Page:The black tulip (IA 10892334.2209.emory.edu).pdf/73

 looked upon this parcel, as a clever pilot does on the distant and scarcely perceptible cloud which is increasing on its way, and which is fraught with a storm.

Little dreaming of the jealous hatred of his neighbour, Van Baerle had proceeded step by step towards gaining the prize offered by the Horticultural Society of Haarlem. He had progressed from hazel-nut shade to that of roasted coffee; and on the very day when the frightful events took place at the Hague, which we have related in the preceding chapters, we find him about one o’clock in the day, gathering from the border the young suckers, raised from tulips of the colour of roasted coffee; and which, being expected to flower for the first time in the spring of 1675, would, undoubtedly, produce the large black tulip required by the Haarlem Society.

On the 20th of August, 1672, at one o’clock, Cornelius was, therefore, in his dry-room, with his feet resting on the foot-bar of the table, and his elbows on the cover, looking with intense delight on three suckers which he had just detached from the mother bulb, pure, perfect, and entire, and from which was to grow that wonderful produce of horticulture, which would render the name of Cornelius Van Baerle for ever illustrious.

“I shall find the black tulip,” said Cornelius to him. self, whilst detaching the suckers. I shall obtain the hundred thousand guilders offered by the Society. I shall distribute them among the poor of Dort; and thus the hatred which every rich man has to encounter in times of civil wars will be soothed down, and I shall be able, without fearing any harm either from Republicans or Orangists, to keep as heretofore my borders in splendid condition. I need no more be afraid, lest on the day of a riot the shopkeepers of the town, and the sailors of the port, should come and tear out my bulbs, to boil