TULIP. 
73 
of persons. It would be almost impossible to credit 
the extraordinary accounts of the high prices given 
in that country for Tulips, did we not know that 
it was a rage for gambling speculations, rather 
than a fondness for flowers, which occasioned these 
excesses. For a single Tulip, to which the Dutch 
florists had given the fine name of Semper Augustus^ 
were given four thousand six hundred florins (about 
jE400), a beautiful new carriage, a pair of horses, 
and harness: another of the same kind sold for 
thirteen thousand florins; and engagements to the 
amount of £5000 were made during the height of 
this mania for a single root of a particular sort. A 
person who possessed a Tulip of a very fine variety, 
hearing that there was another of the same kind at 
Haerlem, repaired to that city, and, having purchased 
it at an enormous price, placed it on a stone and 
crushed it to a mummy with his foot, exclaiming 
with exultation, “ Now my tulip is unique!” We 
are also told that another, who possessed a yearly 
income of sixty thousand florins, reduced himself to 
beggary in the short space of four months, by pur¬ 
chasing these flowers. From this spirit of floral 
gambling the city of Haerlem is said to have derived 
4 
