

over two years old, and all weakly Huse and all 
delicately growing kinds should be cut down to 
3or4eyes. Stronger growing kinds may be left 
longer. Teas and Noisettes require less cutting 
back, the tips should be shortened, and weak 
shoots cut out, and they should not be pruned till 
May. Use a good pruning knife in preference to 
a secateur; it cuts cleaner, and does not bruise 
the wood. 

The real cause of the eminence of France in the 
cultivation of Roses is the fact that it absorbs the 
almost exclusive attention of French florists ; the 
high price of fuel in France places the cultivation 
of tender exotics almost out of the question. 
The first impulse was given to the culture of 
the Rose in France at the commencement of the 
present century, under the auspices of the Em- 
press Josephine, who caused her own name to be 
traced, at considerable expense, in the parterres 
of Malmaison, with a plantation of the rarest 
roses. The Rose School of the Luxembourg nur- 


