1869.] THE ROSE. 341 



In ordering these Rose-trees, which -will cost, many of them being 

 new, about £7, 10s.,* I advise the amateur to ask for low Standards. 

 The height which I prefer is about 2 feet from the ground to the 

 budded Rose, because these lesser trees escape the fury of the wind, 

 requiring no stakes to support them after their first year; because 

 they are more conveniently manipulated than either dwarfs or giants ; 

 and because their complete beauty presents itself pleasantly to our 

 eyes, without bringing us down on our knees, or requiring us to stand 

 a-tiptoe. They should be planted in November, just deep enough to 

 have a firm hold upon the soil; and the surface round them should be 

 covered with a stratum of manure, both to protect and enrich the roots. 

 Should they be sent from the nurseries with any shoots of great length, 

 or with tajDroots, shorten the former, or secure them to a stake, and re- 

 move the latter altogether. Affix your permanent tallies (I use smooth 

 slips of deal, smeared with white paint, written upon with a black-lead 

 pencil, and secured with thin wire to the trees), because the labels of 

 the nurseryman, even when on parchment, become illegible from rain 

 and snow. 



"And next summer," exclaims the ardent disciple, "we shall have 

 Roses as large as finger-glasses ; we shall win the Cup ; we shall make 

 the Marquess's gardener, that bumptious Mr Peacock at the Castle, for 

 ever to fold his tail." It troubles me to repress this charming en- 

 thusiasm, to demolish a superstructure as gay, but, alas ! as baseless, as 

 those card-houses which the child builds, with the kings, queens, and 

 knaves of the pack, upon the polished mahogany of his sire. No, my 

 dear amateur, not next summer, nor in any summer, with those Roses 

 only which will grow upon the trees just commended to you, are you 

 to whip creation, and make the family plate-chest groan. If you 

 ■propose to grow Roses for exhibition — that i,% to groio them to their full 

 perfection — ijou must groio them on your own stocks from buds. The 

 Rose-trees, which we will suppose you have just planted, are to supply 

 these buds, and you have still to provide, if you will follow my direc- 

 tions, some 500 stocks, to receive those buds in July. These stocks, like 

 the Rose-trees, should be planted in November ; but what are these 

 stocks to be 1 



^sop told the gardener of his master, Xanthus, that " the earth was 

 a stepmother to those plants which were incorporated into her soil, 

 but a mother to those which are her own free production ; " and wher- 

 ever the Dog-Rose flourishes in our hedgerows — now delighting our 

 eyes with its flowers, and now scratching them out with its thorns, 



* I allow £5 for 100 older varieties; the price usuafly charged by nurserymen 

 being, for dwarf Standards, Is. each, and £2, lOs. for 25 newer varieties, at 

 2s. each. 



