THE ROSE. 25 



But let us return to our rose. We will not call it the Queen 

 of Flowers; we wUl avoid all the common-places of which it 

 has been the subject, and over which it has triumphed. Let 

 us look at it only, and say what we see. There is no country 

 without roses; from Sweden to the Coasts of Africa, from 

 Kamtschatka to Bengal, or on the Mountains of Mexico, the 

 rose flourishes in all climates and in aU soils; it is one of the 

 grand prodigalities of nature. 



The rose-tree before which we now stop is covered with 

 white blossoms. Others bear flowers, varying from the palest 

 rose to the deepest crimson and purple, from the most 

 delicate straw colour, to the most brUliant yellow. Blue is 

 the only colour nature has refused it. There are very few I 

 blue flowers. 



Piu-e blue is a privilege which, with some few exceptions, 

 nature only grants to the flowers of the fields and meadows. 

 She is parsimonious in blue : blue is the colour of the heavens, 

 and she only gives it to the poor, whom she loves above all 

 others. 



Botanists, who take no account of either colours or per- 

 fumes, pretend that double roses are monsters. What shall 

 we call the botanistsi We will exchamge a few words with 

 the botanists before we come to the end of this journey. 



This rose- tree was once a wild rose, or eglantine, which, ia 

 some obscure comer of a wood, decked itself with little 

 simple roses, each composed of five petals. One day, its head 

 and its arms were cut off; and then the skin of one of the 

 stumps which it was allowed to retain was opened, and between 

 the bark and the wood, a little morsel of the bark of another 

 rose-tree was insuiuated, upon which was a scarcely perceptible 

 bud. From that day all its strength, all its sap, all its life, 

 have been consecrated to the nourishment of this bud. The 

 wound is closed, but the cicatrice may still be seen. This 

 eglantine bears no flowers of its own : it is a slave, who works 

 for a haughty master. That beautiful tuft of leaves and 

 flowers are not its flowers or its leaves. 



But observe! there is, upon the green stem, just below the 

 graft, a rose-bud, which begins to peep out. That bud will 

 become a branch; that branch wiU belong to it. Oh, then 

 nature will resume her rights : the tyrant above, the beautiful 



