Gerard, and was formerly much valued for its musky fragrance, when that scent was the fashionable perfume. The Persian attar of roses is said to be obtained from this species. The musk rose does best trained against a wall, on account of the length and weakness of its branches; and Miller adds that it should always be pruned in spring, as in winter it will not bear the knife. It requires very little pruning, as the flowers are produced at the extremities of the shoots, which are often 10 feet or 12 feet in length. It flowers freely, and is well worthy of cultivation. This rose is thought by some to be the same as that of Cyrene, which Athenæus has mentioned as affording a delicious perfume, but of this there is no certain evidence. It seems to have been rare in Europe in the time of Gessner, the botanist, who, in a letter to Dr. Occon, dated Zurich, 1565, says that it was growing in a garden at Augsburg, and he was extremely anxious that the doctor should procure some of its shoots for him. Rivers mentions that Olivier, a French traveler, speaks of a rose tree at Ispahan, called the "Chinese Rose Tree," fifteen feet high, formed by the union of several stems, each four or five inches in diameter. Seeds of this tree were sent to Paris and produced the common Musk Rose.

BANKSIANE.-BANKSIA ROSES.

(So called because all the species contained in this section agree in character with R. Banksiæ, a rose named in honor of Lady Banks.)

Stems

Stipules nearly free, subulate, or very narrow, usually deciduous. Leaflets usually ternate, shining. climbing. The species of this section are remarkable for their long, graceful, and often climbing, shoots, drooping flowers, and trifoliate, shining leaves. They are particu larly distinguished by their deciduous, subulate, or very narrow stipules. Their fruit is very variable.

R. Banksiæ, R. Br.-LADY BANKS' or BANKSIA ROSE. -Without prickles, glabrous, smooth. Leaflets 3 to 5,

lanceolate, sparingly serrated, approximate. Stipules bristle-like, scarcely attached to the petiole, rather glossy, deciduous. Flowers in umbel-like corymbs, numerous, very double, sweet-scented, nodding. Tube of the calyx a little dilated at the tip. Fruit globose, black. A native of China. A climbing shrub, flowering in June and July.

Description, etc.-This is an exceedingly beautiful and very remarkable kind of rose; the flowers being small, round, and very double, on long peduncles, and resembling in form the flowers of the double French cherry, or that of a small ranunculus, more than those of the generality of roses. The flowers of R. Banksia alba are remarkably fragrant, the scent strongly resembling that of violets.

Thunberg speaks of the Rosa rugosa as growing in China and Japan, being extensively cultivated in the gardens of those countries, and producing flowers of a pale red or pure white. The original plant is of a deep purple color. Siebold, in his treatise on the flowers of Japan, says that this rose had been already cultivated in China about eleven hundred years, and that the ladies of the Court, under the dynasty of Long, prepared a very choice pot-pourri by mixing its petals with musk and camphor.

More than one hundred distinct species are mentioned by botanists, in addition to those we have enumerated, but none of very marked characters or much known.

CHAPTER II.

GARDEN CLASSIFICATION.

The varieties of a plant are, by Botanists, designated by names intended to convey an idea of certain characteristics, the form and consistency of the leaves, the arrangement, number, size, and color of the flowers, seedvessels, etc. The varieties of roses, however, have so few distinct characteristics, that florists find it difficult to give any name expressive of the very slight shades of dif ference in the color or form of the flower. Fanciful names have therefore been chosen, indiscriminately, according to the taste of the grower; and we thus find classed, in brotherly nearness, Napoleon and Wellington, Queen Victoria and Louis Philippe, Othello and Wilberforce, with many others. Any half-dozen English or French rose growers may give the name of their favorite Wellington or Napoleon to a rose raised by each of them, and entirely different in form and color from the other five bearing the same name. Thus has arisen the great confu

sion in rose nomenclature.

A still greater difficulty and confusion, however, exists in the classification adopted by the various English aud French rose growers. By these, classes are multiplied and roses placed in them without sufficient attention to their distinctive characters; these are subsequently changed to other classes, to the utter confusion of those who are really desirous of obtaining some knowledge of the respective varieties. Even Rivers, the most correct of them all, has in several catalogues the same rose in as many different classes, and his book may perhaps place it in another. He thus comments upon this constant change:

"Within the last ten years, how many plants have been named and unnamed, classed and re-classed!-Professor A. placing it here, and Dr. B. placing it there! I can almost imagine Dame Nature laughing in her sleeve, when our philosophers are thus puzzled. Well, so it is, in a measure, with roses; a variety has often equal claims to two classes. First impressions have perhaps placed it in one, and there rival amateurs should let it remain."

If there exists, then, this doubt of the proper class to which many roses belong, we think it would be better to drop entirely this sub-classification, and adopt some more general heads, under one of which every rose can be classed. It may often be difficult to ascertain whether a rose is a Damask, a Provence, or a Hybrid China; but there can be no difficulty in ascertaining whether it is dwarf or climbing, whether it blooms once or more in the year, and whether the leaves are rough as in the Remontants, or smooth as in the Bengals. We have therefore endeavored to simplify the old classification, and have placed all roses under three principal heads, viz:

I. Those that make distinct and separate periods of bloom throughout the season, as the Remontant Roses. II. Those that bloom continually, without any temporary cessation, as the Bourbon, China, etc.

III. Those that bloom only once in the season, as the French and others.

Remontants.-The first of these divisions includes only the present Damask and Hybrid Perpetuals, and for these we know no term so expressive as the French Remontant. Perpetual" does not express their true character.

Everblooming Roses is the name we give to those included under the second general head. This is divided into five classes:

1. The Bourbon, the varieties of which are easily known by their luxuriant growth, and thick, large, leathery leaves. These are, moreover, reasonably hardy.

2. The China. This includes the present China, Tea, and Noisette Roses, which are now much confused, as there are many among the Teas which are not tea-scented, and among the Noisettes are those which do not bloom in clusters; they are, moreover, so much alike in their growth and habit, that it is better each should stand upon its own merits, and not on the characteristics of an imaginary class.

3. Musk.-Roses of this class are known by their rather rougher foliage.

4. Macartney. The varieties of this are distinguished by their very rich, glossy, almost evergreen foliage.

5. Microphylla.-A class easily distinguished by their peculiar foliage and straggling habit.

The third general head we divide again into five classes: 1. Garden Roses.-This includes all the present French, Provence, Hybrid Provence, Hybrid China, Hybrid Bourbon, White, and Damask Roses, many of which, under the old arrangement, differ more from others in their own class than from many in another class.

2. Moss Roses, all of which are easily distinguished. 3. Brier Roses, which will include the Sweet-Brier, Hybrid Sweet-Brier, and Austrian Brier.

4. Scotch Roses.

5. Climbing Roses; which are again divided into all the distinctive subdivisions.

In describing colors, we have given those which prevail. It is well known that many roses are very variable in this respect, and that the same flower will frequently be white or yellow, crimson or blush, at different periods of its bloom. We have seen a plant produce several flowers totally unlike each other; one being dark crimson, and the other pale blush. We therefore describe the prevailing color, and the cultivator should not be disappointed if his rose, the first season, should not correspond