^ The Old <Hgses f% 



The Damask rose, which ' casts fragrant smell amid 

 fra golden graines,' came to us, according to tradition, 

 through the Crusaders. Small wonder that they brought 

 back with them this treasure from the gardens for which 

 Damascus in those days was so famed. For the Damask 

 rose is surely one of the loveliest flowers in the world. 

 With its exquisite petals flung wide to the sun, its great 

 golden eye and its atmosphere of a wondrously storied 

 past, there is something so arresting about the beauty of 

 this rose that familiarity only increases its hold on our 

 affection. 



According to Loiseleur-Deslongchamps this rose was 

 grown in France centuries before Crusading days, and he 

 says it was the rose extolled by Homer. There is no 

 reason why this rose should not have been grown by the 

 ancient Romans in their villas in Gaul, and if so, 

 considering the continual intercourse between all parts 

 of the Empire, it was quite possibly grown in England 

 also in those far-off days. In the troublous days of the 

 Saxon invasions it may have been lost. What roses, if 

 not varieties of R. centifolia, R. damascena, R. gallica 

 and R. alba, did they grow in the monastic gardens in 

 early Norman days? What were the roses William II 

 demanded to see in the convent garden of Romsey? 

 Eadmer, who records this famous incident, was told it by 

 Anselm, who had it direct from the Abbess Christina. 

 According to Eadmer, William Rufus desired to see 

 Maud (who was afterwards wife of Henry I) and went 

 to the convent of Romsey, where she was being educated 

 by her aunt, the Abbess Christina. On arriving at the 

 convent, he gave as his pretext that he wished to see the 

 roses and flowering herbs. Maud, veiled like the other 



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