culture
of his cherished flower; he had mixed the soil according to the most
approved prescriptions, and given to his hotbeds just as much heat and
fresh air as the strictest rules of horticulture exact.

Isaac knew the temperature of his frames to the twentieth part of a
degree. He knew the strength of the current of air, and tempered it so
as to adapt it to the wave of the stems of his flowers. His productions
also began to meet with the favour of the public. They were beautiful,
nay, distinguished. Several fanciers had come to see Boxtel's tulips.
At last he had even started amongst all the Linnaeuses and Tourneforts a
tulip which bore his name, and which, after having travelled all through
France, had found its way into Spain, and penetrated as far as Portugal;
and the King, Don Alfonso VI.--who, being expelled from Lisbon, had
retired to the island of Terceira, where he amused himself, not,
like the great Conde, with watering his carnations, but with growing
tulips--had, on seeing the Boxtel tulip, exclaimed, "Not so bad, by any
means!"

All at once, Cornelius van Baerle, who, after all his learned pursuits,
had been seized with the tulipomania, made some changes in his house
at Dort, which, as we have stated, was next door to that of Boxtel. He
raised a certain building in his court-yard by a story, which shutting
out the sun, took half a degree of warmth from Boxtel's garden, and, on
the other hand, added half a degree of cold in winter; not to mention
that it cut the wind, and disturbed all the horticultural calculations
and arrangements of his neighbour.

After all, this mishap appeared to Boxtel of no great consequence. Van
Baerle was but a painter, a sort of fool who tried to reproduce and
disfigure on canvas the wonders of nature. The painter, he thought, had
raised his studio by a story to get better light, and thus far he had
only been in the right. Mynheer van Baerle was a painter, as Mynheer
Boxtel was a tulip-grower; he wanted somewhat more sun for his
paintings, and he took half a degree from his neighbour's tulips.

The law was for Van Baerle, and Boxtel had to abide by it.

Besides, Isaac had made the discovery that too much sun was injurious to
tulips, and that this flower grew quicker, and had a better colouring,
with the temperate warmth of morning, than with the powerful heat of the
midday sun. He therefore felt almost grateful to Cornelius van Baerle
for having given him a screen gratis.