338 THE GARDENER. [Aug. 



perhaps, lying peacefully on their backs in the sawdust, they may see 

 the error of their ways, and come to a better mind. They may rise 

 up, sorer and wiser men, and, meekly seeking the nearest reformatory, 

 may gradually amend and improve, until at last they become regular 

 subscribers to the ' Gardener,' and respectable subjects of the Queen 

 of Flowers. Be it mine, meanwhile, to teach the virtuous amateur 

 how to buy a charger, and how to ride him, what Roses to show, and 

 how to show them, first reminding him that he must have a good 

 stable, good corn, and good equipments in readiness for his steed — must 

 be armed before he competes with those weapons which I have named 

 before as essential to success, and which I must once more ask leave 

 to commend. He must have an enthusiastic love of the Rose, not the 

 tepid attachment which drawls its faint encomium, " She's a nicish 

 girl, and a fellow might do worse," but the true devotion, which sighs 

 from its very soul, "I must, I will win thee, my queen, my queen !" 

 He must have a good position, a home meet for his bride. He must 

 have for his Roses a free circulation of air, a healthful, breezy situa- 

 tion, with a surrounding fence, not too high, not too near, which shall 

 break the force of boisterous winds, temper their bitterness ere they 

 enter the fold, and give shelter but not shade to his Roses. He must 

 have a good garden-soil, well drained, well dug, well dunged. And 

 having these indispensable adjuncts, he may order his Show-Roses. 



" Thanks, dear professor," here exclaims the enraptured pupil 

 (I am mocking now with a savage satisfaction those dreadful scientific 

 dialogues which vexed our little hearts in childhood) ; '' your instruc- 

 tions are indeed precious — far more so than the richest jam, than 

 ponies, than cricket, or than hide-and-seek ; but may we interrupt 

 you for a moment to ask, What is your definition of a Show-Rose 1 " 



"Most gladly, my dear young friends," replies the kind professor 

 (anxiously wishing his dear young friends in bed, that he might work 

 at his new book on beetles), " will I inform a curiosity so honourable, 

 so rare in youth. I propose, therefore — avoiding all prolixity, re- 

 petition, tautology, periphrasis, circumlocution, and superfluous ver- 

 bosity — to divide the subject into forty-seven sections," &c. &c. &c. 



Leaving him at it, let us be content to know that a Show-Rose 

 should possess — 



1. Beauty of form — petals, abundant and of good substance, regu- 

 larly and gracefully disposed within a circular symmetrical outline. 



2. Beauty of colour — brilliancy, purity, harmony, endurance. And, 



3. That the Rose, having both these qualities, must be exhibited in 

 the most perfect phase of its beauty, and in the fullest development 

 to which skill and care can bring it. 



The names of the Roses which are more specially adapted for exhi- 



