to;
poem on the Rose, has commemorated this old story in the following
lines:—
“ The stake
Branches and buds, and spreading its green leaves,
Embowers and canopies the fair maid,
Who there stands glorified ; and Roses, then
First seen on earth since Paradise was lost.
Profusely blossom round her, white and red.
In all their rich variety of hues.”
According to a Roumanian tradition, the Rose was originally
a young and beauteous princess, who, while bathing in the sea, so
dazzled the Sun with the radiance of her loveliness, that he stood
still to gaze upon her, and covered her with kisses. Then for
three days he forgot his duty, and obstructed the progress of night.
Since that day the Lord of the Universe has changed the princess
into a Rose, and this is why the Rose always hangs her head and
blushes when the Sun gazes on her, r 1 • • r
Anacreon gives the following poetic account of the origin ot
the Rose, connecfting it with the goddess of love and beauty:
“ oh ! whence could such a plant have sprung?
Attend, for thus i he tale is sung :
When, humid from the silvery stream,
Effusing beauty’s warmest beam,
Venus appeared, in flushing hues,
Mellowed by ocean’s briny dews ;
When, in the starry courts above,
The pregnant brain of mighty Jov e
Disclosed the nymph of azure glance,
The nymph who shakes the martial lance ;
Then, then, in strange eventful hour,
The earth produced an infant flower,
Which sprung with blushing tinctures drest,
And wantoned o’er its parent’s breast.
The gods beheld this brilliant birth.
And hailed the Rose, the boon of earth,”—Moore.
Bion describes the Rose as springing from the blood of the slain
Adonis; and the Mahometans have a legend that it was produced
from a drop of perspiration which fell from the brow of Mahomet.
Relative to the colour of the Rose, we find a number of stories
left us by the ancients. Catullus tells us, that the Rose is red
from blushing for the wound it infli(5ted on the foot of Venus as
she hastened to the assistance of Adonis; Claudian, when Venus
plucks a Rose, says it is in remembrance of Adonis; an ancient
epigram mentions her wishing to defend Adonis from Mars, when
“ Her step she fixes on the cruel thorns;
And with her blood the pallid Rose adorns.”
Anacreon tells us that the flower was dyed with n e d ia r by the
gods:—
“ With nectar drops, a ruby tide,
The sweetly orient buds they dyed
And bade them bloom - th e flowers divine
Of Him who sheds the teeming Yine.’'—Moore.
Still another legend is to the effea that Cupid, whilst leading a
dance in heaven, stumbled and overset a bowl of ne^ar, which,
falling upon the earth, stained the Rose.
The Rose—the flower of love, poetry, and beauty—was specially
dedicated to Venus, who is sometimes represented crowned
with Roses, and sometimes with a sceptre terminated with that
flower. One of the Three Graces—the attendants of Venus—
usually carried a Rose in her hand. Cupid is often depicted
crowned with Roses, and the chaplet of Hymen consisted generally
of Marjoram or Roses, which latter flowers were used in his
feasts. The Thracians crowned Bacchus (Sabazius) with Roses,
and, in the vicinity of Pangæus, held a feast called Rosalia. In the
procession of the Corybantes, the goddess Cybele was pelted with
white Roses. 1 • . j u 4-v.
The Rose was a domestic flower sedulously cultivated by the
ancients, but especially by the Romans. It is said to have ^arly
flourished at Rhodes, and possibly gave its name to that island.
The Roses of Campania, Miletus, Præneste, Malta, Cyrene, and
Sybaris were all noted; but especially celebrated were those of
Pæstum: to this day the insignia of Pæstum—a Syren holding a
Eose—remains sculptured on the ruined arch of one of its gates.
Among the ancients, it was customary to crown brides and
bridegrooms with a chaplet of red and white Roses. The Roman
bride was decorated with a wreath of Roses and Myrtle. Ihe
shrines of the gods and of illustrious men in Rome were surmounted
with wreaths of Roses. The triumphal arches were
adorned with these flowers, and garlands of Roses were thrown
into the chariots. At the public games, wreaths of Roses were
presented to the senators, and sometimes to the perforniers and
speffiators. At the private entertainments of the ancients, the
guests wore wreaths of blooming Roses, The Romans thought
to impart additional relish to their feasts by the aid of the
fragrance of the Rose. Pacutus relates that “ even in tho time
of the Republic, people were not satisfied unless the c iÿ ot
Falernian wine were swimming with Roses.” The Spartan solidiers,
after the battle of Cirrha, were so fastidious as to refuse wino that
was not perfumed with Roses. At the famed regatta of Baiæ, the
whole surface of the Lucrine Lake used to be strewn with these
flowers. At some of his banquets, Nero caused showers of Roses
to be rained down upon his guests from apertures in the ceiling.,
Heliogabalus carried this pradtice to such an absurd extent, as to
cause the suffocation of some of his guests, who could not extricate
themselves from the heap of flowers. Cleopatra^ in the entertairi'
ment she gave in honour of Antony, spent an immense* sum^m
Roses, with which she had the floor of the banqueting chamber
covered to the depth of an ell, and over the flowers a thin net was.
drawn. The Romans were at great expense to procure Roses in
the Winter. Suetonius affirms that Nero spent upwards, ot tour