1 40 FROM A MIDDLESEX GARDEN 



the North, where summer lasts but two months, boast of 

 roses, and travellers through Greenland and Northern Siberia 

 find at their certain season an abundance of roses of a certain 

 kind, for there are over one thousand species of the wild rose 

 known to botanists. Far away down the dim vistas of ages 

 to the present time the praises of the rose, justly designated 

 " the Queen of Blossoms," have been sung, and is the eternal 

 theme of sage, poet, and man of the world of all countries 

 alike. The word rosa, the old Latin name, is derived from 

 the Greek rhodon, " because," says Gerarde, " it sendeth foorth 

 plentie of smell." Throughout the vegetable kingdom there 

 is no genus which commands and receives so much atten- 

 tion from horticulturists as this order. Apart from the value 

 of the genus as an unrivalled collection of the most beautiful 

 floral objects, it forms an important factor in commerce ; the 

 manufacture of rose-water and attar giving employment to 

 thousands of persons. The rose is also a prominent con- 

 tributor to materia medica. As the emblem of youth it 

 was dedicated to Aurora ; of love and beauty to Venus ; of 

 danger and fugacity to Cupid. It was given by the latter, 

 according to classic writers, as a bribe to Harpocrates, the god 

 of silence ; hence, undoubtedly, the origin of the common 

 expression, " under the rose." In ancient Egypt it was also 

 the token of silence, as in ancient Greece this same signifi- 

 cance was preserved where Eros is often represented as offer- 

 ing a rose to Harpocrates, indicating the secrecy in which 

 love doth ever delight. 



In England the musk-rose was one of the earliest species 

 of roses cultivated, and rose-water was introduced about the 

 time of the Crusaders, when it became a custom to offer it to 

 guests in noblemen's houses with which to wash their hands 



