66 FA.VILIAS OARDEN FLOTFERS. 



brought 4,208 florins. A florin then represented a bushel 

 of wheat, and by this standard the value of the single 

 bulb may at any time be estimated in current money. 

 With wheat at 50s. the quarter, the equivalent in money 

 would be about £1,'314. Beekmann relates that about 

 half an ounce weight (400 perits) of the variety named 

 Admiral Leifken was sold for 4,400 florins, and half that 

 weight of Semper Augustus realised 5,500 florins. In 

 the " History of Inventions " the story is fully and 

 amusingly told, and we should but waste our space in 

 attempting to repeat or summarise it. But we must 

 warn all that the florists had nothing to do with it. 

 The gamblers and speculators knew nothing of the flowers 

 but their names and the latest prices realised. A 'certain 

 number of Dutchmen had gone mad, and another body 

 of Dutchmen were ready to profit by the event. If the 

 history casts any reflections of an unpleasant nature, they 

 do not fall on the florists in particular, but on human 

 nature in general. 



The class of tulips in which the florists take especial 

 delight are not, generally speaking, costly ; but the diffi- 

 culty of obtaining them, in the first instance, the peculiar 

 nature of their special technical merits, and the slow rate 

 at which, in many cases, they are multiplied, combine to 

 invest them with a considerable money value during the 

 early years of their appearance. In this respect they are 

 like other commodities, but the demand, though limited, 

 being pretty constant, the money value of tulips does not 

 fluctuate with anything approaching to violence. Within 

 the experiences of the present generation, the highest 

 price offered for a single bulb was £100. !Mr. Goldham 

 refused an offer of this amount for a bulb of Louis X^'I. 



