Very, very interesting! And Cardinal Carasa needs to get over it, because nothing smells better than a sweet-smelling rose. :)

Juliet

Juliet, I've heard of people who can't tolerate the intense fragrance of damask scent. As Alexander Pope wrote, it's a good thing our olfactory sense isn't stronger than it is; otherwise we would "Die of a rose, in aromatic pain" (Essay on Man). I love that line.

More random pedantry: here is Thomas Browne (The Gardens of Cyrus, also 17th century) on the sepals of the rose. Very nicely observed:

"The rose at first is thought to have been of five leaves, as it yet groweth wilde among us; but in the most luxuriant, the calicular leaves [sepals] do still maintain that number. But nothing is more admired then the five Brethren of the Rose, and the strange disposure of the Appendices or Beards, in the calicular leaves thereof, which in despair of resolution is tolerably salved from this contrivance, best ordered and suited for the free closure of them before explication. For those two which are smooth, and of no beard are contrived to lye undermost, as without prominent parts, and fit to be smoothly covered; the other two which are beset with Beards on either side, stand outward and uncovered, but the fifth or half-bearded leaf is covered on the bare side but on the open side stands free, and bearded like the other."

Michael, I cannot think of a better, more romantic way to die than to "die of a rose, in aromatic pain". I love that line too!

Thanks for the intellectual stimulation by way of random pedantry, as you say.

Juliet

On second thought, the passage about sepals is pretty opaque, so here's a paraphrase:

The original roses were of five petals, like our wild roses; but even very double roses still have five sepals. People have been puzzled by the five sepals with their peculiar arrangement of fringes, but that can be explained by the need to be tightly closed before they open. For the two sepals with no fringe lie undermost where the edges can be smoothly covered by other sepals; the two with fringe on both edges are the outermost; and the one with fringe only on one side has its smooth edge covered by another sepal, while its fringy side is. exposed.

(I bet somebody had tried to give a symbolic explanation of this arrangement.)

There IS a symbolic explanation!
Or at least an allegory about five brothers, some with beards and others not.
I got it some time back from Bob Martin, but it is a very old riddle, I think.

Jeri

Last fall, my box of roses came and General Washington was blooming. I stuck my nose in it, and had to run away.
It smelled like rotten garbage.
For three days until the bloom fell off, I kept checking back, thinking I was crazy. But it was still stinking to high heaven.
If it stinks like that this summer, out it goes.

I don't remember the exact passage now, but in his book on the "antique" roses Graham Stuart Thomas quotes an old writer with regards to his intolerance for the odor of Rosa gallica (I think?, it was something such as that) when it is in full bloom in a friend's garden. The friend had a walkway in that garden lined with gallica, and when it was in full bloom the smell of the flowers gave the writer a headache.

I can imagine how such a thing might be possible, but given that I love the smell of Easter lilies, Trumpet lily hybrids, Oriental lily hybrids, and hyacinths I doubt I would suffer much from such a walkway!

:)

I do love my stinky sweet flowers! :)

I too have heard of people who couldn't stand rose fragrance. I love all those powerfully scented flowers myself, and fragrance in general, but I can't eat if I have a bloom of 'Cl. Etoile de Holland' on the table: the Damask smell is just too strong.
Your offerings are great, Michael: thanks!!
Melissa

Jeri, thanks for the hint. Here is the riddle (God bless Google):

On a summer's day, in sultry weather,
Five bretheren were born together.
Two had beards and two had none,
And the other had but half of one.

That's one tough riddle! Browne around 1640 was referring to this form of it, since there are verbal echoes.

Richard Mabey quotes that version in the 'Flora Britannica' as being transmitted through a line of distinguished gardeners from Canon Ellacombe to Edward Bowles to William T Stearn. It is the dog rose, of course.

I vaguely remember some Colonial pedant discoursing on the following lines:

Beyond his hope, Eve separate he spies,
Veild in a Cloud of Fragrance, where she stood,
Half spiÂd, so thick the Roses bushing round
About her glowd, oft stooping to support
Each Flowr of slender stalk, whose head though gay
Carnation, Purple, Azure, or speckt with Gold,
Hung drooping unsustained, them she upstaies
Gently with Mirtle band, mindless the while,
Her self, though fairest unsupported Flowr,
From her best prop so farr, and storm so nigh.

Roses being prelapsarian?

Hi, Michael :)

Jon

Jon, as you know, roses before the Fall had no thorns, which is a good thing for naked Eve in the rose patch.

Sounds like Cardinal Carasa had allergies, or asthma, or both. I do also, and sometimes I go into a rose show and just start coughing uncontrollably until I walk back out. But only some shows, and I haven't narrowed down the particular rose that causes it. I grow lots of very fragrant roses, and it's none of those. That's all I can say -- it's there somewhere.

Kathy

"...whence to cold and moist brains, the smell is not proper, but to hot brains the rose is comfortable..."

I guess I just found out I have a pretty hot brain! Thanks, Michael!

The only strongly sweet fragrances I've so far found objectionable among the flowers are all tropical ones.

I'm not so fond of the Aroids when they bloom. Somehow it seems that when they don't have flowers that smell like carrion ("voodoo lilies" are in the Araceae family), they have flowers with a really cloying, sickly sweet odor. (If you've ever been in a production greenhouse full of blooming Spathiphyllums I suspect you know what I'm getting at. The last time I was in such a greenhouse was when I was 16, in 1976, but I still remember! :) )

Great thread! I am giving a talk on roses to one the local garden clubs and I think I shall start with the riddle.
Thank you everyone.

The friend had a walkway in that garden lined with gallica, and when it was in full bloom the smell of the flowers gave the writer a headache.

Sometimes it's the intensity. I love the smell of gardenias and usually have a vase with one or two when they're in bloom. Once I brought in a small potted one in full bloom, and had to put it back out because the scent became overwhelming and gave me a headache. With some flowers, less is more.