THE ROSE, -

HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE;

GATHERED

FROM VARIOUS SOURCES.

Y i
By HENRY SHAW,

“TOWER GROVE.

SAINT LOUIS:
R. P. STUDLEY & Co., Printers and Binders.
1879.
oo

Rosa, from rhos, red, in the language of Armorica,
(a province of ancient Gaul,)

Ropon, Greek, and

Rosa, Latin.

~~ Pa

SHstorical,

F hoe ROSE has been a favorite flower from

time immemorial, among the civilized nations of
Europe and Asia. Many ages ago Anacreon sang
the praises of the Rose. He calls it ‘“‘the most
beautiful of flowers,’? ‘‘the delight of the gods,”’
‘‘the favorite of the Muses,’’ and since that time it
has been denominated the Queen of Flowers. It is
frequently spoken of in Holy Writ, and Homer often
refers to the Rose, both in the [liad and the Odyssy.

It may be said to be the oldest of celebrated flowers,

wY ed
~

4 THE ROSE.

and, in the impassioned strains of the ancients, we
find it associated with the Lily of the Valley, as ex-
pressive of all that is pleasing to the senses, and ren-
ovating to the mind.

In the mythologic ages it was sacred as the flower
of young affection and endearment, and of mature
love—the flower of Cupid and Venus, and stripping
this of the mythological phraseology, which in all
cases was a fictitious mantle, thrown around some-
thing previously felt, no similitude of any flower could
be more appropriate. The rosebud, the sweetest
object that appears in the garden, is typical of all
beginnings from the issue of which joy and pleasure

may be expected.

‘“¢ Ah see the Virgin Rose, how sweetly shee
Dost first peep forth with bashful modestie,

That fairer seems, the less you see her may!

Lo! see soon after, how more bold and free

Her bared bosom she doth broad display !

Lo! see soon after how she fades and falls away !”

Spenser’s Faerie Queen—1589.

The early dawn; young schemes and projects; young
life; young love, anda hundred other associations, all
of a delightful kind, are associated with the Rosebud.

There seems a physical attraction in it beyond all

THE ROSE.

flowers in every stage of its growth, and an attraction
which addresses itself strongly to the feelings. When
roses are in full bloom, they certainly are the most
delightful flowers the amateur can cultivate; the Rose

is the most obedient to his labor, and rewards the

cultivator richly for his care and skill. Still, there are

persons who share with the black beetle a positive
dislike for the Rose. Among those who have taken so
prominent a part in public life as to have attracted
the attention of history, is the famous Chevalier de
Guise, who could not smell a rose without feeling .
uncomfortable; and Vinieri, one of the Doges of
Venice, suffered under the same inconvenience for
the enjoyment of the garden. Anne of Austria, wife
of Louis XIII, could not even look at a rose in a

picture without being seized with tantrums.

In the East there is still the belief that the first
Rose was formed by a tear of the Prophet Mahomet,
but nations of more cool and dispassionate imagina-
tions have sometimes admitted that its origin was
lost in obscurity. Roses were used in very early
history among the most potent ingredients of love
philters. They seem to have been imported by the

Romans from Egypt until the age of Domitian.

6 THE ROSE.

Antiochus slept upon a bed of rose leaves; Mark
Anthony begged that Cleopatra would cover his tomb
with these flowers, and, mea rosa was a favorite term
with Roman lovers. Homer has adorned the shield
of Achilles, and the helmet of Hector with roses.
Among the Greeks it was customary to leave bequests
for the maintenance of rose gardens over the grave
of the testator, and at Torecallo, near Venice, an
inscription may still be seen, which shows that the
fashion was adopted in Italy. In Turkey, a stone
rose is often sculptured above the graves of unmar-
ried women. A charming bas-relief on the tomb of
Madame de la Live, who died at the age of twenty-

one, represents Time mowing a Rose with his scythe.

