In his pride the gardener told me with much exultation how 

 nearly all his roses had hung their heavy heads disconsolately dur- 

 ing three days recently. When it rained, all but Lady Pirrie — 

 William R. Smith (even he rested his perfect blooms on anything 

 conveniently near), Admiral Ward, Augustus Hartman, Ophelia, 

 Jonkheer L. Mock and Sunburst. He had written down the names 

 of these roses with remarks and little notes, which I thought very 

 clever of him. 



All the time he was speaking of his roses he patted and 

 caressed a bloom here and there, just as he might have patted and 

 caressed a little child. But then, why not? These roses were his 

 little children ! I could see that Lady Pirrie was his favorite. She 

 certainly is one of mine, with her warmly ruddy, exquisite blooms. 



Here was a bed of some fifty or sixty plants that had come 

 through a Summer of drought with an August of intense heat. 

 Here was Lady Pirrie opening her salmon rose and copper colored 

 buds in a beating, tearing rain, dipping her lovely head at intervals 

 to shed it, then proudly erect again waiting for the too full cup. 



I stepped into the bed on a board laid there so I might not sink 

 down to the "bottom spit", two feet below. I examined the foliage 

 over and under for mildew — not a trace. Lady Pirrie roses im- 

 mune. How satisfactory, how splendid! A rose so beautiful, so 

 willing and so free from every garden blight. I was so pleased, 

 because I love this rose — not because she has been awarded a gold 

 medal by the Royal Horticultural Society, but because she has 

 never failed me. It always has been possible to find many cutting 

 blooms from my collection of Lady Pirries. 



If we amateur gardeners would promise ourselves never to 

 plant two or three bushes of any tried-out rose, but to have fewer 

 varieties of those whose faithfulness we are not so certain of, 

 and more of each that are dependable our rose gardens would never 

 look meagre and bloomless at any season. A rose that has been 

 tested and found to be good and willing should be given the prefer- 

 ence over others extravagantly acclaimed, but that have not proved 

 satisfactory in your garden or mine. For instance. Lady Pirrie, 



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