THE SIX OF SPADES. 117 



the front of your house with it. You may, in fact, 

 grow the roses you most like in the form you most 

 like standards or half-standards, pillars, pyramids, 

 or dwarfs. And I may say here, that I prefer to grow 

 my own roses, generally speaking, on briers about two 

 feet above the ground, for thus they require no 

 unsightly props, no rain can spoil their blooms by 

 beating them against the wet earth as with dwarfs 

 their complete beauty is brought at once before the 

 eye, and, being within easy manipulation of the 

 gardener, a symmetrical proportion is more readily 

 attained, and of course more lastingly prolonged. Tea 

 roses should be budded as low as possible on briers, 

 grown from seed or cuttings, with a view to their 

 protection from frost by mulching. Tall standards 

 are very useful for the back row in borders, or as the 

 centre of beds, but are rarely beautiful in an isolated 

 state. Their most zealous admirers must allow, I 

 think, that the more the brier is concealed the more 

 attractive is the tree that the more we see of the 

 banner and the less we see of its pole the better ; and 

 no opponent of the standard, though he liked it as 

 little as the brave Scots our standard at North allerton, 

 could require a more full confession. 



Then, as to cost, you may establish a rose-garden 

 with the money which is asked for a rare Pinus or 

 Orchid, and may reproduce your favourite varieties on 

 the brier or the Manetti, by the easy, interesting, and 

 sure processes of budding or grafting, at a very small 

 outlay, and to almost any extent. But be cautious, 

 my Spades, unless you have a taste for rubbish, not 

 to order your rose-trees, nor your anything else, from 



