292 BRECK'S BOOK OF FLOWERS. 



to within a few inches of the ground, as it is important to get 

 a clean, vigorous growth for the next year's bloom. Another 

 important matter is, to dig the ground deep and have it thor- 

 oughly enriched. A third is, in pruning. The wood of climb- 

 ing Roses does not produce so fine flowers after it is two years 

 old. It is necessary, therefore, to encourage the growth of one 

 or more new shoots every year, cutting out the old wood as fast 

 as there is new to supply its place. The lateral branches are 

 to be pruned in, while the main stems are to be kept the 

 whole length. 



We had almost forgot the Multiflora Rose, a class distinct 

 from those already named ; they produce flowers in large clus- 

 ters, but rather small. Some of the varieties are, the Cottage 

 Rose, Laure Davoust, Garland, &c. In New England they 

 are all rather tender. 



In closing our remarks on Roses, we cannot refrain from giv- 

 ing Gerarde's account of it some two hundred and fifty years 

 ago. His mode of classification was, among thorny plants. 

 " This plant of Roses, though it be a shrub full of prickles, yet 

 it had been more fit and convenient to have placed it with the 

 most glorious flowers of the world, than to insert the same here, 

 among base and thorny .shrubs, for the Rose doth deserve the 

 chiefest and most principled place among all flowers whatso- 

 ever, being not .only esteemed for its beauty, vertues, and his 

 fragrant, odoriferous smell, but also because it is the honour and 

 ornament of our English sceptre, as by the conjunction appear- 

 eth in the uniting of those two most royal houses of Lancaster 

 and York. # * It is reported that the Turks can by no means 

 endure to see the leaves of Roses fall to the ground, because 

 that some of them have dreamed that the first or most ancient 

 Rose did spring from the blood of Venus, and others of the Ma- 

 hometans say, that it sprang from the sweat of Mahomet. # ^ 

 The Holland, or Provence Rose hath divers shoots, proceed- 

 ing from a woody root, full of sharp prickles, dividing itself 

 into divers branches, whereon do grow leaves, consisting of five 

 leaves set upon a single mid-rib, and those snip ^ -out the 



