remarked as she put the latter dish on the table.

A single glass of ale was placed by Mr Fluke's side. Owen declined
taking any, for he had never drank anything stronger than water.

"Very right and wise, boy," observed his host in an approving tone.
"You are the better without what you don't require. I never drank a
glass of ale till I was fifty, and might have refrained ten years longer
with advantage, but Kezia insisted that I should take a glass at supper,
and for the sake of quiet I did so. Kezia is not a person who will
stand contradiction. She is sensible though. Could not have endured
her if she were not. But she is not equal to her husband Joseph. The
one rules supreme in the house, the other in the garden. You've seen
what Joseph Crump has done there. What do you think of my tulips? I am
indebted to Joseph for them. Beautiful! glorious! magnificent! Are
they not?"

Owen nodded his head in assent.

"Their worth cannot be told. Once upon a time one of those splendid
bulbs would have fetched thousands. That was nearly two centuries ago,
that events repeat themselves, and, for what we can tell, that time may
come round again, then, Owen, I shall be the richest man in England. No
one possesses tulips equal to mine."

"Indeed," said Owen; and he thought to himself, when at Wapping this old
man's whole soul seems to be absorbed in business, while out here all
his thoughts appear to be occupied in the cultivation of tulips. How
could he have been first led to admire them? Before many minutes were
over Mr Fluke answered the question himself.

"Twenty years ago I scarcely knew that such a flower as a tulip existed,
when one day going on board a Dutch vessel I saw a flower growing in a
pot in the cabin. I was struck by the beauty of its form--its brilliant
colours. I learned its name. I was seized with the desire to possess
it. I bought it of the skipper. The next voyage he brought me over a
number of bulbs. I wanted something to engage my thoughts, and from
that day forward I became fonder and fonder of tulips."

The evening was passed more pleasantly than Owen had anticipated. Mr
Fluke, indeed, appeared to be an altogether different person to what he
had seemed at his first interview with his young relative.

"Boys want more sleep than old men," said Mr Fluke, pulling out his
turnip-like watch.

"Here, Kezia!" he shouted, "come and take him off to bed. She will look
after you," he ad