138 FLORA HISTORICA. 



hood of the Levant, it is not extraordinary that it 

 should be found growing in the wild state, as it is 

 frequently discovered in the vicinity of Constanti- 

 nople. Mr. Hobhouse tells us that he found the 

 Tulip growing spontaneously under the hedges 

 between Smyrna and Bournabat. But this flower 

 appears to have been scarce at Constantinople even 

 so late as the middle of the sixteenth century, as 

 in the year 1554 Auger Gislen Busbec (Busbequius) 

 being at the Porte as Ambassador from the Emperor 

 Ferdinand I. of Germany, sent both seeds and 

 bulbs of the Tulip to Vienna, with an observation 

 that the Turks charged a high price for these 

 flowers, which would not have been the case had 

 the Tulip been then growing spontaneously in that 

 country *. 



This is the first notice we have of the Tulip 

 which was afterwards figured by Conrad Gesner, 

 who has been with justness denominated the German 

 Pliny. This excellent writer of natural history, 

 botany, and medicine tells us, in his additions to 

 Cordus, that he first saw the Tulip plant in the 

 year 1559, in the garden of John Henry Harwart, 

 at Augsburg. From its having been figured and 

 made generally known in the works of Gesner, the 



* We have already observed under the proper head, that Europe 

 is indebted to Busbec for the common Lilac-tree. 



