons per annum, valued at about $55,000,000.

Into the United States, in 1871, '72, '73 and '74, the imports of tea were about 27,500 tons per annum, of an annual value of about $20,000,000.

CAMPHOR TREE.

A valuable indigenous growth of Japan is the camphor tree, one of the laurel family (Lauracea Camphora). It is native to the soil of nearly all the islands of the Eastern Archipelago and the Asiatic coast. The tree grows to a large size, with beautiful, widespreading foliage, and bears a small fruit, not unlike in size and appearance to a black currant. The ordinary camphor of commerce is produced by steeping the twigs, roots, and other portions of the tree in water, and then, by heat, distilling the liquid over into condensors, where it deposits in small white crystals, when it is carefully dried and packed for shipment.

That of Borneo, Java, Sumatra, and some of the Molluccas, is taken from the tree in the form of a gum, which exudes from the limbs, body and roots, drying and crystallizing in masses, sometimes weighing ten or fifteen pounds. This quality is considered to be of great value by the Chinese and Japanese, who readily pay a hundred times more for it than for that produced by distillation.

The wood of the tree is of considerable importance, being worked up in many ways into glove boxes, trunks, chests, and as a veneer for all receptacles re

quiring protection from the inroads of the insect world.

GOVERNMENT-RELIGION.

The system of government of the Japanese Empire is that of an absolute monarchy. The power of the Mikado is absolute and unlimited in legislative, executive and judicial matters. The Great Council (Daijo-Kwan), in which the Emperor himself presides, is the supreme executive, as well as the highest legislative body. It is composed of a Prime Minister, two Junior or Vice Prime Ministers, and a number of Privy Councillors. The latter, as a rule, are either heads of the several executive departments or other important bodies. At present there exists no complete severance between the legislative and executive sections of the Government. The most important body in the Government is the Gen-Roin, or Senate, established in 1875. It deliberates on legislative matters, but its decisions are subject to confirmation by the Great or Cabinet Council, and sanction by the sovereign. The number of Senators is unlimited (thirty-seven in 1883); they are chosen from those who have rendered signal service to the state. Another body, the Sanji-in (Council of State), created in 1881, has the function of initiating and framing bills, and discussing matters transmitted by the executive-departments, subject to deliberations in the Senate. It also hears and decides cases relating to administration.

The religion of nearly the whole of the lower classes is Buddhism, which had 76,275 priests in 1881; Shintoism had 17,851 priests. Christianity is stated to be spreading among the people. School attendance has been made compulsory.