ROSE. (fs) 
variegated flowers. The full flower-buds of the 
French rose are used in medicine, and are ex- 
tensively raised for medicinal purposes in the 
vicinity of London. They are less fragrant than 
the flowers of the Provence rose; but they im- 
prove by drying. They have a pleasantly bitter 
and austere taste; and they yield both their taste 
and odour to boiling water. They possess astrin- 
gent and tonic properties; and are pharmaceuti- 
cally prepared in the forms of infusion, confec- 
tion, honey, and syrup. 
The damask rose, &. damascena, belongs also 
to the same subgenus as the Provence rose and 
the French, and was introduced to Britain from 
the Levant 20 or 25 years earlier than either. 
It has an average height of about 3 feet; and 
carries pink-coloured flowers in June and July; 
and is sometimes confounded with the normal 
Provence rose; and comprises a very great num- 
ber of garden varieties. The family of the da- 
mask rose, however, as usually grouped in cata- 
logues and collections, is one of the most incon- 
gruous of all the horticultural families, and com- 
prises not only a wide diversity of colours, such 
as white, white and red, flesh-coloured, striped, 
and red-margined, but also the most discrepant 
_ characters, and even perfectly contrasted habits. 
The musk rose, 2. moschata, was introduced to 
Britain from Barbary toward the close of the 
16th century. It is an evergreen, and belongs 
to the clustered-styled subgenus, and has long 
been a great and general favourite. It is na- 
turally a trailing or a climbing plant of about 
12 feet in length; but, when planted singly, it 
forms itself into an erect bush of 5 or 6 feet in 
height. Its stems are clothed with a green 
bark, and armed with strong, crooked, white 
spines; its leaves are five-lobed, smooth, and 
lucid green, and make a fine appearance in 
winter; its lobes or leaflets have acute points, 
and are slightly sawed on their edges; and its 
flowers come out in large bunches at the end of 
the branches, and are white, and have a strong 
musky odour, and bloom from July till October. 
A few varieties of it of very distinct character 
occur in gardens, some evergreen and others 
deciduous,—some not more than 4 feet high, and 
one so much as 30 feet high; but the family of 
musk roses, in the common horticultural ar- 
rangement, partakes largely of the uncertainty 
and confusion which prevail so generally through 
that arrangement.—T'wo indigenous species, the 
clustered -styled rose, 2. systyla, and the corn 
white dog rose, R. arvensis, belong to the same 
subgenus as the musk rose,—both inhabiting 
the hedges of various parts of Britain,—the for- 
mer about 6 feet high and carrying pink flowers 
from May till July,—and the latter about 8 feet 
high and carrying white flowers in June and 
July. 
The garden rose is the only flower which is beau- 
tiful in all its stages, from the instant of its inci- 
piently bursting the ealyx till it attains full bloom; 
it is also the only flower which is really rich in its 
confusion, or which is not the less elegant for the 
total absence of all uniformity and order; it like- 
wise possesses points or developments which rank 
as excellencies in one group and as blemishes in an- 
other; and it therefore is more difficult of definition 
than any other florist’s flower. Yet some very dis- 
tinct properties can be named as essential to good- 
ness in all roses whatever; and other and additional 
ones, as essential to all the varieties of each of some 
of the principal groups.—As to all roses whatever, 
—1l. The petals should be thick, broad, and smooth 
at the edges. Whether this be for a moss, which is 
never to be shown fully opened, or the florist’s fa- 
vourite, which is to be shown as a dahlia, this pro- 
perty is equally valuable, because the thicker the 
petal the longer it is in opening, and the longer does 
it continue in perfection when it is opened. ‘The 
thicker the petal, too, the more*dense and decided 
the shade or colour, or the more pure a white; while 
the most brilliant searlet would look tame and watery 
if the petal were thin, transparent, and flimsy. 2. 
The flower should be highly perfumed. Whether 
the plant climb the front of a house, or bloom on the 
ground, or mount poles or other devices, fragrance 
is one of the great charms which place the rose on 
the throne of the garden as the queen of flowers. 3. 
The flower should be double to the centre, high on 
the crown, round in the outline, and regular in the 
disposition of the petals The more double the 
flower. even when amounting to confusion, the more ~ 
full and beautiful the bud in allits stages. Those 
who have noticed the single and semi-double moss- 
roses will remember that the buds are thin and 
pointed, and starved-looking affairs, while the old 
common moss-rose, which is large and double as the 
cabbage-rose, is bold, full, rich, and effective, from 
the instant the calyx bursts.— As to every moss-rose, 
the quantity of moss, the length of the spines which 
form it, and its thickness or closeness on the stems, 
leaves, and calyx, cannot be too great; the length of 
the divisions of the calyx, and the ramifications at 
the end, cannot be too great; the plant should be 
bushy, the foliage strong, the flowers abundant and 
not crowded, and the bloom well out of the foliage; 
the colour should be bright or dense, as the case may 
be, and must be the same at the back as the front of 
the petals; and the stem should be strong and elas- 
tic, and the footstalks stiff, so as to hold the flower 
well up to view.— As to al! roses for stands, designed 
to be set out in detached flowers like dahlias, the 
petals should be imbrieated and in distinct rows, 
whether they be reflexed, like some of the velvety 
tuscan kind, or cupped like a ranunculus, and the 
petals to the centre should continue the same form, 
and only be reduced in size; the colour should be 
distinct and new, and stand fast against the sun and 
air, till the bloom fail; the stem should be strong, 
the footstalk stiff and elastic, the blooms well out 
beyond the foliage, and not in each other’s way. 
The very worst habit a rose can have is that of 
throwing up several blooms close together, on short 
stiff footstalks, some of which must be cut away be- 
fore the others can be fully developed; as show- 
flowers they are bad, and as plants they are very 
untidy; the side buds prevent the centre flowers 
from opening circularly, and when the first beauty is 
off them, they exhibit dead roses held fast between 
two living ones.— As to all noisette roses, the clus- 
ter should be sufficiently open to enable all the 
flowers to bloom freely, and the stems and footstalk 
should be firm and elastic, to hold the flower face 
upward, or face outward, and not to hang down, and 
show the outside. instead of the inside of the blooms; 
the bloom should be abundant at the end of every 
shoot; the blooming shoots should not exceed twelve 
inehes before they flower; the bloom should stand 