According to Indian mythology, Pagodastri, one of
the wives of Vishnu, was foundinarose. Zoroaster is
said to have made a rose-tree spring out of the earth
and bud and bloom in the presence of Darius, who
had called upon him to perform a miracle. In one
of the books attributed to Solomon, eternal wisdom
is compared to rose-trees at Jericho. Princess Nou-
mahal, the most lovely lady in the harem of the Great
Mogul, had a canal filled with rose-water, and rowed

about in it with her august consort, the heat of the

THE ROSE. 7

sun disengaged the essential oil from the water, and
their majesties having observed the fact, invented Otto
of Roses. When the Soldan, Saladin, who had so much
trouble with our hard-fisted King Richard, and his
turbulent christian friends, took Jerusalem in 1188,
he would not enter the Temple, which he profanely
called a mosque, until he had its walls washed with
rose-water; and Samet assures us that five hundred
camels were no more than sufficient to carry the
purifying fluid. Also after the taking of Constanti-
nople by’ Mahomet II, in 1455, the church of Saint
Sophia was solemnly purified with rose-water before
it was converted into a mosque. The high priest of
the Hebrews wore a crown of roses when he offered
up certain sacrifices under the Mosaic: dispensation,
and it was perhaps in remembrance of this fact, that
the Synod of Nismes, which was held in the third
century, enjoined every Jew to wear a rose on his,
breast, as a distinguishing mark of his inferiority.
In many countries, the Jews still celebrate the festi-
val of Eastern Flowers; during which they ornament

their lamps, chandeliers and beds with roses.

When Maria Antoinette passed through Nancy, on

her way to be married to Lewis XVI, the ladies of

D

THE ROSE.

Lorraine prepared her a bed strewed with roses. In
the middle ages roses were held so precious in France
that a royal license was necessary to erow them ;
Charlemagne, recommended the cultivation of the
Rose in his ‘‘ Capitulation.” The Persians of Shiraz
stop their wine bottles with roses to give the wine a
| pleasing perfume; and during the festival of Abrizan,
which takes place during the equinox, Persian ladies
throw roses at each other when they visit. ‘On
entering the gardens of the royal palace of Persia,”’
says Sir Robert Porter, ‘‘ you are struck with the
appearance of rose-trees full fourteen feet high, laden
with thousands of roses, blooming and diffusing a del-
icacy of perfume, that imbued the whole atmosphere;
but in these delicious gardens of Negaristan, the
eye and the olfactories are not the only senses regaled
by the presence of the Rose; the ear is enchanted by
the wild and beautiful notes of multitudes of night-
ingales, whose warbling seem to increase in melody
and softness with the unfolding of their favorite flow-
ers. Here, indeed, is the genuine country of the

nightingale and the Rose.

At Rome the Golden Rose was consecrated by the

Pope and given to some prince or princess as a mark

= ;

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THE ROSE.

of the Sovereign Pontifi’s favor. Urban V gave

the Golden Rose to Joan, Queen of Sicily, in 1368.

Henry VIII of England received a golden Rose from

Julius II, and from Leo X. Roses were often, in the
days of chivalry, worn by the cavaliers in tourna-
ments, as an emblem of their devotion to love and

beauty.

THE ROSE.

Hescrvipline.

HE habits and colors of the several varieties of
cu the Rose are almost without end, and yet there
is great beauty in each of them. Then the perfume
with which they embalm the zephyr, as it plays gently
over them, diffusing an odor most delightful to the
sense, and exhilarating to the mind. In most in-
stances the odor of a flower dies along with it, but
not so with the Rose, for some leaves gathered by the
writer at Tower Grove, in 1852, and preserved in a
jar, are now, (1877), stillfragrant. We find it yield-
ing a variety of fragrant liquors, and the attar of
roses especially, when prepared in the valley of the
Ganges, or in Cashmire, where square miles are
devoted to the growth of this flower, is now almost
the only substance which, weight for weight, is more

valuable than gold.

THE ROSE.

The shrub varies in size, usually from one to six or
eight feet; the colors are red, white, yellow, purple-
striped, and in almost numberless shades and vari-
eties; the flowers single, semi-double and double; the
odor is universally grateful; the green rose is a mon-

strosity, without fragrance.

