152 SYLVA FLORIFERA. 



" Who has not heard of the vale of Cashmere, 

 With its roses the brightest that earth ever gave." 



T. Moore. 



The oriental poetry abounds in flowery 

 allusions to this plant. 



" You may place a hundred handfuls of 

 fragrant herbs and flowers before the night- 

 ingale, yet he wishes not, in his constant 

 heart, for more than the sweet breath of his 

 beloved rose."* 



" Oh ! sooner shall the rose of May 

 Mistake her own sweet nightingale, 

 And to some meaner minstrel's lay 



Open her bosom's glowing veil." T. Moore. 



The Ghebers say, that when Abraham, their 

 great prophet, was thrown into the fire by 

 order of Nimrod, the flame turned instantly 

 into " a bed of roses, where the child sweetly 

 reposed." f 



According to the Indian mythology, Pagoda 

 Siri, one of the wives of Wistnou, was found 

 in a rose. 



The island of Rhodes owes its name to the 

 prodigious quantity of roses with which it 

 abounds. 



Ludovico Verthema, who travelled into the 

 East in the year 1503, observes, that Taessa 



* J ami. f Tavernier. 



