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JOURNAL OF THE KOYAL HOBTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



was in fact declared indispensable for roses, always in the form of 

 magnesium, sulphate (one speaker pronounced magnesium, chlorate to 

 be poison to roses) and in doses of 200 grammes to the superficial 

 metre. Kainit, which contains a proportion of 12 per cent, of mag- 

 nesium, was recommended for roses. 



6. The Use of Boses in the Ornamentation of the Garden. — An 

 interesting communication was also read by M. Maurice de Vilmorin 

 on the botanical roses, giving an account of their native habitat, their 

 degrees of hardiness, and their value to the horticulturist, the hybrids 

 to which each of them is parent, and advice as to the most suitable 

 position for each in the rose garden. — M. L. H. 



Roses, Retrospective Exhibition of {-Jour. Soc. Nat. Hort. 



Ft., Series iv. vol. xi. July 1910; pp. 468-472). — One of the most 

 notable exhibits at the International Eose Show held at Cours-la-Eeine 

 in May 1910 was the unique collection called " The Eetrospective 

 Exhibition of the Eose," shown by M. Gravereaux, whose life's work 

 it represents. Not content with the study of all that concerns the 

 ways and wishes of the living rose, M. Gravereaux has followed its 

 traces into all branches of human learning, sciences, arts, letters, and 

 the industrial applications of these. Palaeontology, geology, eth- 

 nology, language, archaeology, botany, and zoology have all been laid 

 under contribution, and as the result it seems to be matter of certainty 

 that the first rose came from where we ourselves, our domestic animals, 

 our cereals, and some of our garden vegetables alike had their earliest 

 home — in the heart of the Pamirs, between the Altai and the Hima- 

 layas. This hypothesis is the more probable that it is even now upon 

 the Central Asiatic plateau that are to be found the greatest number of 

 species of the genus Rosa and its most varied forms. Starting with 

 the scientific truth that the need will at length create the organ, 

 M. Gravereaux has set himself to discover, by examining their charac- 

 teristics, how the various species of the genus Rosa spread themselves 

 over the Northern Hemisphere (there have never been any indigenous 

 roses in the Southern Hemisphere), and he has worked out the follow- 

 mg classification : — 



1. Roses with Imperfect Organs. — Species considered as the most 

 ancient. Principal characters : ovary inserted at the base of the re- 

 ceptacle, seeds only disseminated by artificial or accidental opening of 

 the fruit. The group includes R. berherifolia (which grows in the salt 

 regions round the Caspian and Arab Seas, and is always difficult to 

 acclimatize), B. microphylla, and R. Beggeriana, &c. 



2. Downy or Kairy Roses. — Scattered on the dry elevated plateaux' 

 of Asia; R. sericea, R. pimpinellifolia, R. acieularis, &c. 



3. Unarmed or Spineless Roses. — Apparently contemporary with 

 the lower tertiary upheavals: Pi. alpina, R. cinnamomea, &c. 



4. Prickly Roses. — Having had, no doubt, to attach themselves to 

 the arboreal vegetation of their epoch (tertiary), amentaceous mostly . 

 R. canina, R. oxyodon, R. ruhiginosa, &c. 