The Rose is cultivated in every garden, from that
of the most humble peasant to that of persons of
rank and wealth, but, will not grow to perfection
in the smoky, dusty atmosphere of large towns.
Some species, as Rosa centifolia, damascena, &c., are
also cultivated by commercial gardeners, on a large
scale, for distilling rose-water, or for making attar
or essential oil of Roses; six pounds of rose-leaves
will impregnate, by distillation, a gallon of water
strongly, with their odor, but a hundred pounds

affords scarcely half an ounce of attar. This most

delicious of all perfumed essences is obtained by the

simple distillation of rose-leaves. In our climate
Roses are not sufficiently scented to produce the
odoriferous essential oil. Among the most favorable
countries for the production of the most highly
scented Roses is the middle portion of European

Turkey, at the base of the southern slope of the Bal-

THE ROSE. a

kan mountains, in localities where the Roses are pro-
tected against all winds except those from the south;
and the flowers thus attain a luxuriance of perfume
and growth peculiar to these favored regions. The
center of the cultivation and distillation of the Rose
is the town of Kezanlik, situated in the province of
that name, and is watered by many mountain
streams that furnish a suitable water for the distilla-
tion of the precious attar. The numerous villages
of the province, inhabited by Turks and Christians
employed in the cultivation of the Rose, all live in
peace together and prosper; finding by experience
that it is better and more wise to work, than to waste
time in religious and political quarrels. The great
harvest commences May 15th, and lasts until June
dth or 10th; the gathering is done in the morning
before sun-rise, so as to have the benefit of all the
fresh perfume of the flowers, which might be drawn
off by the heat of day. Every Rose farmer bas
his own small, roughly constructed stills for pro-
ducing the otto or attar immediately after picking
the flowers; and thousands of industrious workers are
thus occupied. earning in the single short period of
twenty days the product of a year’s labor, cultiva-

ting and taking care of the growing plants. The

THE ROSE.

total yearly production of the province of Kazanlik
is from 3500 to 6000 pounds, the product of 1866. but
in 1872 only 1700 pounds could be obtained. When
distillation is over, the farmers come to the great
commercial centers of Constantinople and Adri-
anople to sell their products.

Unfortunate Kazanlik! ravaged by the horrors of

war; in place of quiet villages reposing in the valleys

of the Balkans, presents at this time (1877) a scene of
ruin and devastation; the dwellings of the inhabi-
tants. the churches of the Christians, and the mosques
of the Moslem, are now heaps of smouldering ruins.
The Rose cultivators slaughtered, fled, or suffering
from pestilence and famine; the Rose gardens, once
so delightful, are now overrun by hordes of Muscovite
soldiers, or serve as pens for the horses of the

Cossack.

THE ROSE.

he Geography of the Rose.

OSES in a wild state are natives of Persia, India
=| China, Barbary, Europe, and North America,

and confined to the northern hemisphere, never
having been found wild very near to, or south of the
Equator. The vast continent of Australia, rich in
botanical treasures as it is, has not yet revealed to us

a single species.

Among the wild roses of North America are Rosa
Hudsonensis, found on the shores of Hudson’s Bay,
within the polar circle, where it produces clusters of
double pale flowers. Rosa lucida is found in the
marshes of Carolina. Rosa Woodsiti is found on the
banks of the Missouri along with R. Carolina. Rosa
evratina grows on the marshy banks of the rivulets of
Virginia, and is extremely difficult of culture in gar-
dens. Rosa parvifolia is a diminutive shrub found on

the rising grounds of Pennsylvania. Rosa setigerais

16 THE ROSE.

found in South Carolina, and R. lavigata, a climb-
ing species, inhabiting the woods of Georgia, and was
used by the dusky belles of the forest to adorn their
hair. The Rose of Mexico, Josa Montezuma, is. 2
sweet scented thornless species, which aboundsin the
parts of Cerro Ventoso, near San Pedro, where it was

discovered by Messieurs Humboldt and Bonpland.

