May 28, 1874. ] 



JOURNAL OF HOBTIOULTUEE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



421 



■were stiff, heavy, and hideous. As an example, there was a 

 swan — a white swan of course, exhibited by Mr. Pietro Cardella, 

 of Rome, the long neck of which was composed of white Stocks, 

 and the wings and body of white Indian Azalea. It carried a 

 large bouquet of miscellaneous flowers on its back, while it 

 floated, or was supposed to be floating, on a lake of Pansies. 

 The same exhibitor had numerous other designs, some of very 

 large size, but all equally stiff and heavy. One of them would 

 have been very effective had it not been for a superfluous 

 canopy which surmounted it. It consisted of a basket or vase, 

 the base of which was composed of four rays, two of which 

 were red Azaleas alternated with white, and whoUy sprinkled 

 over with sprigs of Lily of the Valley ; the edging composed 

 of leaves of the latter. The upper portion was mixed flowers 

 of Roses, Azaleas, Deutzias, Heliotropes, Weigelas, Cinerarias, 

 and Pelargoniums, studded all over with sprigs of Lily of the 

 Valley. The canopy had the same flowers in it, and a great 

 bouquet on the top. There was another very pretty basket of 

 white and flesh-coloured Camellias, Tea Hoses, pale Heliotropes, 

 Adiantum cuneatum, Pyrethrum frutescens. Pelargoniums, 

 and Begonias, also studded with sprigs of Lily of the Valley. 

 The edging was also in this case of the latter. 



CvcAS REVOLUTA. — On page 3(55, in reference to the Cycas 

 Tevoluta at Nash Court, which has produced thirty-six fronds 

 this spring, with a spread of 8.\ feet, Mr. McCrow asks if any 

 one of your readers has seen or heard of a Cycas with a like 

 number. We have a specimen of Cycas revoluta which pro- 

 duced last year forty-one fronds and has a spread of 9 feet. — 

 Peter Stewart, Gardener, The Glen Gardens, Innerleithen, 

 Perthshire. 



NEW BOOK. 



The Amateufs Rose Book. By Shirley Hibbekd. 



We have great pleasure in thoroughly recommending to our 

 readers, especially those who are interested in the culture and 

 raising of Roses, this new edition of Mr. Shirley Hibberd'a 

 ■" Rose Book." It is written by one who seems to have fully 

 mastered the subject, and to be familiar with the different 

 operations in budding, grafting, striking, &a., which he de- 

 scribes ; and the directions he gives are of that practical utility 

 60 much needed in any monograph on a single flower. 



Any rosarian who takes it up must not expect to have his 

 ■/ancy tickled, or his risible muscles excited, as many will have 

 experienced when perusing another work on Roses by the Rev. 

 S. R. Hole. There is room for both on our shelves : one to 

 divert the leisure hour, the other to instruct. We mention this, 

 as some mayjthink there are so many books and instructions 

 given about Roses, that there can be no necessity for more. 

 Now, the genial author of " The Book on Roses," the Rev. 

 S. R. Hole, has written his con amore, and has described many 

 a pleasant scene and many an amusing anecdote, but he is so 

 ■full of Hose lore himself that he thinks others must be also ; 

 so that, while his work is both interesting and amusing to all 

 lovers of flowers, it does not enter into the minor details of 

 the craft, and he writes, moreover, ou one especial phase, we 

 might say, of Rose-growing — i.e., for the exhibition-table, and 

 therefore thinks more of the individual beauty of the flower 

 than of the lasting welfare of the plant. This difference be- 

 •Iwecn the two authors is very manifest with regard to their 

 difference of appreciation of the standard and of the dwarf, 

 the Dog Rose and the Manetti. 



The book contains more than 250 pages of closely-printed 

 matter, and it is very difficult, therefore, in a short review to 

 enter at all fully into its merits. It begins by giving short 

 histories of the families of the wild Roses, and secondly of the 

 garden Roses. It appears to be still very difficult to classify our 

 garden Roses with any degree of certainty. So many of our 

 best Roses, especially in that large class Hybrid Perpetuals, 

 being chance seedlings rather than Hybrids, it is difficult at 

 times even to guess at the parents. The classes most distinct, 

 perhaps, are the Banksians, the Moss Roses, the Noisettes, 

 and the Tea-scented ; but even among the Tea-scentod and 

 Noisettes we have several that seem very nearly allied. For 

 instance, Marcchal Niel is generally classified as a Noisette, but 

 both in the form of its flower and petals, its scent and its 

 foliage, it is nearer to a Tea than a Noisette. Gloire de Dijon 

 is usually called a Tea, but in its growth and habit it partakes 

 more of the nature of a strong Bourbon, and it seems more 

 than probable that the male parent of Marochal Niel was a 



Tea, and of Gloire do Dijon a Bourbon. We have, too, a class 

 called Hybrid Chinas, which in many cases seem to be far re- 

 moved from any China blood, the true old pink Monthly China 

 and such Roses as Mrs. Bosauquet, Cramoisie SupCrieure, &c., 

 being remarkable for their freedom in blooming, whereas so- 

 called Hybrid Chinas as Blairii No. 2, Chunedolc, Fulgens, &a., 

 never seem to have the least inclination to second blooming. 

