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 MENTAL EPIDEMICS 267

rapidly in value, and when the mania was in full swing some daring speculators invested as much as one hundred thou sand florins in the purchase of forty roots. The bulbs were as precious as diamonds ; they were sold by their weight in perits, a weight less than a grain.&quot;. . . &quot; Many speculators grew suddenly rich. The epidemic of tulipomania raged with intense fury, the enthusiasm filled every heart, and confidence was at its height. A golden bait hung tempt ingly out before the people, and one after another they rushed to the tulip market like flies around a honey pot. Every one imagined that the passion for tulips would last forever, and that the wealthy from every part of the world would send to Holland and pay whatever prices were asked for them. The riches of Europe would be concentrated on the shores of the Zuyder Zee. Nobles, citizens, farmers, mechanics, seamen, footmen, maid-servants, chimney-sweeps and old-clothes women dabbled in tulips. Houses and lands were offered for sale at ruinously low prices, or assigned in payment of bargains made at the tulip markets. So conta gious was the epidemic that foreigners became smitten with the same frenzy, and money poured into Holland from all directions.

&quot; The speculative mania did not last long ; social suggestion began to work in the opposite direction, and a universal panic suddenly seized on the minds of the Dutch. Instead of buying every one was trying to sell. Tulips fell below their normal value. Thousands of merchants were utterly ruined, and a cry of lamentation arose in the land.&quot; This description, doubtless, is too highly wrought, but well illus trates the absurdities into which a people of average intel ligence can be precipitated by the all-pervasive sweep of mental contagion.

Among epidemics of the extreme type, which we have called manias, are to be classed financial panics, speculative crazes, extravagant religious revivals, popular terrors such as the &quot; great fear &quot; which swept over France in the year 1789; and every form of emotional excitement that may

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