230 



JOURNAL OF HOBTICULTDEE AND COITAGE GAEDE^EE. 



[ March 25, 1873. 



SO that not a ray of light can reach it. Eoots so situated 

 are probably in a lower temperature, and altogether worse off 

 than they would be in an outside border. — William T.\ylor. 



EOSES. 



" Cue .lournal" without some Eose notes is to me always like 

 the play of Hamlet without tlia prince, and of late, somehow, 

 this melancholy arrangement has been in vogue. " How to 

 grow them and how to show them " is a theme which will 

 defy exhaustion, even at the hands of those reverend amateurs 

 whose Rose knowledge of which we have now and then such 

 pleasant glimpses. 



Eeviewing the Eose contribations during the past year, 

 nothing, it seems to me, has appeared having more practical 

 value to a large section of Rose-growers than the published 

 election lists so carefully collected and summarised by Mr. 

 Hinton. Nothing is more bewildering to a novice, or to one 

 whose limited leisure, means, or space precludes his growing 

 more than a few varieties, than to wade through the pages of 

 a nurseryman's list, where the glowing adjectives vie with the 

 flowers they are supposed to describe, driving him at last to 

 feel that " Cajsar and Pompey are very much alike, especially 

 Pompey." After Mr. Hinton's yearly lists have been fairly 

 compared such an amateur need be under no difficulty in 

 selecting a reasonable number of what ought to turn out satis- 

 factory kinds, and this is a real gain. 



Shows are somewhat fallacious standards, as to a tenant 

 farmer on a poor estate is a high-pressure lot of shorthorns 

 from the herds of titled breeders at the "Royal" as a guide 

 for what stock he had better invest in. 



The best collection of cut blooms I had the chance of ex- 

 amining last year was at the Exeter Show held the 3rd July ; 

 and as an example it will doubtless be remembered by some 

 who were there, at least by the Eev. Jlr. Camm with whom I had 

 the pleasure of a short gossip over the boxes, that a bloom 

 of Centifolia Rosea, shown by Paul I think, was one of the 

 finest Eoses in the Show. This of course could only be looked 

 on as a fluke, and so a bad guide to buy from. It is nowhere 

 in the election list for the best fifty. 



But no Show has ever yet surprised me as do the lists of 

 the Eev. Mr. Radclyffe which frequently nppear. I have hardly 

 ever been able to verify his recommendations by experience. 

 On the 20th August " C. P. P." and the Rev. Mr. Camm 

 specify objections to the Roses named by him and demur to 

 his omitting certain well-known high-class varieties, and I am 

 at one with them in what they have said. As to Felix Genero, 

 I have not only never succeeded in growing a decent flower 

 from this Rose, but I have never found anyone else that had. 

 And Madame Margottin is probably the last Tea Eose I should 

 recommend ; it is as ragged as a Falstaff recruit. I should 

 really like to know Mr. Radclyffe's secret for growing satisfac- 

 torily Edward Morren. I have, moved by his eulogies, done my 

 best with it on the Mauetti and on the Briar, but it will open 

 badly ; and if two or three blooms in a season condescend to 

 expand, they are so loosely made and so susceptible of being 

 spoiled by sun, wet, or wind, that I should class it as one of 

 the most unpromising Roses for the amateur who cannot afford 

 to run a race of experimental selection. 



On the 13th August he says, " I specially recommend to 

 persons liking dark Roses Louis Van Houtte, Caron Chaurand, 

 Maxime de la Rocheterie, and Baron de Bonstettin." He omits 

 from his general list of desirable Roses La France and Marie 

 Baumann because of their weak growth. The fact with me is 

 that both these Eoses are more robust and free-blooming than 

 Louis V. Houtte; and in "our Journal" of the 2ith Sep- 

 tember there appears an election list made in the north, which 

 shows that even there both these Eoses stand amongst the 

 highest. Now take Prince Camillo de Rohan, a Rose I have 

 never known him recommend. It was in every show stand of 

 general colk ctions in Exeter ; and my proof of it is that, all 

 points considered, it has no superior as a dark Rose; and for 

 vigour simply — Mr. Radcljtfe'a great point — it is difficult to 

 find an equal. 



I am somewhat surprised to find Mdlle. Marie Eady does 

 not have a better place in the election lists. As a late bloomer 

 especially it is an admirable Rose ; and take the season 

 through, on the Manetti it gives as many perfect blooms and 

 such substance in them as any I could name. It would be 

 included by me in the best twelve. 



;\Iarquise de Castellane by the voting has retrograded this 

 year. This I think is only temporary. It is fine in colour. 



vigorous in habit, and free-blooming ; and I believe the ordi- 

 nary grower will not regret having it in his collection. 



