SCENTED ROSES. 
127 
of fine specimen blooms was mainly catered for both by the raisers of 
new Roses and in our Exhibitions. We were under the inspiration of 
such thoroughgoing enthusiasts as Dean Hole and Foster Melliar. Do 
we not remember that Foster Melliar openly declared that he did not 
consider the Rose pre-eminent as a garden plant ? He thought cut 
Roses were difficult to arrange in water for decorative effect ; his idea 
was that a good Rose should stand in a vase as a queen, and in his 
estimation the value of the Rose lay in the glory of its individual 
flowers. And Dean Hole, avowing himself more of a gardener than a 
botanist, dismissed details of classification to get on with cultural direc- 
tions. We know and appreciate their spirit. Make the Rose your 
hobby, work at your Roses all the year round, attend yourself person- 
ally as a true amateur to all the operations in the Rose calendar, and 
reap your reward in magnificent blooms to grace the vases in your 
home and the exhibition boxes in the Show tent. 
So for years it was laid down in the rules of the National Rose 
Society that the highest type of bloom is one which has form — size — 
brightness — substance and good foliage, and which is at the time of 
judging in the most perfect phase of its possible beauty. Form implied 
petals abundant and of good substance, regularly and gracefully 
arranged within a circular outline and having a well-formed centre. 
Size implied that the bloom was a full-size representative specimen 
of the variety. Brightness included freshness, brilliancy and /or 
purity of colour. There was nothing about scent. The rules have 
been modified to meet modern conditions and the introduction of many 
classes for decorative Roses, but there is still nothing, and it is difficult 
to see how there can be anything, in regard to scent, except in the 
directions for judging new Roses or sports. 
The production of fine specimen blooms was the aim and object : 
we need not criticize or depreciate this stage in development. I 
remember that the late Mr. Mawley used to call us a Council of 
Exhibitors, forgetting, I think perhaps of design, that to the Shows 
he owed at least his early enthusiasm and the National Rose Society 
its existence. Times have changed : our Rose Shows are no longer 
exclusively, or even largely, for the purely exhibition Rose, glorious 
as fine individual blooms may be ; our regulations are no longer limited 
to the form, colour, and size of single specimens, but concern decorative 
Roses in baskets, bowls, vases, and groups ; and, further, as I have said, 
fragrance does enter as one of the considerations in the judging of new 
seedling Roses and sports. 
Now, while it is comparatively easy to judge colour and form and 
to estimate with a fair degree of accuracy the value of a new intro- 
duction whether as an exhibition or a garden Rose or both, fragrance 
is rather an elusive element. Proverbially " tastes differ," and in 
regard to the question of scent perhaps especially is this the case. 
One will detect scent where another will assert there is none. Scent 
is so intangible, so indefinable, and not every person has an equally 
trained sense of smell for the appreciation of perfume. 