Asia can boast of a greater number of species of the
Rose than the rest of the earth united, thirty roses
that admit of accurate definition having been al-
ready established. Of these the vast empire of China,
where both agriculture and horticulture are arts in
high estimation, has a claim to fifteen. The southern
provinces of Asia, comprising those of India, offer
many curious species to our observation. In the gar-
dens of Kandahar, Samarcand, and Ispahan, the Rosa
arborea is cultivated in great profusion by the Per-
sians; this shrub, which attains a considerable size, is
covered during spring with an abundance of white

and scented blossoms.

The Rosa Damascena, transported to Europe from
Damascus by the Crusaders, affording to our gardens

an infinite number of beautiful varieties, adorns the

THE ROSE.

sundy deserts of Syria with its sweet and brightly

tinted flowers.

In Europe even Iceland and Lapland produce the
Sweet Briar, blooming almost under the snows of
those severe climates. Six species are indigenous to
Britain, including the well known Dog Rose. The
Swiss mountains and Alpine chain are in general rich
in native roses. In the eastern and southern coun-
tries of Europe, rose trees abound; Italy and Spain
have several distinct species. The Rosa sempervirens,
common in the Balearic Islands, grows spontaneous-
ly throughout the south of Europe, and in Barbary, its
foliage of glossy green, is intermingled with a profu-

sion of small white highly scented flowers.

For France nineteen are claimed by the Flora of

Decandolle; in the southern provinces is found R:-
Eglantina, whose golden petals are sometimes varied
into a rich orange. In the forests of Auvergne we
find the Rosa cinnamomum, which derives its name
from the color of its branches; its flowers being
small, red and solitary; the Champagne Rose, a beau-
tiful miniature shrub, adorns the fertile valleys in the

neighborhood of Dijon, with its very double but small

2

18

THE ROSE.

crimson blossoms, and the Rosa Gallica, is one that

has afforded varieties of every hue, including the

Province Roses, white, pink, and crimson.

The genus Rosa comprises about a hundred distinet

species, a few of which and their varieties, are grown

in the Missouri Botanical Garden.

Rosa bracteata.—The Macartney Rose.

66

66

spinosissima.—The Scotch Rose.

lucida.—The Burnett Rose.

Centifolia.—The hundred-leaved or Cabbage
Rose; its varieties include the Single

and Double Moss and the White Moss
Rose. Provins Roses are of this class.

Hibernica.—The Irish and R. Lutea, the Yel-
low Rose.
rubiginosa.—The Eglantine or Sweet Briar.

Indica.—The common China, or monthly Ben-

gal which has many varieties.

Indica odorata.—The tea scented; of this class
are the popular Marshal Neil and Duchess
of Edinburg Roses.

multiflora.— The Noisette, of American ori-

gin.

Banksia.—Rosa galica, the French.

THE ROSE. 19

Rosa Bourboniana—Isle of Bourbon Roses. Some
of the most beautiful of Autumnal

Roses belong to this class, the Autumn
indeed being their peculiar season. The
first plant was introduced to France in
1822, and having attracted the attention
of the leading rose growers of Paris, they
set to work and propagated it exten-
sively. From July to September they
are constantly in bloom at Tower Grove.

Climbing Roses are Rosa sempervirens, Rosa arven-
sis, the Ayrshire, Ruga, Multiflora, Rosa Russelliana,
the Boursault Rose; among the American species is
the Prairie Rose. Rosa setigera of Michaux, a splen-
ded native rose of the Southern and Western States,

of which about twenty varieties are in cultivation.

