The Brier Roses 



particularly susceptible to mildew. So he gave the 

 whole matter his earnest attention, and "having ascer- 

 tained beyond a doubt that the various races or families 

 of the Rose are capable of combining by cross-fertili- 

 sation, the road seemed to be open to adventure in 

 search of a new race which might be free from some 

 of the existing defects." And eventually he became 

 convinced that "the Sweet Brier offered itself as a very 

 natural basis of a new race." It was a native, and our 

 soil and climate were its true home ; it was proof 

 against mildew, frost would not hurt it, while it was 

 more richly endowed with fragrance fragrance of leaf 

 as well as flower than was any other Rose. 



" The breeze of spring, the summer's western wind 

 Robs of its odour none so sweet a flower 

 In all the blooming waste it leaves behind 

 As that the Sweet Brier yields it. 



Its sweetness all is of my native land, 

 And e'en its fragrant leaf has not its mate 

 Among the perfumes which the rich and great 

 Buy rrom the odour of the spicy East." 



(G. F. Francis.} 



So he commenced hybridisation with the Sweet Brier 

 as one parent, and various Tea, China, Hybrid, Per- 

 petual and other garden Roses as the second, using for 

 the most part the pollen from one of the last-named 

 flowers to fertilise Sweet Brier blossoms. And he 



