THE DOG-ROSE. 147 



branded is so marked because it looks like what it is not, 

 and is inferior to what it thus resembles, but it will at 

 once be seen that our beautiful briar is no counterfeit of 

 some nobler plant, and it seems a piece of gratuitous insult 

 to pass over all its charms, and merely to call it worthless. 

 We can, therefore, only think that the prefix does not here 

 bear the significance that it certainly does in many other 

 cases. The specific name canina, its French name rose de 

 chien, and its German name hund-rose, all tell against our 

 view ; but the specific name is probably by no means so old 

 as its familiar English name ; and the old botanists, finding 

 it already dog-rose in popular parlance, possibly translated 

 it without much question. It has been suggested by no 

 mean authority that the name refers to its long prickly 

 stems; dagge is an old English word for a dagger. The 

 plant is well defended, and whosoever will bear off its 

 blossoms must be prepared to face its thorns. The dog- 

 wood is certainly so called because the hardness of its wood 

 makes it particularly suitable for skewers, and in the olden 

 time, when iron goods were less accessible, it was employed 

 in preference to any other for this service. 



The dog-rose owes, no doubt, some of its popularity to 

 the fact that it is a flower of. the early summer; its 

 blossoms expand in the early days of June, and last until 

 about the middle of July. Later on, the wealth of floral 

 beauty increases so rapidly that this association of par- 

 ticular plants with special seasons is to a great extent lost ; 

 but as we welcome the snowdrop and the primrose the 

 more, beautiful as they are in themselves, because they tell 

 us that winter is passing away, and the year is opening 

 out, that the dark dull days are past, and the sunshine 

 and awakening life of spring are at hand, so the wild 



