1884.] BEAUTIES OF BBITISII TREES. Ill 



The Hedge Eoses {R. arvensis) are mostly large bushes, with 

 tiailiiig or arching branches often deeply tinged with a ricli maroon- 

 purple tint, with strong hooked prickles, smooth leaves and clustered 

 white flowers, having their styles united into a protruding column. 

 They are often low-growing trailing plants, but the dead white of 

 their petals forms a charming contrast to their purple stems and 

 yellow stamens, or to the pink and gold blossoms and bright green 

 bark of the Sweet Briar or of many Dog Eoses. With these wild 

 briars may well be planted such Eoses as B. hracteata, the large 

 single white ^Macartney Eose from China ; li. Lijdli, also white, 

 but generally double, from the Himalayas ; L. pimiced, the lovely 

 Austrian briar ; li. jpyrepaica and 11. rttgona. 



This is not the place to dilate on the manufacture of the princely 

 Ottar, or Otto, of Eoses, the essential oil distilled from the rose- 

 water obtained from the petals mainly of E. oentifolia grown chiefly 

 in Kashmir, at Damascas and in Eumelia, one drachm of which is 

 said to require five-hundredweight of rose-leaves, and the production 

 of which, in Eumelia alone, yields an annual revenue exceeding 

 ^70,000. In our land the summer sun has not heat enough to ripen 

 the petals so as to form the oil ; but perhaps rose-farming might be 

 successful from a purely mercenary standpoint in ' the sunny south ' 

 of Australia. More we must not add of the Eose — 



'Considering that no flower is so perfite, 

 So full of virtue, pleasannce, and delight, 

 So full of blisful angelic beauty, 

 Imperial birth, honour, and dignity.' 



G. S. BOULGER. 



Wood in Surgery.— Wood is being employed scientifically in surgery m a 

 different form from ordinary splints, says the Chicago Lumberman. A foreigner 

 has introduced wood-wool as a cheap and useful dressing for wounds, and it is 

 bein« prepared extensively as a commercial staple for surgical dressings. It is 

 finely-gi-ouud wood, such 'as is extensively used in the manufacture of paper. 

 It is a clean-looking, delicate-fibred, soft, yellowish- white substance, havmg an 

 odour of fresh wood, and absorbs an immense quantity of liquid. Ihe best 

 wood-wool was found to be that which was obtained from the Pmm picea. ihe 

 wood-wool thus procured was first pressed, passed through a sieve, then dried 

 and impregnated with a solution containing i per cent, of sublimate and 10 per 

 cent of glycerine. The advantages claimed for this dressing ai-e numerous It 

 is cleanly, fresh, and of a whitish colour ; it is at the same time soft and delicate 

 in texture as cotton, and " extraordinarily cheap." The actual price is, however, 

 not stated. It possesses some antiseptic properties naturaUy, has an agreeable 

 odour, and is exceedingly elastic even in thin layers, so that bandages can be 

 put on more lightly with this than with any other dressing. Its absorbent pro- 

 perties are so high that it takes up twelve times its own weight of water, so that 

 10 ounces of well-dried wood-wool, after complete saturation, attain a weight ot 

 130 ounces. 



