The Rose, for matchless beauty famed, (although by botanists so
disregarded) has been the Painter’s study and the Poet’s theme, for ages
past, and will no doubt for ages yet to come; long after many a curious
Nondescript shall in a dusty hortus siccus sleep, unnoticed and unknown.
The intention of the author in the delineation of this unrivalled tribe,
is to arrange as accurately as possible the numerous beautiful
varieties, with their species--an arduous task, considering the neglect
they have experienced, and the wild and indiscriminate manner in which
they have been profusely mixed. This, aided by an heterogeneous mode of
culture, has produced many varieties, the lineal descent of which is
very difficult to ascertain.
The extent of the genus has been most vaguely estimated; by some
enumerated at two hundred and forty; an estimate that must certainly
include many very slight varieties, which, if allowed, might swell the
genus to ten times its real extent. But we think a rational computation
would confine them within a hundred, including every distinct variety.
The author’s intention is to figure only those to which a separate
character can be affixed, regarding a superfluous repetition, even of
beauty, inadmissible. As the merits of the present undertaking may
easily be appreciated by a free access to all its beautiful originals,
the author hopes a candid allowance will be made, upon a comparison with
the living plant, when it is considered that the most elaborate efforts
of art have never yet been able to do justice to its superior beauty.
ROSA muscosa, _Provincialis_.
_Moss Province Rose._