THE BOOK OF ROSES. 3 



beautiful kinds indigenous in specific countries, 

 we will commence with North America ; where, 

 in the glaciers of the most northerly provinces, 

 grows the Rosa blanda, which unfolds its bright 

 pink corolla, always solitary on the stem, im- 

 mediately on the melting of the snows. This 

 shrub is peculiar to the frozen deserts between 

 70 and 75 N. latitude. Within the polar cir- 

 cle, on the shores of the Hudson, is found the 

 Rosa rapa, or Hudsoniana, covered during spring 

 with clusters of double flowers, of a pale colour. 

 Newfoundland and Labrador possess, in addi- 

 tion to the two species above named, the Rosa 

 fraxinifolia, or ash-leafed rose, a small red 

 blossom with heart-shaped petals ; the Rosa 

 nitida, the small cup-shaped, deep-red flowers 

 and fruit of which abound under the stunted 

 shrubs dispersed over the coasts. The Esqui- 

 maux are fond of decorating their hair, and the 

 seal-skins and skins of rein-deer in which they 

 are clothed, with these beautiful blossoms. 



The United States, and adjacent Indian set- 

 tlements, possess a great variety of roses, of 

 which a few striking species may be enume- 

 rated. In the marshes of Carolina grows the 

 Rosa lucida, the bright clusters of which rise 

 above the reeds and rushes ; beside the waves 

 of the Missouri, the Rosa Woodsii; and in the 

 adjoining marshes, the Rosa Carolina, and 

 Rosa Evratina, whose double-flowers, of a pale 



B 2 



