462 
Old Time Gardens 
not seem old ; it is gifted with everlasting youth. 
We know how the Persians gather before a single 
plant in flower ; they spread their rugs, and pray 
before it ; and sit and meditate before it ; sip sher- 
bet, play the lute and guitar in the moonlight ; bring 
their friends and stand as in a vision, then talk in 
praises of it, and then all serenade it with an ode 
from Hafiz and depart. So would I gather my 
friends around this lovely old Rose, and share its 
beauty just as my friends at the manor-house share 
it with me ; and as the Persians, we would praise it 
in sunlight and by moonlight, and sing its beauty in 
verses. This York and Lancaster Rose was known 
to Parkinson in his day; it is his Rosa versicolor. I 
wonder why so few modern gardens contain this 
treasure. I know it does not rise to all the stand- 
ards of the modern Rose growers ; but it possesses 
something better — it has a living spirit; it speaks 
of history, romance, sentiment ; it awakens inspira- 
tion and. thought, it has an ever living interest, a 
significance. I wonder whether a hundred years 
from now any one will stand before some Crimson 
Rambler, which will then be ancient, and feel as I 
do before this York and Lancaster goddess. 
The fragrance of the sweetest Roses — the Dam- 
ask, the Cabbage, the York and Lancaster — is 
beyond any other flower-scent, it is irresistible, en- 
thralling; you cannot leave it. You can push aside 
a Syringa, a Honeysuckle, even a Mignonette, but 
there is a magic something which binds you irrevo- 
cably to the Rose. I have never doubted that the 
Rose has some compelling quality shared not by 
