48 
The Rose. 
withstanding the fact that he endows her with more curative 
abilities than a whole college of physicians would dare to aspire 
to, he has the impudence to remark : “ What a pother have 
authors made with roses ! what a racket have they kept! I 
shall add, that the red roses are under Jupiter, damask under 
Venus, white under the Moon, and,” — here the old astrological 
doctor attempts probably his solitary intentional jest — “ Pro¬ 
vence under the King of France.” 
This last-named and extraordinary fragrant rose does not 
take its name from Provence, as is generally supposed, but 
from Provins, a small town about fifty miles from Paris, where 
it was formerly much cultivated. 
But the lineage, legends, and symbolic associations of the 
rose are an inexhaustible theme ; every poet has hymned, 
and every minstrel sung, the praises of this floral queen, and 
nothing now remains to tell, save these lines of Mrs. Hemans, 
in which all the flower’s endowments are found combined : 
“ How much of memory dwells amidst thy bloom, 
Rose! ever wearing beauty for thy dower! 
The bridal day — the festival — the tomb— 
Thou hast thy part in each, thou stateliest flower! 
“Therefore, with thy soft breath come floating by 
A thousand images of love and grief; 
Dreams, filled with tokens of mortality, 
Deep thoughts of all things beautiful and brief. 
“Not such thy spells o’er those that hailed thee first 
In the clear light of Eden’s golden day; 
• There thy rich leaves to crimson glory burst, 
Linked with no dim remembrance of decay. 
“ Rose! for the banquet gathered, and the bier; 
Rose! coloured now by human hope or pain; 
Surely, where death is not, nor change, nor fear, 
Yet we may meet thee, joy’s own flower, again!” 
