Dumas, Alexandre – The Black Tulip

forgot to examine.

On the other hand, it seemed to Van Baerle an auspicious

omen that this very cell was assigned to him, for according

to his ideas, a jailer ought never to have given to a second

pigeon the cage from which the first had so easily flown.

The cell had an historical character. We will only state

here that, with the exception of an alcove which was

contrived there for the use of Madame Grotius, it differed

in no respect from the other cells of the prison; only,

perhaps, it was a little higher, and had a splendid view

from the grated window.

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Cornelius felt himself perfectly indifferent as to the place

where he had to lead an existence which was little more than

vegetation. There were only two things now for which he

cared, and the possession of which was a happiness enjoyed

only in imagination.

A flower, and a woman; both of them, as he conceived, lost

to him for ever.

Fortunately the good doctor was mistaken. In his prison cell

the most adventurous life which ever fell to the lot of any

tulip-fancier was reserved for him.

One morning, whilst at his window inhaling the fresh air

which came from the river, and casting a longing look to the

windmills of his dear old city Dort, which were looming in

the distance behind a forest of chimneys, he saw flocks of

pigeons coming from that quarter to perch fluttering on the

pointed gables of Loewestein.

These pigeons, Van Baerle said to himself, are coming from

Dort, and consequently may return there. By fastening a

little note to the wing of one of these pigeons, one might

have a chance to send a message there. Then, after a few

moments’ consideration, he exclaimed, —

“I will do it.”

A man grows very patient who is twenty-eight years of age,

and condemned to a prison for life, — that is to say, to

something like twenty-two or twenty-three thousand days of

captivity.

Van Baerle, from whose thoughts the three bulbs were never

absent, made a snare for catching the pigeons, baiting the

birds with all the resources of his kitchen, such as it was

for eight slivers (sixpence English) a day; and, after a

month of unsuccessful attempts, he at last caught a female

bird.

It cost him two more months to catch a male bird; he then

shut them up together, and having about the beginning of the

year 1673 obtained some eggs from them, he released the

female, which, leaving the male behind to hatch the eggs in

her stead, flew joyously to Dort, with the note under her

wing.

She returned in the evening. She had preserved the note.

Thus it went on for fifteen days, at first to the

disappointment, and then to the great grief, of Van Baerle.

On the sixteenth day, at last, she came back without it.

Van Baerle had addressed it to his nurse, the old Frisian

woman; and implored any charitable soul who might find it to

convey it to her as safely and as speedily as possible.

In this letter there was a little note enclosed for Rosa.

Van Baerle’s nurse had received the letter in the following

way.

Leaving Dort, Mynheer Isaac Boxtel had abandoned, not only

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his house, his servants, his observatory, and his telescope,

but also his pigeons.

The servant, having been left without wages, first lived on

his little savings, and then on his master’s pigeons.

Seeing this, the pigeons emigrated from the roof of Isaac

Boxtel to that of Cornelius van Baerle.

The nurse was a kind-hearted woman, who could not live

without something to love. She conceived an affection for

the pigeons which had thrown themselves on her hospitality;

and when Boxtel’s servant reclaimed them with culinary

intentions, having eaten the first fifteen already, and now

wishing to eat the other fifteen, she offered to buy them

from him for a consideration of six stivers per head.

This being just double their value, the man was very glad to

close the bargain, and the nurse found herself in undisputed