EGLANTINE-—TueE Otpb ENGLIsH SWEETBRIER 
Fglantine. Sweetbrier Rose. (Ancient.) It was the writer's great privi- 
lege to accompany the late Francis Lester on many walks through his garden— 
admiring, investigating, snifing—for his was a keen nose for good smells. Some- 
thing about the apple-scented Eglantine, its age and tradition, its “‘Old Eng- 
lish,’’ as it appears at garden gate and round and about the simple Lester cottage, 
reminds me most of those walks, and is of deep and fragrant memory. But its 
charm is better told you by the old writers, to whom we will give, perhaps, 
more space than we should, hoping that you, too, may have pleasant memories 
of the Sweetbrier rose, and will erijoy reading their mellow words— 
From ‘‘PLANTING AND RurAL ORNAMENT, London, 1796. ‘‘Sweethrier—The 
leaves constitute the value of this plant; for they are possessed of so grateful an odour, as 
to claim admittance for this sort into the first class of aromatic plants; the odortferous 
particles they emit are sweet and inoffensive; and they bestow them in such profusion, espe- 
cially in evenings or after a shower, as to perfume the circumambient air to a considerable 
distance. For this reason, plenty of Sweetbriers should be planted near much-frequented 
walks; or if the borders of these are designed for more elegant flowering shrubs or plants, 
they may be stationed at a distance, out of view, and then they will secretly liberally bestow 
their sweets, to rhe refreshment of all. For nosegays, also, there is nothing more proper 
than sprigs of the Sweetbrier, when divested of its prickles; for they will not only have a 
good look as a fine green in the center of a posey, but will improve its odour, let the other 
flowers of which it is composed be what they will.”’ 
And from the ‘‘so-quotable’’ Dean Hole, in a ‘‘Boox Axsout Roszs,’’ England, 
1869, “So may the Sweetbrier, with no flowers to speak of, remind many a gaudy neighbor 
that fine feathers do not constitute a perfect bird, and that men have other senses as well as 
that of sight, to please . . . but the Eglantine to me, when I passed through ‘The Sweet 
Garden,’ as it is called, just after a soft May shower, had the sweetest scent of them all.” 
‘What rosarian dare up-raise his head to test the supremacy of Dean Hole?”’ 
J. Gordon Bennett of China Lake, California, dares these words,—*'Wrathful 
expresses my feelings when I read your belittling descriptions of Eglantine—this ‘so-quot- 
able’ Dean Hole should be sued for slander. ‘With no flowers to speak of, indeed! It is an 
exquisite rosey-pink jewel, hung on crumpled green leather,—the daintiest little wild-rose 
beauty ever.” 3 for 4.00 each 1.50 
if 
