142 MY GARDEN 



alone. But for us, whose love and watchfulness must 

 cover so many other flowers and whose space is limited, 

 there are Roses, too, Roses that will give of their sweet- 

 est, tucked in among the perennials, growing among the 

 shrubs, clambering over walls and trellises, or standing 

 alone in long-limbed, bountiful beauty beside the garden 

 path, and to such as these this chapter is lovingly 

 dedicated. 



Many of these are Roses of yesterday, old-fashioned, 

 sweet-breathed, and simple, which have modestly given 

 way before the great tide of modern beauties, retiring 

 to out-of-the-way nooks in old gardens. Many are of 

 more recent introduction, but have the unostentatious 

 charm of those others; some are free, wild creatures 

 brought to endure garden life with equanimity but keep- 

 ing the native grace of their former state; and then there 

 are the splendid host of climbers, born of the Polyantha, 

 Wichuraiana and other types, which increase in number 

 and in beauty with every year of work done by the 

 hybridizers. 



I do not mean to imply that these friendly Roses will 

 thrive luxuriantly with no comforts in shallow, poor 

 soil, or shade; nor that they are never attacked by in- 

 sect or disease, nor that they will smile year after year 

 without attention. No desirable plant would ! But only 

 that their requirements in all these matters are much 

 less fixed than those of their high-born sisters, that they 

 are adaptable and not exclusive. For every kindness 



