PREPARING ROSES FOR PLANTING. 35 
Roses in April? A comfortable, stage-coach, London-to- 
Brighton-in-fifteen-hours mode of progression, in short. _ 
Alas! there is that hustling, hungry crowd of early birds 
to think about. If you do not allow for them, your chance is 
one. Substituting saves the situation in a measure, but in my 
umble experience as a Rose buyer the sorts the nurseryman 
picks to take the place of those which he has sold out are 
invariably varieties which you have. If you have none at all, 
the substitutes are certain to be Roses you do not care about. 
I cannot explain this phenomenon ; I can only state it. 
For my own part, the particular substitutes which have 
oured down on me ever since [ began to buy Roses are Marie 
—oscation and Madame Lambard. I have received enough of 
these to set up a nursery with them. I have been peppered 
with them, pelted with them, bombarded with them. I have 
written imploringly at the foot of an order: “If you can’t sup- 
ly anything, don’t substitute with Marie Baumann or Madame 
ambard,” and the first variety which has appeared when the 
unpacking begins is always one of this pair. I love Marie 
Baumann, I love Madame Lambard. I have been constant to 
Marie Baumann ever since I saw her first, in the days before 
even my teens began. I have been faithful to Madame Lam- 
bard from the day that Lacharme sent her out—yes, more than 
twenty long years ago. But now—dare I confess it?—these 
sweet and lovely ladies grow superfluous. I am prepared to 
love single spies (so long as they are feminine), but not whole 
battalions. 
Ordering early is therefore good, because it gives you a 
reasonable chance of getting what you want. Another advan- 
tage that might be claimed is that you get better plants. There 
is a tradition that the nurseryman hunts over his quarters and 
picks out the very best plants for the earliest customers. I may 
make a modest claim to know a little about nurseries, having 
spent many happy years in them, but I have never seen this 
going on. However, if the dealer does not search about for the 
best trees for his early orders, he certainly passes over the worst. 
There are a few poor plants in every drift, which he does not 
mean to sell, but when the end of the season comes, and the 
rows are very thin, and the customer is very peremptory about 
having no substitutes, and the workman who is sent for the 
plant has his ear strained to meet the imminent melody of the 
dinner bell—then things happen. 
The Roses have reached us, and reached us early. If the 
ground is ready for them, we trim and plant. If it is not, we 
“heel them in” until the bed is fit for their reception. All 
things considered, November planting is the best, but there is 
not much in it. I would rather plant in March in a properly 
prepared bed than in November in a poor one. Roses “ heeled 
in ”—that is, laid in a shallow trench, roots covered with soil, 
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