Jnly 17, 1808. ] 



JOURNAL OP HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



41 



retain their place in a good catalogue for many years, perhaps 

 for ever. 



I now givo a list of honest, hardy, sure, and heavy-cropping 

 Strawberries, from which a person may select without fear. 



Kuril/. — Sir J. Paxton and Eclipse. 



Second Early. — Rivers's Eliza; Trollope's Victoria, a great 

 favourite at dessert; Empress Eugenie, a good friend, but 

 coarse aud not highly flavoured. 



Later. — Scarlet Pino and John Powell, both first-rate; 

 Wonderful, and Bicton Pine, peculiar and valuable. 



Very Late. — Frogmore Late Pine, a most noble sort; Dr. 

 Hogg," Mr. Radclyffe, and Cockscomb. 



These are a noble lot, you cannot burn your fingers. In 

 tho celestial bodies there are different glories, so it is here. 



I have now only to recommend the Royal Hautbois and the 

 old Red and White Alpines, which I began the season with, 

 and they are cropping heavily now. I am fond of them with- 

 out sugar, but with sugar and cream and a glass of sauterne 

 or sherry, they are the best of all. Hautbois and Alpine 

 Strawberries should be dead-ripe before picked. 



If more mid-season Strawberries are wanted, perhaps Oscar 

 and President, which I have lately tasted in my clergyman's 

 garden (tho Rev. R. Price), aud thought excellent, would be good 

 further selections. — W. F. Radciatfe, Okeford l<'it:i>aine. 



THE ROSE GARDENS OF LYONS. 



I think there are very few persons who, looking at Lyons 

 for the first, or indeed for the twentieth time, would ever think 

 of it as a place celebrated for Roses. Its rivers are broad and 

 muddy ; its new part a poor imitation of Paris ; its older por- 

 tion full of the most abominable stenches that ever offended 

 the nose of a poor mortal ; and to one fresh from the lovely 

 scenes of Switzerland, its glare and its treeless appearance 

 detracted vastly from what I had heard and remembered of 

 its greatness. It was nearly thirty years since I had visited 

 it — when not a railway was constructed in France, when the 

 journey to Marseilles took up the best part of a week, and when 

 the pleasures of travelling were considerably lessened by the 

 confinement, dirt, and dust of a diligence. I remember then 

 it took forty-eight hours of continuous travelling to get from 

 Paris to Chalons-sur-Saone. We did it in five. But even 

 then I recollect Lyons did not strike me very much, yet in size 

 and importance it is the second city in France. Although so 

 celebrated for its silk and velvet, it does not give you the 

 idea of a great manufacturing place. The tall smoke-emitting 

 chimnies that are so plentiful at Manchester and in our manu- 

 facturing districts generally are not to be seen here, from the 

 fact that the weavers work in their own houses, and that hand- 

 looms and not machinery are employed. 



Where, one would ask, can the Rose gardens be? Where 

 are the lovely spots where Senateur Vaisse, Charles Lefebvre, 

 Madame Falcot, and a host of the (Bose) world's most cele- 

 brated characters saw the light ? Where are the lovely nymphs 

 that watched these nascent beauties, where the chivalrous 

 tnights who proclaimed their peerlessness against all comers, 

 in what shady vale was their education carried out, I could 

 not for the life of me imagine. There is a wonderful deal of 

 "bosh" talked about the sunny south, and persons imagine 

 that the south of France must be the most charming place 

 imaginable. When that "vile north-easter" blows right 

 through one — when catarrhs are the rage, and gruel and hot 

 water in request — then one may draw a deep sigh, and wish 

 he were in the " sunny south." But there is a reverse to the 

 medal. Go there now, and what a different tale you would 

 have to tell. It is warm enough here, even though there is a 

 gentle breeze coming in from the Downs ; but there they have 

 perhaps the "mistral" blowing hot and scorching from the 

 south. Not a Rose is to be seen; they are all abime with the 

 fierce heat of a few days. You must try and sit with every 

 window and door closed, for the admission of air is only letting 

 in the atmosphere of a furnace. All this is unfavourable, one 

 would say, to Rose-growing ; but what about the soil ? — this 

 must be cool and deep. No such thing. What I saw was hot 

 and scorching enough, full of stones, and very unsuitable for 

 the growth of the queen of flowers ; and yet we do know that 

 from this place have come some of the very best of our Roses ; 

 and the names of Lacharme, Guillot pere et fils, Ducher, Lia- 

 baud, Damaizin, Gonod, &c, who are inhabitants of Lyons, 

 testify to the truth of this. In fact, those very conditions which 

 are adverse to the growth of the Rose ere favourable to the pro- 



duction of new varieties. They have not to complain, as wo 

 too often have, of cold and wet summers, of seeds rutting in 

 their heps, and of expectations doomed to disappointment. 

