XX MEMOIRS OP THE AUTHOE 



I had visited the nurseries of Messrs. Keynes and Wil- 

 liams, of Salisbury, and I had bought two dozen good 

 H.P.s, and also had had my first lesson in budding, 

 which I soon put into practice, with some success. But 

 roses, although my ruling hobby, did not hold the field 

 alone, for sports and other pastimes too often crowded 

 out the days of leisure, and it was not until my student 

 years were over, and I had stepped into the arena of 

 life, that I was able to grow the Queen of Flowers by 

 the hundred and by the thousand. 



I was enamoured of her beauty, and could not do 

 enough to promote her welfare. I exhibited, I judged, 

 I organised shows, I enthused gardeners and owners 

 of gardens alike. Growers of six or twelve trees grew 

 their fifties and hundreds, and people who had patro-^ 

 nised local shows and looked on their presence there as 

 the performance of a local duty, now went to the show 

 tent as to a Court to bow before a Queen. Like other 

 enthusiasts, I felt no garden could be too big and no- 

 work too arduous. Then to London, not as a yearly 

 exhibitor at the N.R.S. " Grand National," but as an 

 Organiser, leading off at the Crystal Palace in 191 1 with 

 two large rose shows, each one a long-to-be-remem- 

 bered success. 



The end of the year 191 1 and the year 19 12 found 

 greater scope for my labours, for I was appointed 

 Organising Secretary of the Royal International Hor- 

 ticultural Exhibition held at Chelsea, the largest Horti- 

 cultural Exhibition ever held in the world's' history. 

 This turned my attention to the writing of garden 

 articles for the Press, and then the founding, with an 

 old friend of mine, of my paper, '* My Garden Illus- 

 trated." Then came the Great War, and for me 

 France, with the battles of the ist Somme, then a num- 

 ber of large appointments other than Horticulture. 

 Onerous duties and arduous undertaking into which the 

 Queen of Flowers could not force her way. At last 

 once more the love of horticulture asserted itself, and, 

 after a most successful Exhibition organised for St. 

 Dunstan's blinded heroes, I attacked again the Press, 



