194 THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



good soil. So that instead of the bare earth in hot days, the flower 

 shadows are thrown on to soft carpets of green Rockfoil and Thyme, 

 or any other fragile rock or mountain plant that we think worth 

 growing for its own sake also. It may even be that these " mossy " 

 plants prevent the great drying out of the soil in hot summers and 

 autumns, such as we have had of recent years. 



Shelter. — The position was not at all protected in the direction 

 of the prevailing winds, or by walls in any way, so that little was 

 owing to the natural advantages of site The first thing that occurred 

 to people on seeing the Roses was that they were due to some 

 peculiar merit of the climate or the soil ; but the same things were 

 carried out in several gardens formed by me in quite different soils 

 and districts — Shrubland Park, and Hawley, in Hants, for instance — 

 and the results were equally good in every case, in some cases better 

 than in my own garden. It is very likely that working in the same 

 way all should be able to grow Tea Roses — that is, the best of all 

 Roses — on many warm soils which are supposed to be useless to 

 grow Roses now. There is a limit no doubt as to how far north one 

 would get these Roses to open, but over a large area of the country 

 now roseless for half the summer, and in some dry soils with few 

 or no roses at all, we could make a change towards a real Rose- 

 garden. All who have hot and warm soils should enrich them as 

 much as possible, but in view of the failure of the Rose in the brier 

 they should never try any Standard Tea Roses, but grow these on 

 their own roots or grafted low, and the point of the graft buried in 

 the soil so as to allow of the plant rooting itself in a soil which it 

 may be able to enjoy perfectly well without the aid of a horrid and 

 corrupting " middle man " in the shape of a Dog Rose, longing all 

 the time for its home in the clay. 



Climbing Roses. — In the sketch of Rose pillars taken by Miss 

 Willmott in her garden at Warley Place, we see some of the grace 

 of the Rose treated as a climber, in the flower garden. There are a 

 great number of Roses that lend themselves to this, the old climbing 

 Roses being now backed up by a splendid series of long-blooming 

 climbing Tea Roses which are more valuable still, and much in want 

 of planting in simple ways to break up the level of gardens and 

 the chessboard appearance they usually have. Wreaths and gar- 

 lands of this sort were very much more frequent before everything 

 was cleared away for the flatness and hardness of bedding out, and 

 this way of treating Roses ought to be practised more than ever. 

 They should be trained abundantly over well-formed pergolas, covered 

 ways, trellises, and fences. In countries a little warmer than ours we 

 see what can be done with Roses as noble climbers ; in Algeria, and in 

 Madeira, the climbing Tea Roses running up trees in the loveliest 



