88 GARDENING FOR BEGINNERS 



China Roses. Although the China or Monthly Rose has 

 many delightful attributes, it is by no means present in every 

 garden ; indeed, one may go through many and never see 

 it at all. Some one who truly loves good garden plants 

 says : " If I had only one square yard of garden it should 

 have a bush of Rosemary, but if I had a yard and a half it 

 should have a Rosemary and a China Rose." It is, indeed, 

 a delightful flower this common old kind, with its loose 

 clusters of cool pink bloom, sometimes cup-shaped and 

 sometimes flattened from the slight reflexing of the fully 

 expanded petals, always dainty and pleasantly fresh-looking, 

 and with a faint and tender scent whose quality exactly 

 matches its modestly charming individuality. There are 

 garden varieties of deeper colour, but these seem rather to 

 lose the distinctive grace of the type ; it is one of the cases, 

 of which others might easily be quoted, where any departure 

 from the type gives varieties that are a loss rather than a gain 

 to beauty. 



If proof were needed of the merit of this good plant it 

 might be found in the many ways in which it can be used. 

 A hedge of China Rose is always pretty, and there is a certain 

 class of greyish foliage with which it enters into most satis- 

 factory combination. The cool dusky foliage of Rosemary is 

 the best of grounds for the clear pink flowers, and the grey of 

 Lavender is equally pleasing. Old Lavender bushes that are 

 somewhat overgrown, and whose branches fall about, leaving 

 dark empty spaces in the heart of the bush, seem to invite the 

 companionship of these pretty pink Roses, whose flowering 

 branches can be led into the empty spaces. Even if it be 

 desired to do away with the old Lavender, whose lifetime is 

 shorter than that of the Rose, and to plant them afresh, that 

 is only an opportunity for cutting the Roses down and letting 

 them grow up anew in company with the young Lavender. 



But it is not with grey-leaved shrubs alone that China 

 Roses should be planted. Their fullest season is towards the 

 end of June, but even as late as October they are fairly full of 

 flower. The flowering bush Ivies are then in bloom, and on 

 sunny days attracting a busy humming crowd of insect life. 

 Here again the pretty pink of the Rose bloom is charming, 

 with the yellow green of the Ivy clusters, and as the Ivy 

 bushes grow to their full height of 5 feet or 6 feet the Rose 

 shoots up in friendly companionship, and thrusts long flower- 

 crowned stems through the mass. 



With the Anemone japonica it also groups well, or with 

 hardy Ferns, and makes good autumn garden pictures. No 



