York and Lancaster Roses 



the rose must have been well known and popular. 

 Shakespeare decides this, for he certainly mentions 

 the rose three if not four times : 



For flesh and blood, sir, white and red, you shall see a 

 rose ; and she were a rose indeed. 



Pericles^ Act iv. sc. 6. 



The roses fearfully in thorns did stand, 

 One blushing shame, another white despair ; 

 A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both, 

 And to his robbery had annexed thy breath. 



Sonnet xcix. 



I have seen roses damasked, red and white, 

 But no such roses see I in her cheeks. 



Sonnet cxxx. 



More white and red than dove and roses are. 



Venus and Adonis^ iv. 



Pericles was probably only written in part by 

 Shakespeare, but whether by him or a contem- 

 porary it matters little to my present purpose 

 i.e. to fix a date for the introduction of the rose. 

 The sonnets were published in 1609, but probably 

 written at least ten years earlier. 1 



I may now go to the botanists. The first 

 description of the rose is by Clusius, in 1601. 

 I omit his botanical description that I may find 

 place for Parkinson's, but he tells us that he first 



1 To these passages may perhaps be added the whole scene in 

 the Temple Garden, I Henry VI., Act ii. sc. 4. The text will 

 quite bear the interpretation that the different white and red roses 

 were all plucked from the same " thorn " or " briar." 



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