76 A BOOK ABOUT ROSES 



ashes of burnt soil are said to be best/ writes Morton, 

 ' when they are blackest ; black ashes are produced 

 by slow combustion, and red ashes by a strong fire/ 

 Blend these ashes with the parent soil, intermixing 

 lime, rammel, or sand (if you can get them), and then 

 there remains, so far as the soil is concerned, but 

 one addition to be made, and of this we will treat 

 presently. 



First crossing, if you please, the little bridge 

 which divides my Rose-gardens, and passing over 

 the narrow streamlet, from a cold clay soil, fertilised 

 by cultivation, to a light, porous, feeble loam, best 

 described by a labourer digging it when he said, * It 

 had no more natur' in it than work'us soup.' Nor 

 was it ever my intention to try Roses in this meagre 

 material, until a friend happened one day to say of 

 it, * No man in England could grow Roses there^ 

 Then, fired by a noble ambition, or pig-headed 

 perverseness, whichever you please, I resolved to 

 make the experiment. I took a spade as soon as 

 he was gone, for a happy thought had struck me 

 that this soil might resemble that boy -beloved 

 confection Trifle, which, thin, frothy, and tasteless 

 in the upper stratum, has below a delicious subsoil 

 of tipsy-cake and jam. So I found out in my garden, 

 not far from the surface, a dark, fat, greasy marl 

 rich as the nuptial almond-paste, and looking as 



