314 PLirfs NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XXI. 



rose does not admit of being planted in either a rich or an 

 argillaceous soil, nor yet on irrigated land ; being contented 

 with a thin, light earth, and more particularly attached to 

 ground on which old building rubbish has been laid. 



The rose of Campania is early, that of Miletus late, but it is 

 the rose of Praeneste that goes off the very latest of all. For 

 the rose, the ground is generally dug to a greater depth than it 

 is for corn, but not so deep as for the vine. It grows but very 

 slowly''^ from the seed, which is found in the calyx beneath the 

 petals of the flower, covered with a sort of down ; hence it is 

 that the method of grafting is usually the one preferred, or else 

 propagation from the eyes of the root, as in the reed.''^ One 

 kind is grafted, which bears a pale flower, with thorny 

 branches of a remarkable length ; it belongs to the quinquefolia 

 variety, being one of the Greek roses.'^* All roses are improved 

 by being pruned and cauterized; transplanting, too, makes 

 them grow, like the vine, all the better, and with the greatest 

 rapidity. The slips are cut some four fingers in length or 

 more, and are planted immediately after the setting of the 

 Vergiliae ; then, while the west winds are prevalent, they are 

 transplanted at intervals of a foot, the earth being frequently 

 turned up about them. 



Persons whose object it is to grow early roses, make a hole 

 a foot in width about the root, and pour warm water into it, 

 at the period when the buds are beginning to put forth.'^ 



CHAP. 11. (5.) THE LILY : FOUR VARIETIES OF IT. 



The lily holds the next highest rank after the rose, and has 

 a certain affinity'^® with it in respect of its unguent and the 

 oil extracted from it, which is known to us as ** lirinon."" 



''^ From Theophrastus, Hist. PLint. B. vi. c. 6. The rose is but very 

 rarely reproduced from seed. 



7^ See B. xvi. c. 67, and B. xvii. c. 33. 



?* Previously mentioned in tliis Chapter. The meaning of this passage, 

 however, is extremely doubtful. " Unum genus inseritur pallidae, spinosse, 

 longissimis virgis, quinquifolise, quae Graecis altera est." 



'5 If the water was only lukewarm. Fee says, it would be of no use, 

 and if hotter, the speedy death of the tree would be the result. 



'6 « Quadam cognatione." He alludes to a maceration of the petals of 

 the rose and lily in oil. The aroma of the lily, Fee says, has not been 

 fixed by any method yet found. 



" See B. xiii. c. 2. 