 The same may be said, too, of the Hybrid Bourbons Charles 

 Lawson, Coupe d'Hebe, Juno, etc.; neither in form of flower, 

 nor in wood and foliage, do they seem to have the least re- 

 semblance to true Bourbons, such as Sir Joseph Paxton, 

 ApoUine, Baron Gonella, or Souvenir de Malmaison. 



Among the Hybrid Perpetuals there seem to us to be many 

 much nearer to the Chinas and Bourbons. For instance, that 

 beautiful and most fragrant Rose La France has clearly China 

 blood, and, from the character of the wood, Charles Lefebvre, 

 Madame Caillat, and others are closely allied to Bourbons. 

 Mr. Shirley Hibberd points out the complex character of the 

 Hybrid Perpetuals when he says, page 2G, " That China, Bour- 

 bon, and Damask have mainly contributed to the formation of 

 the race, may be clearly deduced from their more prominent 

 characteristics, but we do find in them traces of Tea and 

 Noisette ; and in proportion as the blood of the last two tribes 

 mingles with the stream, the Roses manifesting it tend to 

 detach themselves from the Perpetual group, which has a 

 certain unity and family likeness despite its mongrel cha- 

 racter." 



Much has yet to bo done, we think, in tryin-; by careful hy- 

 bridisation to produce some more definitely-marked classes of 

 Roses. It would be interesting even now to select out of this 

 large class of Hybrid Perpetuals those which are of particular 

 types ; and we are sure, as we have before remarked, there are 

 many more deserving the names of Hybrid Bourbon and 

 Hybrid China than those which appear under this nomen- 

 clature under the heading of Summer Roses. 



Mr. Hibberd gives an interesting classification of Roses 

 under their different shapes, as the globular Rose, the cup- 

 shaped Rose, the tazza-shaped Rose, the imbricated or ex- 

 panded Rose, the reflexed, and the quartered. These shapes 

 have already, we believe, been accepted by French Rose- 

 growers as types. Of these the tazza shape is really only a more 

 fully-expanded form of the cup-shaped Rose, and the expanded 

 and reflexed are really of the same type ; but justice is not 

 done to these in the accompanying engravings, as they are out 

 of drawing. The expanded Rose never has a high centre as 

 in the drawing, and in the reflexed form the calyx would not 

 have been seen, as it is one of the characteristics of reflexing 

 Roses that the petals curl back so as to cover or hide the calyx 

 when looking sideways at the Rose, as in the illustration given 

 in the book. It seems to us that the six forms might be put 

 into four — that is, cup-shaped, globular, flat, and quartered. 

 One thing may, we believe, be especially noted — that in all the 

 highest type of Roses the outer guard petals should be the 

 largest; these protect the bud, but they should not overlap or 

 grow over the point of the Rose, as is the case sometimes with 

 such Roses as M. Neman and a few others of that type. Those 

 Roses which begin to open at their centre before the outer 

 petals are fully developed, such as Clumence Raoux, Comtesse 

 de Jaucourt, Thyra Hammerick, and a few others, are never to 

 be depended upon,ihough occasionally they may give a good 

 flower. We have so many good Roses now of good shape in 

 nearly every form and colour, that every bad-shaped Rose and 

 every new Rose of a bad type should be discarded. We do 

 not want any more flat and ragged Roses as Abbe Bramerel, 

 or rough ones like Edward Morren, or hard-centred Roses 

 of the La Reine type. No new Rose ought to be certificated 

 now unless it is — 1st, distinct; 2ud, of perfect form ; 3rd, 

 good substance of petal; 4th, each petal shell-shaped and egg- 

 shaped. ■■ . .. 



We have not time this week to enter more into detail 

 with regard to this work of Mr. Shirley Hibberd's, but will 

 draw our readers' attention to his remarks on standard 

 Roses, in which we can altogether sympathise, and which one 

 of our contributors to the Rose lore of our pages has already 

 pointed out. Page 14 he says, " Nine-tenths of all the mis- 

 takes made by amateur gardeners are in connection with 

 standard Roses. They buy, they plant, and wait, and never 

 see the beauty of the Rose. They find their gardens filled 

 with ugly sticks, which occasionally flaunt a ragged Rose that 

 proves to be worse than no Rose at all, and yet those same 

 trees would have made handsome heads and myriads of noble 

 flowers had they been properly treated in the lirst instance. 



