issi.j BEAUTIES OF BBITISIl TREES. 171 



* The rose is fairest when 'tis budding new, 



And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears. 



The I'ose is sweetest washed with morning dew, 

 And love is loveliest when embahned in tears.' 



"Whilst Herrick urges the same idea more cheerfully when he writes : — 



* Gather ye roses while ye may, 

 Old time is still a-flying ; 

 And the same flower that smiles to-day, 

 To-morrow will be dying.' 



Perhaps, however, the prettiest of all the connections between 

 roses and innocence is the following quaint legend of the origin of 

 the flower, told by that unrivalled Mediaeval raconteur, Sir John 

 Mandeville, in his Travels which were written in English inl35G : — 

 ' At Betheleim is the Felde Floridus, that is to seyne, the Felde floris- 

 ched ; for als moche as a fayre mayden was blamed with wrong and 

 slaundered, for whiclie cause sche was demed to the Dethe, and to 

 be brent in that place to the whiche she was ladd ; and as the 

 Fyre began to bren aboute hire, sche made hire preyeres to oure 

 Lord, that als wissely as sche was not gylty of that Synne, that He 

 wolde helpe hire and make it to be knowen to alle men, of His 

 mercyfulle grace. And when sche hadde thus seyd, sche entered into 

 the Fuyr ; and anon was the Fuyr quenched andoute ; and the Brondes 

 that weren brennynge becomen red Roseres, and the Brondes that 

 weren not kyndled becomen white Eoseres, full of Roses. And these 

 weren the first Roseres and Roses, both white and rede, that evere 

 ony man saughe.' 



The moral of this pretty story is at least less doubtful than that of 

 sucli legends as that of St. Rose of Lima. 



Mediaeval writers were not so wholly given up to tracing mystic 

 significances, however, as to be incapable of minute observation. In 

 our single wild Roses there are five ' sepals ' or leaves to the calyx — 

 the green leaves beneath the petals, and of these two are ' pinnate,' 

 or cut on both sides, two not at all, and the fifth on one sid^ only. 

 This was expressed in the old Latin enigma — 



* Quinque sumus fratres, unus barbatus et alter, 

 Imberbesque duo, semibarbatus ego,' 



which elegiac couplet has been rendered — 



* Five brothers take their stand, 

 Born to the same command : 

 Two darkly bearded frown, 

 Two without beards are known ; 

 And one sustains with equal pride 

 His odd appendage on one side.' 

 N 



