it. In vain was she radiant and red close on to Christmas-time as
in the fullest heats of midsummer. Nobody thought about her or
praised her. She pined and was very unhappy.

The Banksiae, who are little, frank, honest-hearted creatures, and
say out what they think, as such plebeian people will, used to
tell her roundly she was thankless for the supreme excellence of
her lot.

"You have everything the soul of a rose can wish for: a splendid
old wall with no nasty chinks in it; a careful gardener, who nips
all the larvae in the bud before they can do you any damage; sun,
water, care; above all, nobody ever cuts a single blossom off you!
What more can you wish for? This orangery is paradise!"

She did not answer.

What wounded her pride so deeply was just this fact, that they
never DID cut off any of her blossoms. When day after day, year
after year, she crowned herself with her rich crimson glory and no
one ever came nigh to behold or to gather it, she could have died
with vexation and humiliation.

Would nobody see she was worth anything?

The truth was that in this garden there was such an abundance of
very rare roses that a common though beautiful one like Rosa
Damascena remained unthought of; she was lovely, but then there
were so many lovelier still, or, at least, much more a la mode.