| 160 bushels wheat | … | $179,20 |
| 320 bushels rye | … | 223,20 |
| Four fat oxen | … | 192,00 |
| Eight fat hogs | … | 96,00 |
| Twelve fat sheep | … | 48,00 |
| Two hogsheads wine | … | 28,00 |
| Four tuns beer | … | 12,80 |
| Two tuns butter | … | 76,80 |
| 1000 lbs. cheese | … | 48,00 |
| A bed all complete | … | 40,00 |
| One suit clothes | … | 32,00 |
| A silver drinking cup | … | 24,00 |
| Total exactly $1,000,00 | ||
In 1636, regular tulip exchanges were established in the nine Dutch towns where the largest tulip business was done, and while the gambling was at its intensest, the matter was managed exactly as stock gambling is managed in Wall street to-day. You went out into “the street” without owning a tulip or a perit of a tulip in the world, and met another fellow with just as many tulips as yourself. You talk and “banter” with him, and finally (we will suppose) you “sell short” ten Semper Augustuses, “seller three,” for $2,000 each, in all $20,000. This means in ordinary English, that without having any tulips (i. e., short,) you promise to deliver the ten roots as above in three days from date. Now when the three days are up, if Semper Augustuses are worth in the market only $1,500, you could, if this were a real transaction, buy ten of them for $15,000, and deliver them to the other gambler for $20,000, thus winning from him the difference of $5,000. But if the
