THE FLOEAL WOELD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 75 



It may be worth while, too, to ask the meaning of the difference 

 in the behaviour of roses and fruit trees in such a season as this. 

 One thing is certain, that all the roses in our gardens behave as 

 nearly us they can in the same manner as in their native climes, 

 both as respects their seasons of growing, and blooming, and going 

 to rest. And other plants do the same. Instead of waiting on the 

 weather, and growing as the mulberry and walnut trees do, when it 

 is perfectly safe to grow, they appear to refer to the almanac, and 

 find thereby that their date of growing has arrived, and thence begin 

 to thrust out their hands — only perhaps to have their fingers nipped 

 off, and their arms benumbed, so as to be disahled for some time 

 afterwards. Our native trees have their several times of leafing in 

 regular succession, and those times are in perfect harmony with the 

 average phenomena of the seasons. But exotics, especially such as 

 come from warmer climates than this, have also their dates of leafing, 

 and those dates are generally in advance of the dates of our native 

 trees, and hence in advance of the average phenomena of the seasons 

 here. Every year the lilacs push first of all our garden trees ; they 

 are natives of parts of China and Persia, where by the 1st of February 

 spring is as far advanced as it is usually with us by the 20th of May. 

 The story of the Glastonbury Thorn derives its phvsiological interest 

 from the fact that, as having been brought from Palestine, it still 

 endeavours to regulate its movements to the Palestine almanac, 

 which requires barley to be harvested in April, and the flowers of 

 Crataegus to open in December. 



Our wild roses in the hedgerows are quiet enough at the present 

 time, but Damasks, that are natives of Syria, and Teas, that are 

 natives of China, always endeavour to grow before the season is 

 sufficiently advanced for them ; and hence the policy of pruning late, 

 and in the case of Teas of giving them a check by lifting annually. 

 Nearly all our good roses are natives of climates that are earlier and 

 warmer. than ours, or if of English origin, are derived from parents 

 that were originally natives of warmer climates ; so that however 

 inured — as they are to a certain extent, but not completely — to the 

 climate of Britain, their family idiosyncrasies, or as we may say 

 their peculiarities transmitted by descent, remain, and if the rose- 

 grower does not pay proper attention and respect to the fact he 

 must fail somewhere in his routine of cultivation. 



On this consideration may be founded an objection to Manetti 

 roses. The Manetti is a mere Italian brier, which does not make 

 strong stems like our English briers, but throws up from the root 

 continually, and so renews itself as a bush. We use it as a stock, 

 and as a stock it regulates its movements as much as possible by the 

 almanac of its native land, and begins to grow always before the 

 season here is sufficiently advanced for it. When used for pot-roses, 

 the excitability of the Manetti is sometimes an advantage, because 

 if we want early growth and early bloom the stock is in the right 

 humour to co-operate with our measures of stimulating vegetable 

 activity. But out of doors the excitability of the Manetti is a dis- 

 advantage, and goes a great way to explain how it it is there are so 

 many losses among Manetti roses after a hard winter. The fine 



