334 



THE ROSE. 



beaten track, with the hope and courage 

 necessary to fill well a large octavo volume. 

 But the Rose, like the female loveliness of 

 which poets always delight to make it the 

 emblem, is an inexhaustible subject. All 

 the novelties of the botanist and the florist, 

 all the gorgeous and rare flowers of the 

 tropics, all the bright and lovely gems of 

 eastern mandarin's gardens, and all the 

 curious and brilliant blossoming plants of 

 Mexico, have not been able for a moment 

 to shake the six thousand years constancy 

 of mankind to this queen of flowers. Nay, 

 as if to prove the vainness of even the at- 

 tempt to weaken the faith of her subjects, 

 by bringing forward the novelties of strange 

 lands, the Queen of flowers reproduces her- 

 self every year in a hundred new forms — 

 new varieties, if possible, ten times more 

 lovely, more deliciously fragrant, more 

 perfect in form, and more refined in colour 

 than of old ; so that her wondering devotees 

 are forced, almost in spite of themselves, to 

 bid adieu to the familiar types — the "old 

 roses," dear to the memory and the heart — 

 and cultivate the new ones, so captivating 

 are they to all the senses. 



An examination of Mr. Pabsons's work 

 has convinced us that he has been highly 

 successful in the labor he undertook — evi- 

 dently a labor of love. He has not laid a 

 mere rose-leaf in the brimful cup : he has 

 actually placed a whole bouquet in this vase 

 so filled by his predecessors and contempo- 

 raries, whose previous contents seem to 

 nourish and vivify it. 



The volume before us looks at the Rose 

 in every aspect. Its history, from the time 

 of the "Ancient Coptic manuscripts," down 

 to the present day, with all the fables, my- 

 thological, scriptural and allegorical, that 

 belong to it ; all the anecdotes of its magical 

 charms and its wonderful influence, whether 

 as the symbol of friendship between mighty 



princes, or the badge of rival factions in 

 cruel and bloody wars ; all the details of 

 its luxurious use among the ancients, and 

 the scent of the perfumes distilled from it, 

 of the value of thousands at the present day ; 

 and every thing touching its medical pro- 

 perties, and its employment in ceremonies 

 and festivals. Then there are more than 

 sixty pages of the " Poetry of the Rose ;" a 

 collection of all the admirable odes, poems, 

 sonnets, and lays of the numerous bards, 

 who have delighted to lay the homage of 

 the muse at the feet of this favorite of na- 

 ture. After this, we have a chapter on the 

 " General culture of the rose ;" and others 

 on " Soil and planting," " Pruning and 

 training," "Potting and forcing, propaga- 

 tion, multiplication by seed, and hybrid- 

 izing : " the whole concluding with both a 

 botanical and a garden classification, in 

 which the finest varieties are described. 



Altogether this may be considered the 

 most agreeable and complete work on the 

 Rose, in the English language. The author 

 has not only collected and arranged all of 

 most interest and value that has hitherto 

 been written on this subject, but he has 

 interwoven through the volume a good deal 

 of interesting information, drawn from his 

 own experience and observation, which has 

 not before been given to the public. The 

 volume is not simply a practical treatise for 

 the rose cultivator, but a pleasant contribu- 

 tion to the library of the scholar, or the 

 book-table of the lady's boudoir. 



It is not a little curious to see how much 

 more extravagant are the oriental nations 

 in their fondness for roses, than ourselves ; 

 though one might reasonably conclude, from 

 an examination of the immense catalogues 

 of some of our nurserymen, that we were 

 almost beset with a rosc-viania. We quote 

 the following paragraph from page 139 : 



" The Rose is to this day also extensively 



