THE ROSE BOOK 



PART I 

 Roses to Begin With 



CHAPTER I 



ON BEGINNING WELL 



EVERYONE who writes gardening books is morally 

 bound, I think, to help the beginner ; someone is 

 always beginning. There is also a debt to the roses, 

 for some are so much more accommodating than 

 others, and to start with the difficult ones is like 

 taking the wrong turning on setting out for a long 

 journey. How light-heartedly we go forward, the 

 mind full of pleasurable anticipation, eager to dis- 

 cover fresh delights, keen to perceive new points of 

 interest that every bend of the road brings into view. 

 But when it is forced upon us that the way we 

 have taken leads not where our hopes are set, but 

 that each step takes us farther from the goal in mental 

 view, how different it all seems ! How long and weary 

 is the way back; how dull, how void of interest the 

 path that seemed so bright, so gay, so full of sunshine ! 

 Above all things, then, let us make sure that the 

 beginner knows the way before he starts, and so, while 