 Tho seed sets early and ripens rapidly, and this is more e pe- 

 cially the case when the Roses are planted against a wall with 

 a south aspect. Ifenco they are able to excel us in the raising 

 of seedlings, especially amongst the Teas and Noisettes ; al- 

 though I have no hesitation in saying that we excel them in 

 the growth of our trees, and in the size and quality of our 

 blooms. 



The chief object that I had in visiting Lyons was to find ont 

 the truthfulness of the statement made to me last autumn by 

 Lacharme— that he had a Perpetual Rose of a " true yellow" 

 colour. I felt quite confident, that if it were true it was such 

 a step as we had not of late years seen, and that, as I had been 

 appealed to about it, it would bo most desirable to obtain 

 correct information. While I was hesitating about extending 

 my journey from Paris to Lyons, I was solicited by one of our 

 most eminent introducers of novelties, Mr. Bull, of Chelsea, to 

 report on it, and whatever information I am able to give on 

 the point rosarians are indebted to him for it. 



Despairing of finding my way to Lacharme's, which I knew to 

 be some distance off, and knowing from experience that names 

 well known to us may be little known even in their immedi- 

 ate localities, I secured the services of a "cocher," and, after 

 various inquiries, found far down on tho banks of the river, 

 and hard by ono of the numerous forts with which Lyons is 

 encircled, the place I was in quest of. It was an unpretending- 

 looking house, and the garden gave no indication of the great- 

 ness that was due to it ; neatness certainly was not its charac- 

 teristic. Lacharme was in one of his other gardens, and I had 

 to wait some little time before he made his appearance ; when 

 he did he struck me at once as an honest and sensible man. 

 We sat down and had a little chat together ; I found there was 

 some kind of embarrassment about him when I told him that 

 I had come to Lyons on purpose to see his yellow Hybrid Per- 

 petual, «,nd I began to fear there was some screw loose. _ I 

 would here remark that the French Eose-growers do not quite 

 understand our taste for yellow Roses, they do not themselves 

 seem to think much about them, and also do not see why we do 

 not admire their " ardoise" flowers, that indescribable slaty 

 colour appearing to have great charms for them ; and hence 

 the advent of a genuine yellow Perpetual would not see-in to 

 them so great a feat, but that there is connected with it the 

 commercial gain of a flower that would be sure to sell well in 

 England, England being their chief market at all times, and 

 now more especially, when this awful and wretched war is 

 desolating Germany, where they have been in the habit of 

 supplying many orders every year. 



We walked on through his grounds, which were singularly 

 untidy, across to another garden, where, on a wall facing the 

 south, he has a large quantity of Teas and Noisettes planted, 

 and where he has matured most of the seed from whence he 

 has raised the Roses which have made his name famous. We 

 talked of and saw many of these Roses as we walked along, but 

 still I did not see the yellow Perpetual. I saw Alfred Colomb, 

 which I did not hesitate last year to pronounce, from the 

 blooms I saw of it, to be a fine Rose, and which both here and 

 in my own garden has merited the praise I gave it. Souvenir 

 de Dr. Jamain is also dark and rich in colour, but I am afraid 

 too small to suit our taste ; the petals are thick and firm, but 

 there are too few of them ; while Prudence Bresson, a great 

 flaunting flower, with petals of immense size and brilliancy of 

 colour, is more like a semi-double Preony than a Rose. Its 

 effect seen at a distance is very striking, but it will not do for 

 us. Charles Lefebvre and Souvenir de la Malmaison were there 

 in quantities, but the blooms were certainly not so fine as I 

 have seen them in England. At last we came to where the 

 yellow Rose was said to be, and great was my disappointment, 

 and, I believe, honestly that of Lacharme himself. The truth 

 is, he has been the raiser of many Hybrid Noisettes, such as 

 Louise Darzens, Charles Maynard, Madame Gustave Bonnet, 

 &c, and that it is in this class, which are not really Hybrid 

 Perpetuals, that he believed he had obtained what he announced. 

 I saw the plant not absolutely in flower, but with the buds 

 partly open, and it has no pretensions to being a yellow Rose. 

 It came last year with a good deal of yellow in it, and Lacharmo 

 was in hopes that this would be permanent. But alas ! this 

 year it has only shown a very faint tinge of yellow in the centre 

 of the flower— m peujaimatre, and it win not be sent out as a 

 yellow Rose. I am not at all sure that it may not be the 

 avant-coweur of a yellow Rose ; but even then, if of tins class, 



