36 THE ROSE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 



blood, should be entitled to the first presentage. Among the 

 princes of the royal family who submitted to this ceremony at 

 later periods, are numbered the dukes of Vendome, Beaumont, 

 Angouleme, and several other distinguished names. Henry IV., 

 while only King of Navarre, proved to the procureur-general 

 that neither he nor his predecessors had ever failed to perform 

 that duty. 



About the year 1631, there was published a very curious book 

 on the Rose, by a German named Rosenberg. About 250 octavo 

 pages are devoted entirely to the praise of the curative properties 

 of the Rose in almost every known disease, making, in fact, this 

 flower a universal panacea for the many ills to which flesh 

 is heir. The author also claims for it supernatural qualities, 

 particularly for driving away evil spirits. The work closes by 

 asserting, as a positive fact, supported by several authorities 

 which he quotes, the remarkable regeneration or resurrection of 

 the Rose. He gives also the process of this reproduction, which 

 is scarcely worth inserting here, being, like the story of the 

 Phrenix, a fable engendered by superstition upon ignorance. It 

 is somewhat surprising that this fable should have been very 

 gravely reproduced, in a French work on the Rose, published in 

 1800. The author states that, " notwithstanding the many 

 marvelous things which we already know respecting the im- 

 proving, forcing, changing, and multiplying of roses, we have yet 

 to describe the most surprising of all that of its regeneration ; 

 or, in other words, the manner of reproducing that flower from 

 its own ashes. This is called the imperial secret, because the 

 Emperor Ferdinand III. purchased it of a foreign chemist, at a 

 very high price." The conclusion is a rather amusing instance 

 of Munchausenism in the 19th century. " Finally, all this 

 material being placed in a glass vessel, with a certain quantity 

 of pure dew, forms a blue powder, from which, when heat is 

 applied, there springs a stem, leaves, and flowers, and a whole 

 and perfect plant is formed from its own ashes." 



It is difficult to credit the fact that, in any part of this 

 enlightened age, an author could be found who would gravely 



