416 ROSA 



of the calyx-tube, containing, when ripe, a large number of dry, hard 

 seeds. The species are spread over all the temperate parts of the 

 northern hemisphere, three or four only of which occur south of the 

 Tropic of Cancer. 



There is an extraordinary diversity in the number of species of rose 

 as estimated by different authors. Mr Baker, the leading British 

 authority, some years ago estimated them at about seventy. At the 

 present time new species from China and elsewhere have brought the 

 number up probably to a hundred. Other writers have made over three 

 hundred species. No group of plants, in fact, unless it be Rubus, has 

 suffered more at the hands of injudicious and incompetent species makers 

 than this. One gentleman is known to have cut his species so fine that 

 two of them could be found on the same bush. 



The wild roses suffer somewhat in the estimation of planters because 

 they have to bear comparison with those innumerable garden types, 

 evolved by ages of cultivation and selection, which include what are, 

 by common consent, the loveliest products of the garden. Few of them 

 remain in bloom more than a month, where again a comparison is made 

 to their disadvantage when the hybrid perpetual, teas, and other long- 

 blossoming races are considered. Still, when the wild roses are regarded, 

 as in justice they should be, from the standpoint of their own merits, 

 there are few .hardy shrubs which surpass the best of them in beauty, 

 grace, and fragrance. Take the humblest of them all, the dog-rose and 

 the sweet-briar of our hedgerows, is either of them excelled in their sweet- 

 ness and charm on a fresh June morning? And many have in their often 

 large, abundant, and handsomely coloured fruits a beauty in autumn the 

 garden races do not possess. 



Cultivation. These roses are of the simplest cultivation. They 

 all do well in a good loamy soil such as suits the garden types, although 

 it need not be quite so rich. Many of the stronger, more or less rambling 

 growers, like multiflora, moschata, arvensis, and Wichuraiana, are very 

 well adapted for planting in big shrubberies, on rough slopes, against 

 unsightly fences, or on the outskirts of woodland. The smaller and 

 daintier ones like sicula, Ecae, Webbiana, lutea, ferox, .etc., will need 

 a front place in the ordinary shrubbery; some may even be planted 

 in the rock garden. The common bushy type, such as sericea, rugosa, 

 microphylla, are pleasing as isolated shrubs on lawns. Whilst all {hose 

 strong enough and bushy enough to kill the grass beneath their branches 

 are admirable for the wild garden. 



Most of the species can be propagated by cuttings made of firm wood 

 in July and August, and placed in gentle heat. Cuttings should be made 

 of short twigs with a " heel " of older wood attached. Many of the 

 robuster sorts can be increased by cuttings put under hand-glasses out-of- 

 doors, or even in the open ground, but this is not so quick and certain 

 as where a gentle bottom heat is given. But some do not root at all 

 freely, such as Webbiana, lutea, the Scotch rose group, and generally 

 those with very pFickly stems and small leaves. For such of those as 

 have spreading roots and sucker freely, like the Scotch roses, it is best 

 to break them up into small pieces and replant them ; pieces with a little 



