JUNE. 123 



A HINT 

 ON THE OUT-DOOR CULTURE OF TEA-SCENTED ROSES. 



Being an ardent admirer of Roses, but more particularly of the Tea- 

 scented varieties, the culture of which I have pursued with great 

 success for several years, I am induced to offer a few remarks, think- 

 ing if my system were more generally known and adopted, it would 

 greatly tend to improve that beautiful class of flowers, both as re- 

 gards longevity, size, and blooms. All who are in the habit of buy- 

 ing Standard Tea- Roses must have found that, even with the best 

 culture, most of them are very short-lived : this circumstance induced 

 me to bud a few of the best sorts on the White Banksia, a stock 

 known to be exceedingly vigorous. I well recollect a few years 

 ago being in the garden of a friend, where I found some of the 

 most superb blooms of EHza Sauvage I had ever seen, and upon 

 inquiry I was told that it was budded on the Banksia ; this induced 

 me to try the experiment, and I have ever since had the finest flowers 

 that could possibly be produced. There are two large White Bank- 

 sias occupying a south-west wall in my garden ; on these I have 

 strong plants of Eliza Sauvage, Moire, Devoniensis, Josephine, Alal- 

 ton, Goubault, Safranot, Smith's Yellow, Vicomtesse de Cazes, Cloth 

 of Gold, and Pactolus. There are also on them good plants of Geant 

 des Batailles, Duchess of Sutherland, La Reine, (Hybrid Perpetuals,) 

 Souvenir de la Malmaison, Reine des Vierges, and Acldalie, besides 

 several buds of the best Teas, which were inserted last autumn ; all 

 are doing well, and the established plants bloom most beautifully. 

 It is worthy of remark that the Cloth of Gold is growing on a very 

 old stem of the Banksia ; in fact, it is more than half denuded of its 

 bark, and the plant even now shews an abundance of flower-buds, 

 and has always evinced a greater disposition to bloom than any other 

 I possess. One more suggestion I cannot help offering, viz. that 

 should any of your readers have a south-west wall unoccupied, they 

 cannot do better than plant it with Banksias ; it will soon be covered ; 

 and when the midsummer shoots are strong enough, bud them with 

 any of the Roses I have mentioned, and they will be amply repaid 

 by having a fine display of blooms from May till November. 



A. A. 



THE FRUITIST. 



The Purple Fontainebleau Grape. Some ten or twelve years 

 ago, in early autumn, when in the garden of the late Mr. Scott, a 

 retired agriculturist, then living at Wenden, near Saflfron Walden, 

 he directed my attention to a grape-vine against a south wall covered 

 with fruit, although very young. He stated that a friend had re- 

 cently brought it from France under the name of " The Muscat of 

 Fontainebleau," and that it was the hardiest, the earliest, and the 



