50 PICTORIAL PRACTICAL ROSH GROWING. 
unworthy ambition. The Roses at the show represent the 
greatest possible development of the particular varieties, and 
people cannot be blamed if, seeing a high ideal, they resolve 
to work up to it. There is, however, reason to fear that this 
laudable resolution often leads to disappointment, and the 
amateur may well be warned not to expect too much. Under 
the merciless pruning which the great exhibitor practises many 
varieties would fail unless they had the best of well-chosen 
soil and the highest of skilled culture. Many amateurs cannot 
give the soil and culture of the great grower, consequently the 
hard pruning system is not for them. 
Pruning Dwarf Teas. 
Let us look a little farther into the details of pruning, this 
time in connection with Teas. Every year these lovely 
varieties — which, be it remarked, are far more “perpetual” 
than the so-called “Hybrid Perpetuals” — grow in favour. Teas 
are pruned hard by exhibitors, who want a few very fine 
blooms, but hard pruning is not the thing to give a long succes- 
sion, extending over several months, of sweet, shapely, and 
beautiful blossoms. 
Fig. 20 (p. 47) will help us in our search for the happy 
medium in pruning Teas and Hybrid Teas. It shows us 
(A BCD) a set of plants in different stages on their own roats, 
and (H Ff) a pair of plants at two different stages on the seed- 
ling Brier stock. 
We have inserted a cutting (A) of La France, or some other 
Tea or Hybrid Tea, which in due course pushes roots (a) and 
branches (b). In a year’s time we transplant it, pruning the 
weak shoots to a single bud (c), and plant it deeply enough to 
bury the whole of the cutting stem (d). Two strong branches 
spring up (f), which we prune in the spring of the following 
year. If we want a few very fine flowers we prune hard (h); 
if we want good growth and a long supply of nice blooms we 
prune lightly (9). 
In either case the result of our pruning is to cause our 
lant to throw out side shoots. If we prune lightly we get a 
ush similar to C; if we prune hard we get a bush similar 
to D. C has more wood than D, and it will give more flowers, 
pen individual blossoms will not be quite so fine as those 
of D. 
The exhibitor uses the seedling Brier a good deal for his 
Teas, and his mode of procedure is outlined in figures # and 
’, wherein are shown the shortening of the yearling and the 
subsequent pruning of the two years old tree. | 
The foregoing, and the references which accompany the 
figures, will perhaps serve to give even novices a good con- 
ception of the principles of pruning as applied to dwarf 
