THE PROTENCE ROSE. 



Culture and Pruning 



There are but two ways in which Provence 

 Eoses can be employed as ornaments to the 

 flower-garden — as standards for the lawn, and 

 as dwarfs for beds. Standards of some of the 

 varieties, if grown on a strong clayey soil, form 

 fine objects of ornament, as their large globular 

 flowers are so gracefully pendent. In this de- 

 scription of soil also, if grown as dwarfs, they 

 will not flourish unless they are worked on the 

 Dog Rose, but in light sandy soils it will be ad- 

 visable to cultivate them on their own roots ; the 

 freedom with which they grow in the light sandy 

 soils of Surrey points out this method of culture 

 on such soils as the most eligible. In pruning, 

 they require the free use of the knife : every 

 shoot should be shortened to three or four buds. 

 If not pruned in this severe manner, the plants 

 soon become straggling and unsightly. To pro- 

 long their period of flowering, half the shoots may 

 be pruned in October, the remainder at the end 

 of April. In poor soils, they should have an- 

 nually, in November, a dressing of rotten manure 

 on the surface of the bed, to be washed in by the 

 rains of winter. 



