December 27, 1894 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
585 
intimation that “ the soil drying in the letters makes them more legible,” 
but would not this to some extent depend on its colour? Our corre¬ 
spondent is an intelligent practical gardener, and one of the least likely 
to strain after effect in description, and therefore what he finds useful 
is likely to be so to many others, though not to men of all ages, and 
whose eyes may be dimmed by the lapse of years.] 
At Dean Hole’s lecture in Boston a few nights ago, at which Bishop 
Lawrence (of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts) took the chair, 
the platform was arranged with the idea of surrounding the Dean with 
a display of Boses in honour of his life-long devotion to the cultivation 
of this flower. “ A prettier or more novel and effective decoration of 
the stage of this great hall,” said the “ Boston Herald,” “ has seldom if 
ever been seen.” When the Dean—who, we regret to learn, has been in 
indifferent health—entered the hall, accompanied by the Bishop, the 
Chorister Glee Club took their stand under a beautiful floral arch which 
had been erected, and sang with fine effect the old glee, “ My Love is 
Like a Bed, Bed Bose.” If the Dean was not happy that evening he 
ought to have been. 
The National Bose Society—Southern Provincial Show, 1896. 
Your report (page 568) of the annual meeting of the National Bose 
Society, at which, for a reason which I will state directly, I was not 
present, records several unhappy divisions of opinion that may hereafter 
lead to a disastrous issue, but makes no mention—probably even most 
of the Committee are in ignorance of it—of the extraordinary way in 
which Portsmouth has now been treated by the Society. No place is 
even named as possible for the southern show of 1896 but Beading, and 
though almost every real southern exhibitor might well regard it as 
unfortunate that, in the year of a southern show at Windsor, another 
place should be selected only eighteen miles from Windsor, he would 
naturally conclude that the meeting had no option in the matter. I 
therefore feel obliged to lay before you some startling facts, as to the 
true explanation of which I am, at present, wholly in the dark. 
Last year in the discussion about a southern show you, I think, 
published letters from rosarians deserving some attention, pointing 
to Portsmouth as an obviously suitable place for the purpose; 
genuinely southern, neither suburban nor on the Welsh border : a very 
large town, with an admirably suitable hall (or public gardens for an 
alternative) ; and, above all, in a maiden district, whence the Society 
would be likely to gain many new recruits. There was every reason 
then to suppose that the N.B.S. would gladly welcome such a promising 
field for exertions. 
There is, however, I believe, no rosarian exhibitor in or close to 
Portsmouth, and for a while the correspondence produced no sign. But 
last summer a true rosarian, the Bev. J. Spittal, Vicar of Havenstreet, 
Isle of Wight, went to interview the town authorities of Portsmouth on 
the point, with such success that a resolution was passed in the Town 
Council to invite the N.B.S. for 1896, offering every possible welcome 
on the part of the town, and guaranteeing £50 towards the expenses. 
Of this the Secretaries were certainly informed, since I (and I think 
others) wrote to one of them, thinking that the meeting for 1896 was 
now secure. In November I heard to my vexation that no formal 
application had yet been received from Portsmouth, and that the 
Beading authorities had been invited to apply for the show to be held 
there. I have no means of testing the accuracy of this information. I 
thereupon wrote at once to Alderman Scott Foster, who has taken the 
lead in this matter at Portsmouth, and received this reply. 
November 28th, 1894. 
Rev. and Dear Sir,—T he letter has been sent to Secretary. The clerk who is 
responsible for minutes overlooked the matter, and I am glad you reminded me. 
I think I wrote you. and said we shall be gUd of any advice and assistance from 
your Society in the Isle of Wight. Our Drill Hall has the electric light, and this 
probably is an advantage. We shall endeavour to make the show a success.—Believe 
me, yours very truly, T. SCOTT FOSTER. 
I also wrote to Mr. D'Ombrain (a friend of thirty-six years’standing) 
saying that I had arranged to come to the annual meeting on the 6th, 
though at some inconvenience, in order to see that—as Portsmouth had 
no representative on the Committee—no further mistake should be 
made. Mr. D’Ombrain kindly replied to tell me as early as possible 
about the curious mismanagement in regard to the date, and added 
that I need not trouble myself to come up on the 13th, if the place 
of the Southern show were my object, because that loould not be dealt 
with at the general meeting hut in Committee. 
With these facts before you you may perhaps judge of my surprise, 
disgust, bewilderment—it is difficult to find the right word—when I 
heard again from Mr. D’Ombrain (Decem’oer 15th) as follows :— 
“ I am afraid that you will be disappointed, but the question of 
place for 1896 was submitted to the annual general meeting Beading 
was chosen by an unanimous vote, on account of priority of apjMcation.” 
(italics mine). 
