94 timothy Hatrhram. yu/y 35. 



sefs much vigour. I mubt first beg leave to know, 

 in case your infallible manure fhould prove like the in- 

 fallible phial of Paracelsus, how I fhall be able to re- 

 store that to life, which is already dead ? A garden- 

 er, like yourself, came last year to this place from 

 France, with a great variety of fine plants, which he 

 afsured me, in the most positive manner, were all ge- 

 nuine; and I might trust my life to their proving 

 true. He sold to me a plant which he said would 

 produce black roses. I paid him a high price for it: 

 See there it grows, — a pun j plant it is; and the few 

 roses it bears are of a pale pink colour. Now, what 

 would become of me fhould you turn out as great a 

 quack as he was ? There is only this single plant of 

 its kind in the universe ; fliould it be once lost I ne- 

 ver may find the like again. No, no, friend ; were 

 Baron Van Haak himself to rise from the dead, 

 and afsert the omnipotence of this manure,^ I would 

 not take his word for it. I fliould tell him to go and 

 rest in peace with his fathers. Nothing fhall ever 

 induce me to destroy this valuable plant, while it ij 

 evidently pofscfsed of a health and vigour that no 

 other plant of the same sort ever could equal. 



• I know indeed that it has spines. This is one of 

 those inevitable evils which nature hath annexed to* • 

 all sublunary things. But look around and com- 

 pare it with all other plants of the same kind you 

 have ever seen ! How poor, — how puny, — how insig- 

 nificant are they, when compared with it ! Try your 

 manures if you think proper upon other soils. "They 

 have evidently occasion for it. There, the puny plants,, 

 in place of flowers, carry not even leaves to cover their 



