July 1, 1S67.] 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



147 



Blooms blushing: to her lover's tale; 

 His queen, the garden queen, his Rose, 

 Unbent by winds, unchilled by snows, 

 By every breeze and season blest, 

 Far from the winters of the west, 

 Returns the sweets by nature given 

 In softest incense back to heaven, 

 And grateful yields that smiling sky 

 Her fairest hue and fragrant sigh. 



So intimate are the bonds of attachment between 

 the rose and the bulbul, and so sensitive is the 

 former to the song of the latter, that it is said to 

 burst from the bud and open at the sound. 



Oh, sooner shall the Rose of May 

 Mistake her own sweet nightingale, 



And to some meaner minstrel's lay 

 Open her bosom's glowing veil, 



than that we should longer continue to chant the 

 praises of both, or lull our readers to sleep over the 

 song of the one or the sweet odour of the other. 



The very common expression, " under the rose," 

 has been referred to two or three sources. Haydn, 

 in his " Dictionary of Dates," says, — " The rose a 

 symbol of silence, gave rise to the phrase 'under 

 the rose,' from the circumstance of the Pope's pre- 

 senting consecrated roses, which were placed over 

 confessionals to denote secresy." Whilst others 

 contend that the old Greek custom of suspending 

 a rose over the guest-table was employed as an 

 emblem that the conversation should not be re- 

 peated elsewhere. Whichever was the true origin, 

 whether Christian or Pagan, it is evident that both 

 regarded the rose as an emblem of secresy, and in 

 the same sense, but less studiously followed, we are 

 supposed to regard the same flower, whenever we 

 pick up a stray scrap of scandal, "under the rose." 



This reminds us of the association of this flower 

 with the names of persons, places, and things. It 

 has been said that Syria derived its name from Suri, 

 a beautiful and delicate species of rose, whence 

 came " Suristan," the land of roses. 



Now upon Syria's land of roses 

 Softly the light of eve reposes. 



Beside a goodly number of such more evident com- 

 pounds as Rosenthal, Rosenberg, Rosenau, &c, to 

 say nothing of the beautiful visions of feminine 

 humanity which have blessed the day-dreams of 

 prosaic man, bearing for themselves the fragrant 

 appellations, not merely of the Rose of Arragon or 

 the Rose of Castile, but the less assuming Rose, 

 Rosa, Rosina, or Rosalind. Ill-natured old bachelors 

 and gouty sexagenarians may mutter incoherently 

 about "thorns" and "briars" but we will not listen 

 to them, we will not believe them — 



We have a vision of our own, 

 And why should we undo it ? 



Cultivated Roses are supposed to have been first 

 planted in this country in A.D. 1522. The damask 

 rose {Rosa damascena) being introduced from the 



south of France some time prior to A.D. 1573. 

 The Province rose {Rosa provincialis) , from Italy, 

 before A.D. 1596. The moss rose not much earlier 

 than A.D. 1721, and the China rose perhaps about 

 A.D. 1787. Resides these we have, and had long 

 before these dates, wild roses, less beautiful and 

 fragrant, but equally deserving of a remembrance 

 at a "Feast of Roses." 



How are we to enumerate the species of Rosa 

 which are indigenous to Great Britain, since so 

 much depends on the limitation of the word 

 "species," upon which point botanists are not 

 agreed. If we take the last edition of Sowerby's 

 " Botany," we find that the first place is given to 

 sixteen, which are by many authorities accepted as 

 good species. These are again subdivided by 

 others, for under the name of the Dog-rose twenty- 

 one forms are named and characterized as species, 

 so that there are to be found men of strong faith 

 who can believe that in the British Islands we 

 possess forty distinct species of native roses. On 

 the other hand, Mr. Bentham limits the number to 

 fice. It matters but little to us for our present 

 purpose whether there are forty species or only five. 

 We believe in the Dog rose, the Burnet rose, and 

 the sweetbriar ; and if there were no others, we 

 should still delight in the fragrance of the Eglantine, 

 and have faith in the roses of England so long as a 

 rose could he found to entwine with the thistle and 

 shamrock, and never quarrel, whether it be known 

 to science as Rosa canina, or Rosa verticillacantha, 

 or Rosa platyphylla . 



A wild rose-tree {Rosa canina) grows in the 

 crypt of the cathedral of Hildesheim, which has 

 the reputation of being one thousand years old. 

 Baron Humboldt states that, from accurate informa- 

 tion which he obtained, the age of the main stem 

 did not exceed eight hundred years. This is, 

 however, a respectable antiquity, and he adds that 

 a legend connects this rose with a vow of the first 

 founder of the cathedral, Louis the Pious, and a 

 document of the eleventh century says, that when 

 Bishop Hezilo rebuilt the cathedral, which had 

 been burnt down, he inclosed the roots of the rose- 

 tree within a vault still remaining, raised on the 

 latter the walls of the crypt, which was re-conse- 

 crated in 1061, and spread the branches of the 

 rose-tree over its sides. The stem, still living, is 

 nearly twenty-seven feet in height, and only two 

 inches thick, and spreads across a width of thirty- 

 two feet over the outer wall of the eastern crypt. 

 It is undoubtedly of very considerable antiquity, 

 and well worthy of the renown it has so long 

 enjoyed throughout Germany. 



The Abbe Berleze gives an account of a rose- 

 tree which he saw flourishing at Caserta, near 

 Naples, in 1819, and which had been planted near a 

 poplar sixty feet high, and had clambered up to the 

 topmost brandies of its companion tree. 



H 2 



