i66 A BOOK ABOUT ROSES 



of our best white Roses ; and Rose Devigne is 

 large and beautiful and blushing. These Roses, 

 having long and vigorous shoots, should not be 

 severely cut, or they will resent the insult by 

 ' running to wood ^ — excessive lignification, as I 

 once heard it termed by a magniloquent pedant, 

 and burst out laughing, to the intense disgust of 

 the speaker. 



And now I am not entirely exempt from the 

 fear, that with some such similar derision the reader 

 may receive a fact which I propose to submit to 

 him. It is, nevertheless, as true an incident in my 

 history as it may be a strange statement in his 

 ears, that, once upon a time, hard on fifty 

 summers since, I was driven out of London by a 

 Rose ! And thus it came to pass : Early in June, 

 that period of the year which tries, I think, more 

 than any other, the patience of the Rosarian, 

 waiting in his garden like some lover for his Maud, 

 and vexing his fond heart with idle fears, I was 

 glad to have a valid excuse for spending a few 

 days in town. To town I went, transacted my 

 business, saw the pictures, heard an opera, wept 

 my annual tear at a tragedy (whereupon a swell in 

 the contiguous stall looked at me as though I were 

 going to drown him), visited the Nurseries, rode in 

 the Park, met old friends, and was beginning to 



