ROSE PILLARS 37 



wider iron frame is placed to make a thicker block 

 of upright Roses. Another is wider still, and the 

 Roses are trained either up or round it outside, or 

 up a central support and then out at the top, from 

 whence they fall over and cover the sides. This is 

 an excellent way of growing that beautiful old Rose 

 Blairii No. 2. For full fifty years this fine thing has 

 been with us, and in its own way there is as yet 

 nothing better. Its origin is not clearly known, but 

 it seems to be related to the China Roses. Its dainty 

 pink colouring, deepening to the centre, gives it a 

 rare charm, and recalls the loveliness of a looser 

 Rose, the Blush Boursault, that, alas ! so seldom gives 

 well-formed blooms. Another way of forming the 

 thick pillar or balloon is to have a stout wooden 

 central post and three intersecting iron arches each 

 six feet wide, forming six outer standards that arch 

 over to the central post, and lateral wires girthing 

 the whole about eighteen inches apart. The post 

 should be five to six inches thick, the iron arches 

 three-eighths of an inch, and the lateral wires one- 

 quarter inch. In the case of a structure of this size 

 six plants of the same kind of Rose are used, one to 

 each upright, and all are trained upwards. 



This thick form of pillar leads to the Rose umbrella, 

 a way of training a free-growing standard that, though 

 its evident elaboration of support does not commend 

 it to people of simple taste, yet certainly does produce 

 a wonderful show of bloom. But the iron frame, if 

 of any size, has to be guyed all round by stiffly 

 strained wires, and these have to be fixed to stumps 



