198 
THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 
the shoots rise, train them their full length upright till June, then 
untie or unnail them, and nail them in again in the form of half 
circles, or as near that figure as possible, thus : — 
This bending of the shoots will promote the ripening of the wood ; 
and if the season is hot and dry there will be an abundant pro- 
duction the next year of golden trusses on the upper parts of the 
shoots. As soon as the bloom is over, cut half the shoots back to 
plump buds at the base, train the shoots from these buds upright, 
and bend as before. By this treatment the trees will bloom again 
in autumn. 
It really does not matter what stock Isabella Gray is worked on ; 
but it must have a warm and dry position. To promote the formation 
of spurs it is necessary to hasten the growth by giving abundance of 
water, alternating with liquid manure, early in the spring, and to 
train in all the wood its full length and cease watering about the 
middle of July. As soon as these shoots begin to ripen, there will 
probably appear a second growth of shoots from the base, and these 
shoots must be suppressed, otherwise the formation of spurs will be 
prevented. If the season is tolerably dry, and the tree has plenty 
of sun, it will at once throw out spurs and bloom freely. As soon 
as the side spurs begin to push, the critical moment is past, the tree 
will now devote its energies to the production of fiowers instead of 
new wood, and it may be assisted again with liquid manure. The 
next spring cut back a portion of these shoots, to induce a strong 
growth of new wood to go through the same process as the year 
before, and perchance on the shoots not pruned a few (or many) 
blooms will appear in May or June. 
The first year that Isabella Gray was sent out, and when rose 
growers had no other subject to talk about, so thoroughly did 
it engross their attention, we purchased some plants of Messrs. 
E. G. Henderson, of St. John’s Wood. They were in five- 
inch pots, worked on Boursault stocks, and consisted entirely 
of bloom spurs, the buds having been taken from ripe wood. There 
were some eight or ten wiry branches upon each, forming very com- 
pact little bushes. These little plants bloomed in the greenhouse in 
May, most beautifully, being completely covered with small but very 
perfect blossoms, of a rather pale gold colour, two or three shades 
paler indeed than the flowers usually come out of doors. When the 
bloom was over, they were cut back very close, and the pots were 
dropped into larger ones and rich soil rammed in between. They 
soon produced shoots which naturally broke into spurs, and bloomed 
tolerably well in the autumn. After blooming they were shaken 
out, repotted into seven-inch pots, and slightly shortened. In 
February they were put in a warm house and again bloomed as 
before ; but the flowers were always pale, though they were always 
kept near the glass. In the winter of 1860 these plants were in an 
unheated structure, the pots were frozen through, and they perished 
