LETTEE XV. 



THE TULIPS, AND THEIR STORY. 



I KNEW a man who had always been happy until the moment 

 when some one sent him a present of a dozen tulip roots. 



I never saw but one man more embarrassed, and that was 

 a merchant of Marseilles, to whom an African prince sent 

 two tigers and a panther, begging him to keep them for his 



The poor man asked some one if tulips would grow in water 

 on a chimney, as hyacinths do, and was assured they would not. 

 He went to see a friend who was a great amateur of tulips, 

 and offered him his twelve bulbs. His friend answered 

 somewhat haughtily, that he sometimes gave away tulips, but 

 that he never accepted any; not oaring to see his flower-beds 

 dishonoured by any flower without a name or of base extrac- 

 tion ; besides, those which he possessed had been sown and 

 cultivated by himself ; it was a sort of family into which he 

 was tiot willing to admit strangers. 



