We have hitherto viewed the Rose as the chief ornament of our gardens, and if we have found it abounding with charms of fragrance and beauty, we shall now find it occupying a prominent place in Materia Medica. Some authors have, with a degree of exaggeration, endeavored to make its medical as brilliant as its floral reputation. Rosenberg, in his work on the Rose, makes it a specific in every disease, and even attributes to it supernatural virtues.

In the opinion of most medical men, the medicinal properties of the Rose are about the same in all the kinds, while some writers assert that the Rosa Gallica is superior to all others in a greater or less degree. We will mention those principally used in medicine, and the properties which are especially attributed to each.

The most valuable properties of the Rose reside in its[Pg 199] petals, and in order to preserve these properties, it is highly essential that the petals should be quickly and perfectly dried. Those of the Provence Rose (Rosa Gallica) have an astringent and somewhat bitter taste, and are tonic and astringent in their effects.

According to an analysis recently made in France, they contain, besides vegetable matter and essential oil, a portion of gallic acid, coloring matter, albumen, tannin, some salts, with a base of potash or of chalk, silex, and oxide of iron. A small dose in powder strengthens the stomach and assists digestion. Their prolonged use will sometimes cause a slight constipation of the bowels, while in a much stronger dose they act as purgatives.

The conserve of the Provence Rose has much reputation in France for the treatment of all chronic affections of the bowels, caused by weakness and inactivity of the digestive organs; it is also employed in colic, in diarrh?a, in cases of hemorrhage and leucorrh?a.

The conserve of any variety of roses is considered excellent in cases of cold or catarrh. It is prepared by bruising in a mortar the petals with their weight in sugar, and moistening them with a little rose-water, until the whole forms a homogeneous mass. Some receipts prescribe powdered petals mixed with an equal part of sugar; others direct to use two layers of sugar, and only one layer of pulverized petals.

Opoix, a physician of Provence, states that the true Rose of Provence has a more sweet and penetrating fragrance than the same rose grown elsewhere, and even goes so far as to say that it has acquired properties which it does not possess in its native country, the Caucasus. On account of the supposed superior qualities of this rose, the citizens of Provence, in 1807, addressed a petition to government to encourage in their territory the cultivation of the true Provence Rose, by giving it the preference in all the hospitals and military dispensaries. This gave rise to a[Pg 200] discussion between two French chemists, but without deciding the fact whether the Rosa Gallica was superior in medical properties to any other rose. It seems to be acknowledged that those cultivated at Provence were superior to the same kind grown elsewhere, and this superiority is attributed by some to the presence of iron in the soil about that city. It was probably owing, also, to the very careful cultivation practiced there. The petals are used extensively in several medical preparations, as the sugar of roses, the ointment of roses, the treacle of roses, etc. Rose-water is, however, more extensively used in medicine than any other preparation of the rose. This water, when manufactured from Rosa Gallica, or any other of the section of Centifoli?, is employed internally as an astringent, and is sometimes mixed with other medicines to destroy............