208 



SOILS. 



THE most eligible soils for roses budded on the 

 Dog Eose stock are strong alluvial loams inclining 

 to clay, they also grow well in heavy calcareous 

 clays, for on a si^ep bank on my premises, which 

 was cut through in lowering the turnpike road, 

 leaving a bare surface of white clay, full of chalk 

 stones with literally no surface soil, Dog Eose 

 stocks were made stout shoots, fourteen feet long 

 in one summer. Still any deep soil with a cool 

 subsoil suits them well. A light surface soil with 

 gravel or sand beneath is not favourable to them ; 

 but, with abundance of surface manure, Standard 

 Eoses will even in such soils do pretty well. Stiff 

 soils on the whole are most favourable, for 

 they are the soils in which the Dog Eose grows 

 most vigorously, and if they are of the most reten- 

 tive nature, they are easily corrected by some 

 burnt earth and manure. 



It is light sandy soils that are naturally unfa- 

 vourable to Standard or dwarf Standard Eoses 

 budded on the Dog Eose, and in such soils they 

 should not be planted ; but the remedy is simple, 

 for by planting pyramidal roses on the Manetti 

 stock, as directed in p.l 14, no soil obstacle remains, 

 and the rose lover may cultivate his favourite 

 flower in the sands of Bagshot, the blowing sands 



