Page:The black tulip (IA 10892334.2209.emory.edu).pdf/82

 Yet, full of hatred as was Boxtel’s heart, he at first shrank with horror from the idea of informing against a man whom this information might lead to the scaffold.

But there is this terrible in evil thoughts, that evil minds grow soon familiar with them.

Besides this, Mynheer Isaac Boxtel encouraged himself with the following sophism:—

“Cornelius De Witte is a bad citizen, as he is charged with high treason, and arrested.

“I, on the contrary, am a good citizen, as I am not charged with anything in the world, and as I am as free as the air of heaven.

“If, therefore, Cornelius De Witte is a bad citizen—of which there can be no doubt, as he is charged with high treason and arrested—his accomplice, Cornelius Van Baerle, is no less a bad citizen than himself.

“And as I am a good citizen, and as it is the duty of every good citizen to inform against the bad ones, it is my duty to inform against Cornelius Van Baerle.”

Specious as this mode of reasoning might sound, it would not, perhaps, have taken so complete a hold of Boxtel, nor would he, perhaps, have yielded to the mere desire of vengeance which was gnawing at his heart, had not the demon of envy been joined by that of cupidity.

Boxtel was quite aware of the progress which Van Baerle had made towards producing the grand black tulip.

Doctor Cornelius, notwithstanding all his modesty, had not been able to hide from his most intimate friends that he was all but certain to win, in the year of grace 1673, the prize of a hundred thousand guilders offered by the Horticultural Society of Haarlem.