ROSA. 



25: 



1 2 



ROSA. 



may be purchased at any ironmonger's, 

 or up a pyramid. The latter may be 

 made either of iron rods and wire, 

 or of three pieces of wood, with 

 holes bored in them at regular 

 distances, through which narrow- 

 laths may be passed. It is useful to 

 put a ball and spike on the top of 

 this figure, to prevent birds from 

 settling on it, which they would be 

 very apt to do, and would dirty the 

 flowers and foliage beneath. Climbing 

 Roses may also be trained over trel- 

 lis-work, or up the trunks of trees ; in 

 which last case they should be allowed 

 to climb through the head of the tree, 

 and to hang down from the branches 

 in wild and graceful festoons. 



Musk Roses (Rosa moschafa) 

 form another family of Roses, though 

 not a numerous one, as there are not 

 above ten or twelve kinds ; they have 

 very long slender branches, which 

 being too weak to support alone their 

 large bunches of flowers, should be 

 trained against a wall. These Roses 

 never require pruning (except to cut 

 out the dead wood), as the flowers are 

 only produced at the extremity of the 

 shoots. The Banksian Roses (R. 

 Banksice), which are of two kinds, 

 one with buff flowers and the other 

 with white ; the Macartney Roses 

 (R. bracteata and R. microphylla) 

 and some others, are natives of China, 

 and rather tender in England, requir- 

 ing to be trained against a wall, and 

 to receive a little protection in severe 

 winters. R. Alpina, the Alpine 

 Rose, of which there are a great num- 

 ber of varieties ; R. lutescens, the 

 yellow American Rose ; and R. spi- 

 nosissima, the Scotch Rose, of which 

 there are almost innumerable va- 

 rieties, are hardy, early-flowering 

 Roses, that will grow in almost any 

 soil or situation. R. sulphured, the 

 double yellow Rose, is, however, more 

 difficult to manage. This beautiful 

 rose, which till lately was only 



known in a double state, has large 

 drooping flowers, shaped like those of 

 the common Cabbage Rose, and is 

 supposed to be a native of Persia. 

 In some situations it grows freely, but 

 in others the flower-buds burst on one 

 side, when only half formed, and the 

 flowers are thus imperfect. It should 

 be grown in an open airy situation, in 

 a light free soil, and it should have 

 abundance of light and air. It should 

 be well supplied with water during 

 the flowering season, but the ground 

 in which it grows should be so well 

 drained as never to allow the water to 

 remain in a stagnaut state about the 

 roots. "When trained against a wall, 

 it should have a north or eastern 

 exposure rather than a southern one ; 

 and the shoots should never be cut in. 

 This Rose, in fact, does not require 

 any pruning, except what may be 

 necessary to remove the dead wood ; 

 or to train the plant into shape, 

 though the latter should be avoided 

 as much as possible, as all wounds on 

 this Rose are apt to produce canker. 

 It is said to flower freely when 

 grafted on the musk cluster at eight 

 or ten feet from the ground, or on 

 the common China Rose, but I have 

 never seen the experiment tried. The 

 most beautiful yellow Roses I ever 

 saw were in the neighbourhood of 

 Worcester, where the plant had grown 

 in a border in front of a south-eastern 

 wall, and had been partly trained 

 against it, though for some time 

 before I saw it, probably two or three 

 years, it had evidently been left en- 

 tirely to Nature. A plant supposed 

 to be the single state of this Rose, 

 was imported about 1835, by Sir 

 Henry Willich, from Persia, and 

 flowered for the first time in England 

 in the garden of the London Horti- 

 cultural Society, in the summer of 

 1840. 



There are many other Roses not 

 included in the foregoingenumeration; 



