CHAP. Ill 



SITUATION AND SOIL 



29 



is still to be found apparently sound it has probably 

 received some permanent injury or disfiguration that 

 will render it valueless, but cannot be detected till it is 

 too late. In such cases it will be advisable to remember 

 that the injury is almost always worse than it appears to 

 be at first, and that if the growth is not far advanced 

 the sooner the damaged shoots are removed the better. 



Even the native briar standard stocks, just transplanted 

 from the hedges, will sometimes suffer; and many 

 thousands were thus destroyed in nursery grounds 

 in the winter of 1890-91. In one year in the eighties 

 many of my standard H.P.s were thus destroyed, and 

 in almost every case the injury — the frost-bite — was not 

 to the Rose, but to the stock, black dead places, looking 

 like actual bites, appearing in the stems. This was an 

 exceptional case, and it does seem odd, as we rarely see 

 a wild briar injured by frost, that the same plant should 

 be more tender when transferred to a garden ; but we 

 must remember that standard stocks for budding have 

 nearly all their fibrous roots cut off, and that they are 

 generally taken from a sheltered place and planted right 

 out in the open, much more exposed to evaporation, and 

 are often perhaps allowed to become dry at the root in 

 moving. It is plain, therefore, that, as frost is such an 

 enemy to the Rose-grower, a situation should be sought 

 where the least damage of this sort may be expected. 



Frost is seldom very severe in England at the sea-side, 

 but the salt spray and violent winds would render such 

 a place generally undesirable, though good Roses are 

 grown in some seaside localities. The old-fashioned 

 saying is that " frost falls." This is of course not true 

 in itself, but it is true in effect. Heated air, being 

 lighter, ascends ; colder air, being heavier, descends : and 

 it is found that frost is always most severe and danger- 