Rosa Hibernica, with prickles of stem, rather hook- —
ed, leaflets eliptical, smooth. Discovered and describ-
ed by John Templeton, Esq., in the county of Down,
about Belfast harbor, where it grows abundantly,
flowering from the early part of June to the middle
of November. The discoverer of this Rose, thus be-
came entitled to the liberal reward of £50 offered
by the patrons of botany at Dublin, for the discovery

- of any new Irish plant. The stem is six feet high,

20 THE ROSE.

and much branched; flowers pale blush colored;
fruit scarlet, smooth and globose. Doctor Taylor also
found other native Irish Roses of distinct species.
The sweet briar, or Eglantine ofthe poets, has the un-
der leaflets clothed with reddish viscid glands, the
seat of a delightfulfragrance. Almost all the culti-
vated open ground sorts delight in a rich moist soil,
and an open situation free from smoke and dust,
where they are much finer than when they are upon

a dry soil or in a shady situation.

Rosa Laurenciana, Fairy roses. These beautiful
little plants of sixteen varieties, are well worthy our
attention, from their dwarfness and perfect symmetry
of form, often flowering when not more than six inches
high, and for the beautiful color of their diminutive
rosebuds; they are named in honor of Miss Lawrence
who published in 1799 a collection of engravings of
the Rose accurately drawn, and elegantly colored;
this lady’s name is perpetuated in this class, Lauren-
ciana. Rosa moschata, the Musk Rose, a very beau-
tiful class of single Roses, very fragrant with flowers
in bunches. The musky odor is very perceptible,
even at some distance from the plant, particularly in

the evening.

THE ROSE. 21

“When each inconstant breeze that blows,
Steals essence from the musky Rose.”’

It was formerly much valued for its: fragrance when

musk was a fashionable perfume.

Loudon gives the description of 97 distinct species,
and the names of 468 varieties that he had seen in

cultivation in 1840. -

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THE ROSE. 23

A History of Roses by a Freuch
osarian, LO74,

ety years ago the Rose list of Decemet was
Ss considered very full; it included 300 roses. In

1830 we knew about 2,500 varieties ; we have now
more than double that number, and this fact is main-
ly owing to the seedlings by hybridisations, and the

intelligent selections of French florists.

If France is not the native country of the Rose
which like the vine was born in Asia, it is in France
that the vine and the Rose have found the soil, the
climate and the care which have made their fortunes.
More than 5000 Roses! and how many simple ad-
mirers of nature, with the poets at their head, seem
to think them only one; the Rose of Homer, of Vir-
gil, of Delille, and of St. Lambert. But of the poets’

Rose we have no picture, no actual record. There is

24 THE ROSE.

every reason to suppose however, it was the Rosa
centifolia, the Hundred-leaved Rose, which the poets
sang, and it was almost the only one to which the
painters paid homage; since Redoute (a celebrated
painter of flowers) their pencils have delineated
many of the lovely varieties which our gardens have ~
produced; but look at the paintings of the 16th, 17th
and 18th centuries, and you will see none but the
Cabbage (100-leaved) Rose, the English White and
Red Roses of York and Lancaster and the Yellow Rose
which only became really double about a hundred
years since. We must admit the Cabbage Rose, as
the Dutch formed it, has never yet been surpassed
by any of the productions of our florists, none had
even approached it; and it has the advantage of flow-
ering twice a year like the Roses of Pzstum, which
were probably a kind of fourseasons Rose. In almost
every country these roses are apparently as old as the
hills: but itis from the Asiatic hundred-petaled rose

tribe that man has everywhere his first delight.

The Rose of Provence, down to the time of the cru-
sades at least, the only famous rose in France, was
the first of these oriental visitors acclimated amongst

us; the Rose of Damascus, which has much of their

THE ROSE.

blood in its veins, was brought to France it is said by
the Count De Brie. and the neighborhood of Brie,
Conté Robert, is still the great field from which
France supplies Europe and America with rose trees.
The old English Rose was a daughter or cousin to the
_ Provence Rose. Their Portland itself is a species of
Cabbage Rose. Centfeuilles—what rendered it famous
was its flowering twice. Where did the Dutch find
the true hundred petaled Rose? Perhaps. like us, they
got it from the Moors in Spain, or the merchants of
Smyrna. Wherever they obtained the original, it

was their art which developed all its beauties.

