GARDEN ROSES. 
GARDEN ROSES. 
By H. R. Darlington, F.R.H.S.' 
[Read June 29, 1920 ; Mr. W. A. Bilney, J. P., in the Chair.] 
Of late years so much has been written and spoken on Garden Roses 
that it may seem superfluous to add to it and difficult or impracticable 
to find any new thing to discuss. 
But the Rose world of our gardens is constantly changing. The 
constant yearly inflow of new varieties, so far as America and Great 
Britain were concerned, was but slightly lessened even by the war, 
and the reports from Bagatelle show that the French growers are 
again to the front. These new varieties at times give us new plants 
which prove in some way better than those previously in use. Thus 
our Roses are constantly changing, partly as the result of improve- 
ment on existing types, and partly through changes of taste, such as 
the shifting of the popularity, which at one time centred in the exhibi- 
tion Rose, to the decorative Roses, which have been found to be more 
useful for adorning the garden and to provide a larger number of 
flowers for gathering and use in vases or bowls for the dinner-table 
and sitting-rooms. 
Garden Roses consist of two great groups. First, the dwarf 
varieties which we grow in beds and borders, and secondly, climbing 
roses for covering arches, pergolas, and other structures. 
There is an intermediate group available for hedges or use as 
isolated bushes or in large shrubbery-like beds ; but for the moment 
we may disregard these. 
Each of our two great groups may be again divided into two sub- 
groups, according as they bear large more or less solitary flowers, or 
carry their flowers in bunches or clusters. In the dwarf group the 
large-flowered varieties are most numerous and important, while 
among the climbers the chief place is taken by the bunch-flowered 
section. 
These divisions are purely arbitrary and have no pretence of 
resting on any botanical or scientific characters, but are merely 
adopted for convenience of treatment ; and even so, roses of inter- 
mediate character will be found between each group, which will be 
treated solely as convenience dictates, and without regard to their 
natural affinities or derivation. 
Turning first to large-flowered dwarf varieties suitable for beds and 
borders, let us take a really popular Rose and consider the qualities 
that have given it its place in general esteem. Perhaps no Rose has 
