70 IN A GLOUCESTEESHIRE GARDEN 



that, unlike other roses, which 'are fast flowers of 

 their smells ; so that j^ou may walk by a whole row 

 of them, and find nothing of their sweetness ; yea, 

 though it be in a morning's dew ' (Bacon), this rose 

 gives out its scent of its own accord for many yards 

 round, and to me the scent is unpleasant. I know 

 of only one other rose that can be called ill-scented, 

 the Austrian briar, and in that the scent is not very 

 perceptible; most of the modern hybrid roses have 

 no scent at all, which in a rose is almost unpardon- 

 able. A very pleasant book has been recently pub- 

 lished in France by M. Charles Joret, which is well 

 worth reading by any lover of roses, for its exhaustive 

 account of the classical and mediaeval history of the 

 rose; indeed, he carries it still further back, for he 

 quotes from one of the old miracle plays on the 

 Creation a speech of the Tempter, in which — ' Le 

 diable voulant depeindre la nature delicate et fragile 

 d'Eve, la compare k la rose : — 



' Tu es fieblette et tendre chose, 

 Et ce plus fresche que n'est rose.' 



This must be the earliest instance of the degradation 

 of the rose for the grossest flattery. Milton ventured 

 to plant the rose in Paradise, but of a special sort, 

 ' without thorn the rose ' ; but he has a touching 



