APPENDIX. 293 



day old, and go on quietly sucking away for seven or eight days ; 

 and then, without love, courtship, or matrimony, each individual 

 begins bringing forth young ones, and continues to do so for 

 months, at the rate of from twelve to eighteen daily." 



What is the cure ? There is none. You may brush ; you may 

 powder ; you may syringe ; you may dip ; you may mix your 

 tobacco-water — your decoction of quassia; — but where the aphis 

 has once taken possession, you shall not see the Rose in its 

 integrity. The injury was done before the aphis came. 



But there is something better than cure — there is pi-evention. 

 The aphis finds no food when the Rose-tree is in perfect health ; 

 it will not taste the sap which is pure and untainted ; it is a leech 

 which sucks bad blood only. If situation, soil, and supervision be 

 such as I have suggested, nothing but weather of unusual sever- 

 ity will bring aphis or harm to the Rose. Early in the year a 

 Rosarian asked me "What I did with the green fly?" I told him 

 truthfully that they never troubled me ; and I suppose I spoke 

 too conceitedly ; for last summer, at all events, they attacked me 

 in force for the first time since I understood the art of Rose- 

 growing. But the May of 1869 was extraordinary, as the farmer, 

 the fruitist, and the florist know to their cost j and it was evident, 

 in the dull look of the leaf, that the trees were frost-bitten, and 

 that the usual consequences must come. 



And here is an additional motive for growing our Roses, as 

 much as may be, year after year, 7^^;;/ the bud, because these are 

 later in their development, and sufier less from frost. I have not 

 seen a single aphis this season in my budding-ground. 



Early in June, the Roses intended for exhibition should be dis- 

 budded ; that is, all buds should be removed except one or two of 



