he perhaps have yielded to the mere desire of vengeance

which was gnawing at his heart, had not the demon of envy
been joined with that of cupidity.

Boxtel was quite aware of the progress which Van Baerle had
made towards producing the grand black tulip.

Dr. Cornelius, notwithstanding all his modesty, had not been
able to hide from his most intimate friends that he was all

but certain to win, in the year of grace 1673, the prize of
a hundred thousand guilders offered by the Horticultural

Society of Haarlem.
It was just this certainty of Cornelius van Baerle that

caused the fever which raged in the heart of Isaac Boxtel.
If Cornelius should be arrested there would necessarily be a

great upset in his house, and during the night after his
arrest no one would think of keeping watch over the tulips

in his garden.
Now in that night Boxtel would climb over the wall and, as

he knew the position of the bulb which was to produce the
grand black tulip, he would filch it; and instead of

flowering for Cornelius, it would flower for him, Isaac; he
also, instead of Van Baerle, would have the prize of a

hundred thousand guilders, not to speak of the sublime
honour of calling the new flower Tulipa nigra Boxtellensis,

-- a result which would satisfy not only his vengeance, but
also his cupidity and his ambition.

Awake, he thought of nothing but the grand black tulip;
asleep, he dreamed of it.

At last, on the 19th of August, about two o'clock in the
afternoon, the temptation grew so strong, that Mynheer Isaac

was no longer able to resist it.
Accordingly, he wrote an anonymous information, the minute

exactness of which made up for its want of authenticity, and
posted his letter.

Never did a venomous paper, slipped into the jaws of the
bronze lions at Venice, produce a more prompt and terrible

effect.
On the same evening the letter reached the principal

magistrate, who without a moment's delay convoked his
colleagues early for the next morning. On the following

morning, therefore, they assembled, and decided on Van
Baerle's arrest, placing the order for its execution in the

hands of Master van Spennen, who, as we have seen, performed
his duty like a true Hollander, and who arrested the Doctor

at the very hour when the Orange party at the Hague were
roasting the bleeding shreds of flesh torn from the corpses

of Cornelius and John de Witt.
But, whether from a feeling of shame or from craven

weakness, Isaac Boxtel did not venture that day to point his
telescope either at the garden, or at the laboratory, or at

the dry-room.
He knew too well what was about to happen in the house of

the poor doctor to feel any desire to look into it. He did
not even get up when his only servant -- who envied the lot

of the servants of Cornelius just as bitterly as Boxtel did
that of their master -- entered his bedroom. He said to the

man, --
"I shall not get up to-day, I am ill."

About nine o'clock he heard a great noise in the street
which made him tremble, at this moment he was paler than a

real invalid, and shook more violently than a man in the
height of fever.

His servant entered the room; Boxtel hid himself under the
counterpane.

"Oh, sir!" cried the servant, not without some inkling that,
whilst deploring the mishap which had befallen Van Baerle,

he was announcing agreeable news to his master, -- "oh, sir!
you do not know, then, what is happening at this moment?"

"How can I know it?" answered Boxtel, with an almost
unintelligible voice.

"Well, Mynheer Boxtel, at this moment your neighbour
Cornelius van Baerle is arrested for high treason."

"Nonsense!" Boxtel muttered, with a faltering voice; "the
thing is impossible."

"Faith, sir, at any rate that's what people say; and,
besides, I have seen Judge van Spennen with the archers

entering the house."
"Well, if you have seen it with your own eyes, that's a

different case altogether."
"At all events," said the servant, "I shall go and inquire

once more. Be you quiet, sir, I shall let you know all about
it."

Boxtel contented himself with signifying his approval of the
zeal of his servant by dumb show.

The man went out, and returned in half an hour.
"Oh, sir, all that I told you is indeed quite true."

"How so?"
"Mynheer van Baerle is arrested, and has been put into a

carriage, and they are driving him to the Hague."
"To the Hague!"

"Yes, to the Hague, and if what people say is true, it won't
do him much good."

"And what do they say?" Boxtel asked.
"Faith, sir, they say -- but it is not quite sure -- that by

this hour the burghers must be murdering Mynheer Cornelius
and Mynheer John de Witt."

"Oh," muttered, or rather growled Boxtel, closing his eyes
from the dreadful picture which presented itself to his

imagination.
"Why, to be sure," said the servant to himself, whilst

leaving the room, "Mynheer Isaac Boxtel must be very sick
not to have jumped from his bed on hearing such good news."

And, in reality, Isaac Boxtel was very sick, like a man who
has murdered another.

But he had murdered his man with a double object; the first
was attained, the second was still to be attained.

Night closed in. It was the night which Boxtel had looked
forward to.

As soon as it was dark he got up.
He then climbed into his sycamore.

He had calculated correctly; no one thought of keeping watch
over the garden; the house and the servants were all in the

utmost confusion.
He heard the clock strike -- ten, eleven, twelve.

At midnight, with a beating heart, trembling hands, and a
livid countenance, he descended from the tree, took a

ladder, leaned it against the wall, mounted it to the last
step but one, and listened.

All was perfectly quiet, not a sound broke the silence of
the night; one solitary light, that of the housekeeper, was

burning in the house.
This silence and this darkness emboldened Boxtel; he got

astride the wall, stopped for an instant, and, after having
ascertained that there was nothing to fear, he put his

ladder from his own garden into that of Cornelius, and
descended.

Then, knowing to an inch where the bulbs which were to