18 SPECIES AND VARIETIES. 



Rose, are not cf such robust and vigorous habits as when the China 

 Rose is the female parent." This looks like plain, straightforward 

 information ; but it is followed by the same incertitude as some of thr 

 other distinguishing features of families. Mr. Rivers adds: "But, per 

 haps, this is an opinion not borne out by facts ; for the exceptions are 

 numerous, and like many other variations in roses, and plants in gen- 

 eral, seems to bid defiance to systematic rules?' Of course, they do ; 

 and, with the exception of those names which bespeak a distinct char- 

 acter, the splitting of this beautiful flower into so many different fam- 

 ilies at all, was a very injudicious measure. Athelin, a Rose classed in 

 this group, is called also a Hybrid Bourbon, and as it blooms in clus- 

 ters, would have been much better understood if called a Noisette. 

 It comprises other roses as unlike each other as can be well imagined, 

 and many of them will shoot ten feet in a season, and would be much 

 more at home if classed as Climbing Roses. Belle de Rosny, among 

 this family, is nevertheless called also a Hybrid Bourbon, and many 

 others of this family are destined to be removed, if the senseless dis 

 tinctions by name are to be kept up. 



White Hoses. 



Here we have an illustration of the extreme folly of the present dis- 

 tinctions. We are told the roses of this division may be easily dis- 

 tinguished by their green shoots, and leaves of a glaucous green, 

 looking as if they were covere.4 with a grayish impalpable powder ; 

 and flowers generally of the most delicate colors, graduating from a 

 pure white to a bright but delicate pink. 



The Damask Rose. 



, .od is as incongruous a group as any. Blanche borde de rouge 

 has flowers sometimes a pure white, at others margined with red. 

 Claudine has flowers of a pale rose cclor. York and Lancaster, also 

 classed among them, has flowers striped with red and white. Coralie 

 is flesh color. Then we have Madame Hardy, which, we are fairly 

 told, "is not a pure Damask Rose;" perhaps not, as it is white, and 

 unlike all the rest Then, there is the Duke of Cambridge, which Mr. 



