1 82 A BOOK ABOUT ROSES. 



" Gallica," responds the intelligent school-boy, 

 " is a Latin adjective, feminine gender, and signi- 

 fying French." But can the intelligent school-boy, 

 or the still more intelligent adult, inform us why 

 the Latin for French should be applied to this 

 particular section only of the multitudinous Roses 

 sent to us from France? "They who send," it 

 may be answered, " make a special claim, for they 

 call them * Rosiers de Provins,' and Provins surely 

 is in France, department Seine-et-Marne." Yes ! 

 but with every grateful recognition of the debt 

 which we owe to "our lively neighbor the Gaul" 

 (as Mr. Micawber calls him), it is well known that 

 in this instance the claim cannot be proved. The 

 birthplace of the Rose called Gallica is unknown, 

 disputed like the birthplace of Homer. " It is 

 from Asia," says one ; " it is the Rose of Miletus, 

 mentioned by Pliny." " It was first found," writes 

 a second, " upon Italian soil." ** It came from 

 Holland," cries Tertius, " beyond a doubt, and Van 

 Eden was the man who introduced it." 



The French Roses, so-called, we read in the 

 Horticultural Magazine, i. 282, have all been de- 

 rived from the original Tuscany. Van Eden and 

 others of Haarlem raised all the early varieties in 

 Holland ; and the first man in France who suc- 

 ceeded in raising new varieties from them was 



