430 THE COTTAGE GARDENER. March 0. 
Roses afterwards, as they, it seems, require no forcing, 
or very little, to bring them into bloom in May and 
•Tune. Is there any thing to prevent me growing a score 
in such circumstances, in order tl.Mt L may select from 
them a dozen of good exhibition plants?” 
1 think there is. Your shallow pit would do for the 
Roses in winter and spring, so long as you kept them 
small, and therefore, for a year or two, you might bloom 
them there if deemed desirable, more especially if you 
had the command of a hot-water pipe, to dissipate any¬ 
thing like damp iu foggy weather, after the buds had 
broken. 
Many kinds, and especially Tea and China Roses, 
would bloom very fairly, if placed in a common green¬ 
house after the now year ; because, after they were fairly 
started, the temperature that suited Geraniums, &c., 
would not be unsuitable to them. Rut unless great care, 
and much room, were given to the Roses, you must be 
gratified more with a quantity of bloom than with 
the beauty of each plant individually. 
To grow from a dozen to a score of Roses in a beautiful 
bush, or pyramidal shape, some four or five feet in height, 
and three to four feet iu diameter at the base, would 
require the whole of a fair-sized greenhouse to themselves, 
from February to June or July. The great secrets of 
success with such fine, largo plants, arc plenty of room, 
so that light and air are given pretty equally to every 
part of a plant, both before and after its buds are 
broken ; a very low temperature ; and more air than 
would suit greenhouse plants, before every bud had 
broken; and abundance of room, to permit of shoots 
being pegged down and bent, so as to secure the break¬ 
ing of every desirable bud. With every desire to encou¬ 
rage making the vory most of little means, it is no charity 
to encourage efforts for the unattainable. I fear that, in 
this respect, some of our great men are to blame, for en¬ 
couraging hopes that can never be realised. With every 
possible convenience, they speak of certain results being 
so easily attainable ; and then, when, without these con¬ 
veniences, some clever men fail, the result is attributed 
to their incapacity, rather than to any thing connected 
with the impossibility of the circumstances. Within 
these few years, I have met with several instances of 
this kind. Take one for an example:—A place dis¬ 
tinguished for a good supply of flowers all the year 
round; and where, as cut flowers were in great demand, 
the cramming system instead of the specimen-growing 
system had to be practised; all at once, the proprietors 
resolved to become exhibitors; the gardener, a most 
worthy fellow, was quite as anxious; a nice little 
sum was spent in a select collection, to obtain a fair 
start; and, even as respects commoner things, it was 
decided to have individual plants to look at, instead of 
plants to crop over when in bloom. So long as the 
flower-garden supplied plenty of cut flowers, all “ went 
merry, as a marriage bell; ” but, heigho! when the 
dark days of winter set in ! There were the plants 
destined for the exhibition, it is true; but, then, how 
little bloom, in comparison, was now to be obtained; 
and how thin the houses looked ; evory plant afraid to 
look at, or rub elbows with its neighbour; and, after 
much grumbling, of which the gardener for the first 
time had known any thing, it was resolved that in future 
exhibition plants must only be in such numbers as not 
to interfere with the general supply. I know several 
cases, in which growing fine specimens of Roses, in 
pots, has led to misunderstandings so great, that smaller 
plants, slightly forced, to bloom among a general collec¬ 
tion of greenhouso plants, had to be resolved upon, 
instead of splendid single specimens. Let it then be 
considered as a fact, that to obtain such fine plants of 
Roses, and to make the most of them when obtained, 
a house must be appropriated to them ; and then they 
must stand quite thinly. 
My neighbour, Mr. Busby, of Stockwood, has beautiful 
plants of the best Roses iu pots, and has been very 
successful in blooming them well, but from the end of 
January until about June, they have a low span-roofed 
house almost entirely to themselves, the houses being 
appropriated to nothing else than growing late Muscat 
Grapes. This house, in two divisions, is furnished with 
a pit over a tank in the centre, with a path all round. 
Iu this pit there is generally enough of saw dust to 
plunge the pots up to their rims, and this saw-dust 
generally supplies enough of bottom-heat. When I 
called there, on a cold day, a fortuight ago, the saw-dust 
was pulled away from the sides of the pots for one-third 
of their depth, to prevent too much heat, and the top 
sashes were down nearly their full length; the buds 
just peeping. Every shoot on the splendid plants, of 
any length, was bent to make the back buds break freely. 
There are few things more gorgeous and lovely than 
such splendid specimens covered with blooms and buds; 
but, to prevent disappointments, let it be clearly under¬ 
stood that success greatly depends upon plenty of room, 
and the having a house almost entirely to themselves. 
I believe every oue of our great Rose-growers would tell 
you a similar tale, so far as these plants are concerned. 
A great result is hardly ever arrived at without involving 
little sacrifices. The chief sacrifice, in the present case, 
is room under glass, as the artificial heat required will 
be comparatively trilling. 
“ How long shall I have to wait for young plants to 
rival those of Messrs. Lane ? Is there no chance of 
getting medium sized plants to start with, and at a 
moderate price ? I asked the price of some fine speci¬ 
mens last season, but it quite frightened me. A fellow 
would require to he made of money.” 
Every oue knows, that though it may not he the 
intrinsic worth, yet the market value of anything is just 
the mouey it will bring. In plants, novelty constitutes 
a great matter in its price. Growing large specimens of 
Roses in pots is comparatively a novel affair. The 
practice has as yet been confined to a few individuals, 
and, so far, they have the market in their own hands. 
The valuo of a thing is not uniformly regulated bv the 
supply and the demand. The demand may be so seldom, 
that to supply it at all must involve much trouble and 
expense. The demand may be so great, and continuously 
increasing, and thus so far affect the mode of pro- 
ducing, that the more the demand, the cheaper and 
more easily obtained the supply. Almost all these fine 
specimen Rose-plants in pots have been grown for 
exhibition purposes, and, consequently, according to 
their age, are looked upon in value, something according 
to the trouble and expense they have occasioned in 
monopolising so much room under glass for such and 
such a time. Let the demand for such large sym¬ 
metrical plants iu pots become general, and our Rose- 
growers will prepare the most of them, with little or no 
assistance from glass at all; merely plunging the ten- 
derest of them in a shed in winter, with, perhaps, a little 
glass in its roof. Evon they could never be cheap iu 
comparison with young plants, if kept in pots for the 
most of their career. But then, it would be an easy 
matter to grow them thinly in beds for two or three 
years and then pot them, as some amateurs do. 
I have had very good Roses in April, from plants 
potted the previous autumn, though they would be 
better of a summer’s growth in the pots, before being 
asked to bloom under glass. From such modes as those, 
amateurs would eventually be able to procure good 
Rose-plants in pots at a moderate price, if there was a 
great demand for them. At present, for the reasons 
mentioned, they must be expensive. I do not know the 
commercial value of such plants, hut it will, perhaps, 
draw out an approximation, did I venture to imagine 
that neither of the great Rose-growers named would part 