Etienne Levet has had a successful year and bids fair to be 

 a good Eose; but I have found Frani.ois Michelon so far to 

 run thin. Of Madame Lacharme's shortcomings I can endorse 

 all the bad things Mr. Beachey and others have said about 

 her. Comtesse d'Oxford , both on Briar and Manetti, retrograded 

 with me in 1874 ; it has the knack of fading rapidly, which is 

 not in its favour. Lyonnais is a good Rose. Mdlle. Eugenie 

 Verdier though shy is worth trouble. 



The old veterans hold their own in the far west. Alfred Co- 

 lomb, Charles Lefebvre, Duke of Edinburgh, Baronne de Eoth- 

 Echild, Camille Bernardin, Souvenir de la Malmaison (specially 

 valuable in autumn), John Hopper, Pierre Netting, Marguerite 

 de St. Amand, Jules Margottin, Gunoral Jacqueminot, Abel 

 Grand, and Fisher Holmes. Nevertheless, after admitting to 

 the full all the glories of the Perpetuals, I quite share Mr. 

 Camm'a enthusiasm for Teas : they are the true Perpetuals. 



What after all can be, not only more lovely but more certain 

 as a matter of culture over a laige part of England, than the 

 "oceans of blooms" a good collection of Tea Eoses fairly 

 attended to will give ? 



Take trellised lines of Gloire de Dijon, Souvenir d'nn Ami, 

 Safrano, Catheiine Mermet, Madame Willermoz, Souvenir 

 de David, Marie Van Ploutte, Madame Falcot, Devoniensis, 

 Adrienne Christophle, Canary, Homoie, Vicomtcsse de Cazes, 

 Eubens, Madame Bravy, Perfection de Montplaiser, with their 

 half-sisters Triomphe de Eennes, Lamarque, and Celine Fores- 

 tier leading from and to these, " through many a bowery turn,"' 

 of wire or wood arcades with blooms of Rive d'Or in profusion 

 mingling with Clematises Jackmani, Prince of Wales, or others 

 of that ilk ; and if a bit of wall can be had cover it with 

 Marechal Niel, Climbing Devoniensis, Perfection de Lyon, and 

 the Banksians. What a feast for the senses ! One need not 

 be morbidly poetic for the radiance of such a sight heralded 

 by the gentle air " full fed with perfume," to recall to his 

 mind that bower whose 



" Flowery roof ehowfred Roses 

 ^^'h^ch the mom repaire«2 ;'' 



or that pavement 



" That lilie a spa of jasper shone 



ImpnrpkHl with celestial lioses, smiled." 



To those who lead busy lives in these busy times I recom- 

 mend sirch pleasures ; they will find in their refining influence 

 a fit counterpoise to the tenor of their daily occupation. If 

 on trying it anyone should fail to find this relief in the hobby 

 of Rose-growing their case is a bad one ; and I do not think 

 they can do better than seek out the "Wiltshike Rector," 

 " open their grief," and seek of him the secret of that alchemy 

 by which genuine pleasure and a healthy mind are to be de- 

 rived from natural objects and harmless tastes.— Coenueh. 



PEACH FORCING.— No. 2. 



BoRDEKS. — These as shown in the sections, pages 09, 70, and 

 71 of the present volume of this Journal, are within and out- 

 side the house. Inside borders should extend the whole width 

 of the house if there are trees against the wall as well as 

 against the front trellis. The outside border should at least 

 be equal in width to half that of the trellis to which the front 

 trees are trained. In any care the border should be of the 

 same width as the trellis the trees are to cover. For early 

 forcing the principal border should be inside, whilst for those 

 not started until a later period the main of the border may be 

 exterior. Why I prefer part outside to all inside is that the 

 former is always certain to be thoroughly moistened by the 

 autumn and winter rains, and the roots in it are always 

 capable of meeting any demand upon them for moisture by 

 the head when the wood is ripening and the trees are at rest. 

 This is more than can be said of inside borders, andover-dry- 

 ness of the roots at that time is one of the chief causes of 

 the buds dropping. 



There is no fear of the roots in an outside border sufteriDg 

 any injury from frost, for, though the Peach be an exotic and 

 tender, the Plum upon which it is woiked is very hardy, sur- 

 viving the severest weather uninjured, even when the surface 

 soil is matted by its fibres. I do not, however, advise leaving 

 them exposed to hard frost, but insist upon a few inches' 

 thickness of short littery dung and leaves being placed on the 

 border when forcing is begun, and that serves every needful 

 purpose of protection for the roots. 



Deep borders have been advised, but I do not see the utility 



