RosESj AND How TO Gbow Them!. 331 



ROSES, AND HOW TO GROW THEM. 

 Henry B. Ellwanoer. From Western New York Horticultural Report. 



This is a query put by many interested devotees of rose cult- 

 ure, annually, and one in which all who love floriculture in any 

 of its many forms have a never failing interest 



As we are ea6h year adding new sorts to our list of varieties 

 and are also making some occasional discoveries and improve- 

 ments in propagation and cultivation, it follows that our selection 

 of kinds and our treatment in culture will vary somewhat from 

 year to year, as new varieties appear to take the places of old fa- 

 vorites, and we have knowledge of improved methods for the care 

 of them. The first requisite is the selection and preparation of a 

 suitable place for planting. This is very important, as all that 

 follows depends upon the care used in this first step. 



To begin with, then, choose the best place you have in the gar- 

 den, a place where yoa can offer sufficient protection by means of 

 hedges or board fences from bleak sweeping winds. When fences 

 are used, their general ugliness can be most appropriately clothed 

 by roses themselves. A warm, sunny position is also requisite ; 

 if so situated that there is an exposure to the morning sun and 

 the hot rays during the afternoon are in part or wholly shaded, 

 all the better, but a certain amount of sunlight is as essential to 

 a rose's welfare as to our own, though many of us do not show 

 our appreciation of the blessings of sunlight as gratefully as do 

 our roses. Besides scattering them through our gardens, roses 

 may be made very effective planted in borders about our lawns, 

 eilher individually or in groups, and also planted in beds on the 

 lawn. When the latter is done, we may with great advantage 

 depart from the usual custom of growing the plants in bush form 

 and resort to what is termed the pegging down system. 



In this case the mode of procedure is quite simple. Having 

 planted our roses — for this purpose those on their own roots are 

 preferable — we allow them to grow the first season in the usual 

 way, the following autumn or spring the short and weak shoots 

 are entirely cut away, and the long ones carefully bent down and 



