For here the rose expands
Her paradise of leaves.
_Southey._
The ROSE, (_Rosa_) the Queen of Flowers, was given by Cupid to
Harpocrates, the God of Silence, as a bribe, to prevent him from
betraying the amours of Venus. A rose suspended from the ceiling
intimates that all is strictly confidential that passes under it. Hence
the phrase--_under the Rose_[075].
The rose was raised by Flora from the remains of a favorite nymph. Venus
and the Graces assisted in the transformation of the nymph into a
flower. Bacchus supplied streams of nectar to its root, and Vertumnus
showered his choicest perfumes on its head.
The loves of the Nightingale and the Rose have been celebrated by the
Muses of many lands. An Eastern poet says "You may place a hundred
handfuls of fragrant herbs and flowers before the Nightingale; yet he
wishes not, in his constant heart, for more than the sweet breath of his
beloved Rose."
The Turks say that the rose owes its origin to a drop of perspiration
that fell from the person of their prophet Mahommed.
The classical legend runs that the rose was at first of a pure white,
but a rose-thorn piercing the foot of Venus when she was hastening to
protect Adonis from the rage of Mars, her blood dyed the flower. Spenser
alludes to this legend:
White as the native rose, before the change
Which Venus' blood did on her leaves impress.
_Spenser_.
Milton says that in Paradise were,
Flowers of all hue, and _without thorns the rose_.
According to Zoroaster there was no thorn on the rose until Ahriman (the
Evil One) entered the world.
Here is Dr. Hooker's account of the origin of the red rose.
To sinless Eve's admiring sight
The rose expanded snowy white,
When in the ecstacy of bliss
She gave the modest flower a kiss,
And instantaneous, lo! it drew
From her red lip its blushing hue;
While from her breath it sweetness found,
And spread new fragrance all around.
This reminds me of a passage in Mrs. Barrett Browning's _Drama of Exile_
in which she makes Eve say--
--For was I not
At that last sunset seen in Paradise,
When all the westering clouds flashed out in throngs
Of sudden angel-faces, face by face,
All hushed and solemn, as a thought of God
Held them suspended,--was I not, that hour
The lady of the world, princess of life,
Mistress of feast and favour? _Could I touch
A Rose with my white hand, but it became
Redder at once?_
Another poet. (Mr. C. Cooke) tells us that a species of red rose with
all her blushing honors full upon her, taking pity on a very pale
maiden, changed complexions with the invalid and became herself as white
as snow.
Byron expressed a wish that all woman-kind had but one _rosy_ mouth,
that he might kiss all woman-kind at once. This, as some one has rightly
observed, is better than Caligula's wish that all mankind had but one
head that he might cut it off at a single blow.
Leigh Hunt has a pleasant line about the rose:
And what a red mouth hath the rose, the woman of the flowers!
In the Malay language the same word signifies _flowers_ and _women_.
Human beauty and the rose are ever suggesting images of each other to
the imagination of the poets. Shakespeare has a beautiful description of
the two little princes sleeping together in the Tower of London.
Their lips were four red roses on a stalk
That in their summer beauty kissed each other.
William Browne (our Devonshire Pastoral Poet) has a _rosy_ description
of a kiss:--
To her Amyntas
Came and saluted; never man before
More blest, nor like this kiss hath been another
But when two dangling cherries kist each other;
Nor ever beauties, like, met at such closes,
But in the kisses of two damask roses.
Here is something in the same spirit from Crashaw.
So have I seen
Two silken sister-flowers consult and lay
Their bashful cheeks together; newly they
Peeped from their buds, showed like the garden's eyes
Scarce waked, like was the crimson of their joys,
Like were the tears they wept, so like that one
Seemed but the other's kind reflection.
Loudon says that there is a rose called the _York and Lancaster_ which
when, it comes true has one half of the flower red and the other half
white. It was named in commemoration of the two houses at the marriage
of Henry VII. of Lancaster with Elizabeth of York.
Anacreon devotes one of his longest and best odes to the laudation of
the Rose. Such innumerable translations have been made of it that it is
now too well known for quotation in this place. Thomas Moore in his
version of the ode gives in a foot-note the following translation of a
fragment of the Lesbian poetess.
If Jove would give the leafy bowers
A queen for all their world of flowers
The Rose would be the choice of Jove,
And blush the queen of every grove
Sweetest child of weeping morning,
Gem the vest of earth adorning,
Eye of gardens, light of lawns,
Nursling of soft summer dawns
June's own earliest sigh it breathes,
Beauty's brow with lustre wreathes,
And to young Zephyr's warm caresses
Spreads abroad its verdant tresses,
Till blushing with the wanton's play
Its cheeks wear e'en a redder ray.
From the idea of excellence attached to this Queen of Flowers arose, as
Thomas Moore observes, the pretty proverbial expression used by
Aristophanes--_you have spoken roses_, a phrase adds the English poet,
somewhat similar to the _dire des fleurettes_ of the French.
The Festival of the Rose is still kept up in many villages of France and
Switzerland. On a certain day of every year the young unmarried women
assemble and undergo a solemn trial before competent judges, the most
virtuous and industrious girl obtains a crown of roses. In the valley of
Engandine, in Switzerland, a man accused of a crime but proved to be not
guilty, is publicly presented by a young maiden with a white rose called
the Rose of Innocence.
Of the truly elegant Moss Rose I need say nothing myself; it has been so
amply honored by far happier pens than mine. Here is a very ingenious
and graceful story of its origin. The lines are from the German.