Zuyder Zee, the plans for which have been made
and the work commenced. It is estimated that the mean depth is 13 feet,
and that by a multitude of engines the water may be removed at the rate of
1 foot of depth per annum. Some 800,000,000 tons were pumped out of the
Haarlem Meer, but that work will be dwarfed by the new enterprise.

The Dutch system of mattresses, gabions, revetting and sea-walls have
furnished models for all the continents, the mouths of the Danube and the
Mississippi being prominent instances. The railway bridge over the Leek,
an arm of the Rhine, at Kuilinburg in Holland, is an iron truss, and the
principal span has the same length as the middle arch of the St. Louis
bridge--515 feet. It is shown here by models and plans.

The largest and most instructive ethnological exhibit from any country at
the Exposition is that from the Netherlands colonies in the East and West
Indies. The Oriental forms by far the larger portion of it, and has an
imposing trophy in one of the four most advantageous positions in the
building. The base of the apartment is about one hundred and forty feet
square, and the domed ceiling at a height of one hundred and fifty feet
rises from a square tower whose sides are round-topped windows of blue and
white glass in chequerwork. These give full illumination and a gay
appearance to the spacious hall, in which the trophy rises to a height of
eighty feet. The pyramidal structure has an octagonal base of forty feet
diameter with inclined faces, from which rises a second octagonal portion
of smaller size. A series of steps above this is crowned with a conical
sheaf of palm-stems, whose fronds make an umbrella of twenty feet
diameter. The peak is a pinnacle of bamboos, with a Dutch flag pendent in
the still atmosphere of the hall. From each angle and side of the octagon
radiates a table, and these are lavishly covered with specimens of the
arts and manufactures of Java, Sumatra, Borneo, Celebes and other of the
Dutch colonial possessions in the Malay seas. Here are models of the
junks, proas and fishing-craft, each structure pegged together and
destitute of nails. The large mat sails depend from yards of bamboo; the
rudders are large oars, one over each counter; the decks are roofed with
bamboo, ratan and the inevitable nipa-palm leaves. The smaller craft, made
of hollow tree-trunks, have the double outrigger, and the finer ones have
shelters of bamboo and palm-leaf. The fishing-craft hav