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CASSELL'S POPULAB GAPDEXIXG. 



much Rose-food by stealth, ^vhile the tops are coyly 

 moving their houghs many clear yards away. 



The Best Soil. — AVithout controversy this is a 

 strong holding argillaceous loam, so tenacious as to 

 almost touch clay in some of its more inviting forms. 

 To imderstand this more fulh* it may be added that 

 not a few soils that are called plastic clay when 

 wet, grow into strong loam when dry. Though 

 such loams are, on the whole, the most favourable 

 for the perfect cultivation of Roses, it must not be 

 hastily asserted that they cannot be grown on others. 

 The writer has seen prize Roses grown on loam so 

 light that it could be driven and drifted like sand 

 in times of protracted di'ought, and also on sheer 

 peat. The mere natural quality of Rose soils is 

 often of less vital importance than might at first 

 sight appear, inasmuch as in very many cases the soil 

 is the mere shell, dish, or basin to hold the savoury 

 materials which are so freely given to Roses to feed 

 upon. By such expedients not a few very poor and 

 indifferent soils have been made to produce Roses 

 «qual to those grown on soils so good that expert 

 rosarians have said of them that they seemed made for 

 Roses. It may also be affirmed in geneml terms that 

 land which will yield good wheat, beans, and mangold, 

 will grow first-rate Roses. This has been proved 

 over wide areas of late years, as the insatiable 

 demand for Roses has impressed many of these into 

 Rose nurseries, which have in some cases been 

 l^lanted with Roses without further preparation, and 

 in others after heavy manuring and double-digging. 

 The results have been satisfactory in both cases, 

 though not equally so. 



AMiile saying this much, so that few may de- 

 spair of growing fair Roses with soils such as 

 they have, or can make with the materials 

 within reach, it should be added that no loam 

 can be too good nor too rich for the well-doing 

 of Roses, Were it not for the expense involved, 

 wherever a rosaiy or a Rose-bed is required on light 

 gravel or sandy soil, such soil should be bodily 

 removed to the depth of between two and three feet, 

 and the space filled up with the top spit of strong 

 fibrous loam from the nearest fat pasture or meadow. 

 If the pasture is not fat, then the lean may be 

 enriched, in the filling up, with a liberal sprinkling 

 of smashed bones, night-soil, or manure; the two 

 latter partially decomposed by age, or separated and 

 weakened by an admixture of earth, are thus con- 

 verted into specially rich and friable composts. 



But it is seldom that such radical and expensive 

 transpositions of soil are needful. 



The Rose, whilst preferring these holding loams, 

 manifests no reluctance to run freely and far into 

 mixtures ; and strength as well as friabihty and 



porosity seem often to be bom of these admix- 

 tures. Two bad soils compounded skilfully will 

 not unf requently result in a good one. To give an 

 extreme example, neither pure clay nor silver sand 

 will grow Roses to any good i)urpose. Convert these 

 two into one, by compounding a half-and-half of 

 each, and the compound will at times almost rival 

 the model loam ah-eady described ; and so of many 

 other soils and subsoils. Separated they are com- 

 paratively useless for Roses ; combined, and further 

 enriched by manures, they furnish all that is needed 

 to glow Roses successfully. Thus heavy di-essings 

 of clay or marl on peat or sand ; chalk or lime, or 

 sea or other sands on clay ; a few loads of ditch- 

 mud and strong loams on gravel, of additions of 

 subsoil to sm'face, and vice versa, have all been 

 fruitful in such transformation of texture and feed- 

 ing qualities of soils, as to force those which were 

 hopelessly inert or ban-en before to grow a garden of 

 Roses ever afterwards. 



Most of those admixtures of earth were accom- 

 panied by liberal dressings of manure. Xot a few 

 of these have been so liberal as to justify the 

 comparison of the soil to a mere shell for holding 

 the kernel, and in not a few cases the mere me- 

 chanical effect of so much manure on the textures 

 of the soil has probabh* been of as much or even 

 more benefit than theii' chemical constituents or 

 feeding properties. For their mechanical influence in 

 the amelioration of soils, few manures equal that 

 from the farm-yard. It is a sort of omnium gatherum 

 of most of the more valuable animal and vege- 

 table manures. Any excess of it, however, on light 

 soils might tend to make them get lighter, and 

 consequently more unfit for Roses. But on heavy 

 soils no manure can match it, and the heavier the 

 son, the heavier the di-essing may be. 



The Ameliorating and Enriching of Rose 

 Soils, — Among other alterative, ameliorative, and 

 enriching appUances of Rose soils, the following 

 are the best : burnt chalk, clay, loam, or other 

 earths, charred refuse of all sorts, charcoal, and Hme 

 or builders' rubbish, smashed bricks, bones, ashes, 

 town refuse, road-scrapings, street-sweepings, spent 

 tan, spent hops, malt, malt-combs, night-soU, and 

 the dimg of cows, pigs, fowls. 



Few things afford stronger proofs of the onmi- 

 vorous character of Roses, and the painstaking care 

 of rosarians in suj)plying their wants, than this list 

 of food, whioh might indeed be considerably ex- 

 tended, so as to include the whole of our natural 

 and artificial maniu'es. 



The mechanical effects of several of these sub- 

 stances are almost permanent, those of others more 

 or less temporary. Of the first class are burnt earth 



