—‘After its grower, Van Baerle,’ will be the answer. ‘And who is this Van Baerle?’—‘It is the same who has already produced five new tulips: The Jane, the John de Witte, the Cornelius De Witte, &c.’ Well, this is what I call my ambition. It will cause tears to no one. And people will still talk of my Tulipa nigra Barlæensis, when, perhaps, my godfather, this sublime politician, is only known from the tulip to which I have given his name.”
“Oh! these darling bulbs!”
“When my tulip has flowered,” Baerle continued in his soliloquy, “and when tranquillity is restored in Holland, I shall give to the poor only fifty thousand guilders, which, after all, is a goodly sum for a man who is under no obligation whatever. Then, with the remaining fifty thousand guilders, I shall make experiments. With them, I shall succeed in imparting scent to the tulip. Ah! if I succeeded in giving it the odour of the rose or the carnation, or, what would be still better, a completely new scent; if I restored to this queen of flowers its natural distinctive perfume, which she has lost in passing from her Eastern to her European throne, and which she must have in the Indian Peninsula at Goa, Bombay, and Madras, and especially in that island which in olden times, as is asserted, was the terrestrial paradise, and which is called Ceylon—Oh, what glory! I must say, I would then rather be Cornelius Van Baerle than Alexander, Cæsar, or Maximilian.”
“Oh, the admirable bulbs!”
Thus Cornelius indulged in the delights of contemplation, and was carried away by the sweetest dreams.
Suddenly the bell of his cabinet was rung much more violently than usual.
