154 A BOOK ABOUT ROSES 



there is a great waste of mural space on which 

 flowers or fruits might be grown. 



Coming down from the Climbers to the 



Tall Standards, 



I take leave to say that, although, where windows 

 and walls are otherwise inaccessible, a long spider- 

 broom in the hands of an efficient housemaid 

 deserves the admiration with which we watched it 

 in our youth, few persons would think of cutting 

 it in twain, and of setting the upper half in a garden 

 of Roses. Yet have I seen objects suggestive of 

 such an operation in some of these remarkably tall 

 standards which are still extant, but which, were I 

 Czar and Autocrat of all the Roses, would soon 

 find themselves, like other wretched Poles, in exile. 

 ' Their appearance is dismal ; there is no congruity 

 between stock and scion, no union between horse 

 and rider — an exposition, on the contrary, of mutual 

 discomfort, as though the monkey were to mount 

 the giraffe. The proprietors, it would seem, have 

 been misled by an impression that the vigour of the 

 Brier would be imparted to the Rose, whereas the 

 superabundance of sap has been fatal. Food, con- 

 tinuous and compulsory, which it could not assimilate 

 or digest, has induced a sickly surfeit ; and the 

 wretched Rose is stupefied, and looks so, with a 



