256 THE BOOK OF THE ROSE CHAP. 
hard, or have too ‘ liberal treatment.’ I would not 
advise the application of liquid manure after the 
buds are formed. If grown well, a large proportion 
of the: blooms come good, and they can stand a 
little rain. They have fine stout petals, and are 
wonderfully full in the centre, so much so that the 
Rose has quite two shapes, and the best one was not 
known for the first year or two: for it has in the 
first stage a grand regular semi-globular shape, and 
when expanded and overblown it is yet so perfectly 
full, even when as flat as a pancake, as to show no 
eye, and to be still presentable and wonderful, 
though not so beautiful as a Rose. The colour is 
best and purest in the first of these stages: in the 
second it is more mixed. When presented for the 
Gold Medal, which was granted by acclamation, it 
was shown by Mr. Bennett in great quantity, 
several large boxes of it being staged. Every bloom 
was fully expanded, and its true beauty remained 
unknown. It was then sold to America and we had 
to wait a year forit. Whenit was at last obtainable, 
there was a large demand for the half-guinea plants, 
with the result, I believe, that there was hardly a 
bloom seen in the country that year, the plants 
having no doubt been budded from non-flowering 
shoots. The following year the true form was seen, 
and it is not now quite so shy a bloomer as it was. 
In size and lasting qualities it is quite at the top 
of the tree: as a free bloomer and autumnal, 
absolutely at the bottom. A secondary or true 
autumnal bloom is rare: it does bloom as a maiden, 
otherwise its title to the term Perpetual might yet 
be in abeyance. It is decidedly a hot-season Rose 
with us. A remarkable point about this Rose is its 
