188 JOURNAL OF THE EOYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



mild and sunny climate, the temperature in winter rarely falling below 35°. 

 But we cannot grow Roses to perfection — that is to say, they grow and 

 bloom freely, but we cannot get good show blooms. 1 Teas ' and ' H.T.'s ' 

 are fairly satisfactory, but ' H.P.'s ' are almost useless." Well, well, we 

 must not expect in this world to have everything. A soil that will grow 

 anything and a sunny climate which never falls quite to freezing are 

 blessings enough for one land. And it is almost certainly this mild 

 climate, with its abundant sunshine and absence of frost, allowing the 

 Roses no season of rest, which prevents the ' H.P.'s ' giving show blooms, 

 and probably throws them instead into sappy Willow-like growth. On 

 the French Riviera, where there is mild weather all the year round, the 

 hot rainless autumn affords to some extent the check and rest which 

 almost all Roses require, and yet even there the ' H.P.'s ' (and especially 

 the red ones) do not do well, and seldom if ever produce what in England 

 would be called good show blooms. The Teas do not demand such an 

 absolute rest as the ' H.P.'s,' and the more Tea blood there is in an ' H.P.,' 

 the better suited we should expect it to prove to the New Zealand climate. 



Lilies in Shade. 



How well some Lilies succeed, planted under deciduous trees, is well 

 known to many Lily lovers, but not to others. Special mention may be 

 made of Lilium rubellum, a lovely Japanese species, growing about 3 feet 

 high, and very sweet-scented. The flowers are of a beautiful shade of soft 

 pink, with bright yellow anthers, and produced in the shade in clusters of 

 five to seven on a stem, while in the open and free from shade the average 

 is certainly not more than three flowers on a stem. 



Lilium giganteum does wonderfully well in the shade, with big fleshy 

 healthy leaves and strong spikes more than 8 feet high, well furnished, 

 with large flowers, while another lot of plants in the sun most of the day 

 had leaves much smaller and thinner, and only one plant blossomed. In 

 each case the bulbs had been established for a number of years. 



Lilium Szovitzianu??i,v> T ith its lovely citron-yellow flowers, is particularly 

 happy in shade, and, like the above, is much finer than it is out in the 

 open. Both on grass and on cultivated parts it is equally good in shade, 

 and should prove a most valuable plant for naturalising in the wild garden. 

 All the above grow at Wisley under the shade of Oak trees, where it is 

 quite impossible for the sun to reach them. Under the same conditions 

 Lily of the Valley blossoms were enormous, proving what excellent things 

 they are for shady borders or positions. No top-dressing except leaf -mould 

 has ever been given, and no doubt this was the most suitable thing they 

 could have had. 



Lawn Grass Treatment. 



A correspondent complains that the lawn is so full of " coarse tough 

 grass " that the lawn-mower lays it flat and will not cut through it. We 

 fancy it is the old old story of not beginning to mow, &c, soon enough. 

 There is no grass, however small and fine, which, if once allowed to run 

 up, will not become long and wiry. The very grasses our correspondent 

 sends specimens of, if they had been kept mown and rolled from the first 

 and not allowed to shoot up seed-culms and long leaves, would probably 



