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The roses were originally picked as much for their perfume as much for their color and form. (Unlike my first roses, which were bought purely because I was enchanted by their romantic names.) Of the basic musk, myrrh, tea, fruit and old-rose fragrances I am drawn to the latter two. Fruity is a broad bush on a night like tonight. Lady Emma Hamilton, reliable though now retired by the growers, is at her most giving: apricots and white peaches spring to mind. Gertrude Jekyll is one of the most intense of the old-rose scented varieties. She calls me over every time I set foot on the terrace.
Unlike the more generous jasmine, even the most scented rose requires us to bend a little, pushing the tip of our nose into the cluster of petals. Not so Gertrude tonight, mingling as she does with the white jasmine, hovering cloud-like over the hot stones of the terrace. I have a plan to bring the Queen of Denmark into the garden too, another old-rose scent, and I long for a decent musk rose such as Buff Beauty, exuding its faint note of cloves on a warm evening.
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