Till nearly the end of the reign of Louis the XIV
the gardens of Europe depended upon the same
source—improving the known varieties by grafting,
without raising seedlings. and making scarcely any
new acquisitions. In 1735 the Fairy Rose, Pompon,
was discovered in a wood near Dijon; it was not of
much beauty then. The Moss Ruse, issue of the Cab-
bage Rose, appeared about the same time. It is
thought that Miller. the learned English gardener ob-
tained it in 1727. The Countess de Genlis introduced

it into Paris about twenty years after that date.

But an unexpected era was now approaching. All

26 THE ROSE.

was changed when the Tea Rose reached us from
China, and the Bengal Rose from India. These pre-
cious shrubs, near relations, however, of the Dog Rose
of our own woods, were the richest presents that the
soil of India could give us. We possessed the finest
of roses, but they only blossomed during a few days at
the end of the spring; the new comers decorated our
gardens to the end of autumn with an abundance
and freshness of foliage and flowers hitherto unap-

proached.

These were, however, only half the treasures seat-
tered by Flora over the gardens which she loves.
The marriage of the old with the fruitful young rose
Was soon consummated, and from that time the wand
of the fairy multiplied the beauties in the hands of
our ablest florists. Hybridisation, and seedlings aid-
ing each other, there is scareely a limit to the caprice

of the most daring cultivator.

It was about 1789 that the Bengal and Tea Roses
became well known. The Banksian climbing Rose
was only brought from China in 1807. The Bourbon
Rose appeared somewhat later; the Noisette had then

already arrived from America.

THE ROSE.

Let us not be ungrateful to our old roses; at the
very moment when an unknown field was opened up
to us in the East, the Portland. cultivated by Mons.
Telieur, of Ville sur Ars, or perhaps by Mons. Sou-
chet, gave us that admirable Rose du Roi, so vigorous,
so hardy, so well formed, so delicious in color and

perfume.

The free-flowering Rose of China, bloomed for the
first time in France in 1812; the English knew it be-
fore that date; how many names and dates should we
have to inscribe, to perpetuate the memory of the
conquests of the Rosary during the last. fifty or sixty

years?

Many exquisite beauties have been brought by the
art of man from beneath the veil which nature had
thrown over them; but the most splendid remains
yet to be discovered, and the victory is not hopeless;
this is not the Blue Rose but the climbing Cabbage
Rose. A simple amateur discovered the Rose du Roi;
this ought to give hope to every one who possesses a
garden, and a little leisure to cultivate the worship of

Flora.

THE ROSE.

A rural feast of some parts of France is called the

festival of the Roses, in which the best behaved
maiden of the town or village is annually crown-
ed with Roses. The Persians have also an an-
nual festival of Roses, which consists of bands of
youths parading the streets with music, and offering
Roses to all they meet. for which they receive a tri-
fling gratuity. Rarities in Roses are held in high
estimation all over the world. - At the Botanical
Garden of the East Indian Island of Java. Dr. R. H.
Scheffer, the Director. states that there the Teas,
Noisettes and Bourbons grow well, and are always in
bloom without ceasing. ‘he Hybrid Perpetuals flow-
er best on the hills. The rich Chinese residing in
Java are great Rose buyers, and do not mind paying
25 florins for a young plant of the Green Rose, or for

a Marshal Neil.

War of the Roses in English history, the well
known feuds that prevailed between the houses of-
York and Laneaster, are so called from the emblems
adopted by their respective partisans; the adherents
of the house of York having the white, those of Lan-
caster the red Rose, as their distinguishing symbol.

These wars originated with the descendants of Ed-

THE ROSE.

ward the III, and after extending over a period of
eighty years, during which England formed an almost
uninterrupted scene of bloodshed and devastation,
were finally put an end to by the victory of Henry
Tudor, Earl of Richmond, over Richard III in 1485.
The victor uniting in his own person the title of Lan-
caster through his mother, and that of York by his
marriage with the daughter of Edward VI. Since
that period the Rose hag been the emblem of England,
as the thistle and shamrock are respectively the sym-

bols of Scotland and Ireland.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

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