34 A BOOK ABOUT ROSES. 



their auspices, successful shows have been held in London, 

 at which window-plants, and plants grown in yards and on 

 roofs, have well deserved the prizes they have won ; that 

 allotments are more numerous near our larger towns ; that 

 at some of our barracks, soldiers have the opportunity of 

 turning their swords into pruning-hooks (metaphorically, I 

 mican, as an actual transformation might not be agreeable 

 to the drill-sergeants) ; and that societies for the improve- 

 ment of cottage-gardening are multiplying throughout the 

 land. I may mention here, that for some years I have 

 tried, satisfactorily, to promote among the children of my 

 parish that love of flowers which we find in them all, not 

 only by giving prizes for their collections of wild-flowers at 

 our annual show, but by taking them walks on Sunday 

 evenings, and helping them to collect and arrange their 

 posies, teaching them names, habits, and uses, and showing 

 them the coloured likenesses and the histories which are 

 provided in a cheap form by the Society for Promoting 

 Christian Knowledge, and in other illustrated manuals. 



But I must cease now to babble of green fields, and must 

 come away from the wild to the garden Rose. 