Priority of application ! When the Secretaries knew that the Town 
Council of Portsmouth had passed a formal resolution two years before 
the show could be held ; when a formal invitation had reached them, 
long before the time for deciding on the place. Unanimous vote! 
when the sole reason why I was not there to explain the facts was 
owing to one of the Secretaries himself. In the general meeting ! when 
the Secretary again tells me that it must be dealt with in Committee, of 
of which I am a member. 
There may be some explanation of these facts that will justify the 
authorities of the N.B.S., though I cannot even vaguely conjecture what 
it may be. But that Portsmouth, for some inscrutable reason, has been 
outrageously treated seems beyond dispute, and I as one of the Com¬ 
mittee of the Society, will clear myself from any share in it. Liberavi 
animam meam. —G. E. JEANS, Shorwell Vicarage, Isle of Wight. 
The National Bose Society—Annual Meetinu. 
Your report of the National Bose Society’s annual meeting, and 
the letter signed “Gleaner” (page 567) whom I congratulate on his 
most admirable resume of the proceedings, must greatly interest 
those who take even slight notice of the N.B.S. and its “ goings on.” 
I use this expression as it fits in with the remark made by “ Gleaner ; ” 
“Verily the ways of the N.B.S. are ‘ and few there be that 
comprehend them.” 
No one was more astounded than I was to read and hear of 
Mr. D’Ombrain’s action towards Mr. Machin. It must have equally 
astonished others who know of past associations, and the Arab’s noble 
chivalry towards those with whom he has eaten bread and salt appears, 
I regret to say, in our Secretary’s opinion, an example to be carefully 
eschewed. 
Now let me give one or two lights on this V.P. question, although 
I confess that I am unable to quite unravel the mystery, or give a 
satisfactory reply to the pointed question of “ Gleaner.” Prior to the 
last Committee meeting of the Society (which was so mismanaged 
in November, at the Hotel Windsor, that neither Mr. Lindsell nor Mr. 
Shea, who came specially to town to attend, knew where it was being 
held, Mr. Lindsell being actually informed at the Horticultural Club 
that it was then over—at 3.45 !), I wrote to Mr. Machin, suggesting 
that we should call the Committee’s attention to the fact, that while 
rosarians of a lower status were being appointed V.P.s the greatest 
rosarian in the Society had, inadvertently no doubt, been forgotten. 
Mr. Machin, with a generosity and warmth which are natural to him, 
at once saw the propriety of the suggestion, but without any hint to me 
as to his proposed action, wrote to the Committee resigning his V.P, in 
favour of Mr. Lindsell. With a want of savoir faire which will appear 
incredible to anyone who mixes in the world, and knows what is usual in 
such cases, the Committee accepted that resignation. As there is no 
limit to the V.P. list there was no necessity for the vacancy, hut the 
Committee were unable to appreciate the generosity of the gentleman 
resigning, nor able to see that a refusal would be inevitable under such 
circumstances by the suggested recipient of the transferred honour, 
Mr. Lindsell very properly declining it under the circumstances. 
An all-round blunder having been committed, I wrote the proposal 
which Mr. Shea moved at the meeting ; this enabled Mr. O’Ombrain to 
say there was no room on the V.P. list for Mr. Machin, but immediately 
afterwards he proposed Mr. Foster-Melliar. Further comment on that 
is unnecessary, as the pointed rudeness to one gentleman was certainly 
not amended by favourable action to another, whom no one doubts is 
worthy of the honour, if he values it as such. 
If Mr. Machin be not suitable for the Vice-Presidency, may I ask on 
what grounds Lord Bathurst is made a V.P. ? What has he done for 
Bose growing, or as a rosarian, as a patron to the trade, or an exhibitor ? 
The same question applies with equal force to others of our V.P.s. 
The milk and water platitudes of your other contributors this week 
may please those for whom they were written, but in the opinion of many 
the N.B.S. meeting was a “ fiasco.” It was nothing but a “ glorified ” 
Committee meeting (thirty-three of the thirty-seven present being 
Committeemen), and was made so simply by the primary blunder 
of the officials in postponing the meeting. They cannot say there is no 
room available in London except at the Hotel Windsor? Many would 
have attended on the 6th who could not on the 13th, and the discourtesy 
accorded to Mr. Machin, and the result to some of the resolutions might 
on the 6th have been very different to those of the 13th ; but “verily 
the ways of the N B.S. arc singvlier," aud those of the Committee very 
much so. — Charles J, Grahame. 
[Whilst preparing for press other correspondence on this subject 
come to hand, but for which space cannot possibly be found this week.] 
NOMENCLATURE AT FLOWER SHOWS. 
We seem to be a long way behind the times in the system of 
naming Boses, Dahlias, Chrysanthemums, and other flowers at our 
exhibitions, so as to make it perfectly easy to see the names even behind 
a doubls row of visitors against the stands. The present system of 
having the names on small slips amongst the flowers has many dis¬ 
advantages, and it is a matter of surprise that more attention has not 
been paid to the subject. 
