352 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER A ED COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, March 6, 1860. 
reason the soil becomes nearly as hard as a stone, and cracked in 
all directions, so that it is sometimes exceedingly rough, and with 
its dark colour appears almost like a field of larva. Between the 
trees some tufts of a coarse kind of grass, and bushes of the 
aroma Mimosa, with the sweet-scented yellow Catkins, are scat¬ 
tered. The ground under the trees is strewed with the fruits, 
which are eagerly sought and eaten by the cattle, the succulent 
pulp allaying at the same time their hunger and thirst. But the 
skeletons of cows, horses, and mules lying about form an essential 
feature of a more extended Jicaral, as a considerable number of 
these animals die in these localities from want of food and water 
during the dry season. 
Poinciana pulcheerima. —The splendid Poinciana pulclier- 
rima , in a yellow and scarlet variety, forms a thicket of shrub¬ 
bery on this elevation near Otnoa. This beautiful plant, called 
Malinche inNicaragua,bears the name of Guacamayo inHonduras. 
Both names have a historical, and, it may be said, a poetical in¬ 
terest ; the former being the name of the Indian mistress of Her¬ 
nando Cortez, while the latter is originally that given to the large 
red parrot, called Ara and Laps, in other parts of South and 
Central America—a bird which, with the Maya Indians of 
Ahicatan, seems to have been sacred, and dedicated to the sun. 
Gigantic Columnar Cactus. —In the lower part of the 
valley of Santa Cruz, the gigantic columnar Cactus ( Cereus 
giganteus ) is first seen upon the road. The inhabitants of the 
country call it Saguarro; but various authors, and recently 
Bartlett, have applied the name of Pitaya (Pita-haya) to this 
remarkable plant. This name, however, belongs to another 
species of Cactus, of a similar but much lower growth. The 
latter also appears not to be found so far north, but occurs fre¬ 
quently further down in Sonora. I have obtained my informa¬ 
tion respecting the difference of these two species of Cactus from 
a good authority—the chief of the Pimas—who told me decidedly 
that the Cactus-shafts in that part were not Pitayas, but Sagu- 
arros. The Saguarro presents a thick fluted column, the size of 
a man’s body, and thirty, forty, and even fifty, feet high, with 
sometimes three or four branches at its top, the whole looking 
like a gigantic candelabrum. The fig-shaped edible fruit grows 
at the edge on the top of the columns ; and from the great 
height of the latter it would be difficult to get at them, did not 
this remarkable plant itself afford the means of reaching it. The 
old stems, when decayed, split into a number of thin poles, 
standing in a circle, the height of the entire column enveloped in 
a loose network; and by the aid of these the traveller is enabled 
to knock down the fruit. I have been told that these poles form 
an article of export from the port of Guaymos, and in Europe 
are made into walking-sticks, and sold under the name of 
“ Spanish canes.” I cannot, however, vouch for the correctness 
of this account. The Pimas at the old Mission of San Xavier del 
Bac had a large store of Saguarro fruit, which is used as food in 
various ways. It is eaten fresh; the sap is boiled to a syrup, 
known throughout Sonora by the name of “ Miel de Saguarro 
and a flour is prepared of the cleaned and dried seeds, which 
have some resemblance in appearance and taste to Poppy-seeds, 
and are contained in the fruit in great quantities. This flour is 
made partly into bread and partly into a chocolate-like drink, 
called Atole. The fruit of the Pitaya is said to be far better 
than that of the Saguarro. Both are of great importance to the 
population of Sonora. In some bad harvests, occasioned by the 
want of rain, shortly before my journey through this state, a 
large portion of the inhabitants were obliged to live on these and 
other wild Cactus fruits.— ( FroebeV s Central America.) 
THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 
Tiie very sensible letter of Mr. W. P. Ruddock, page 313> 
will doubtless give rise to comment in other quarters, as the 
question is one in which public opinion is much divided; and 
whether it be ultimately decided that the Manetti or Hog Rose 
be awarded the highest honours in the class of this “ the queen 
of flowers,” or they be both discarded in favour of something else, 
remains yet to be seen. One thing seems likely—that peace will 
not be proclaimed until victory decides in favour of one or the 
other. Mr. Ruddock’s able advocacy of the Manetti stock will 
doubtless be backed by some of our Hertfordshire friends, who 
are supposed to know more about Roses than any one else. But 
even in that famed Rose-growing county opinions differ on the 
relative merits of the stocks they are worked upon, that the 
cause must be taken up elsewhere, in order to give the combatants 
due encouragement as well as fair play in the struggle, the 
appearance of a neutral now and then being also allowed. To 
this latter class I purpose to ally myself; or, it may be, I may 
bo accused of trying to make a party of my own. This, however, 
I disclaim so far as anything new is concerned; for the indi¬ 
vidual I claim a place for had one before either the Manetti or 
Dog Rose was introduced into gardens, and like many other 
good old customs, it is very likely to outlive these intruders. 
To become more practical, I may relate a circumstance that 
I came under my own notice last year with reference to Roses; 
which, though it did not alter my opinion hi the matter to any 
extent, certainly confirmed what I had previously arrived years 
before—which was simply this, that in all cases when practicable, 
Roses are better on their own bottoms than on any kind of stock 
whatever. This is strong language, and is likely to be found 
fault with ; but I will detail one or two experiments which with 
me carry more weight with them than whole pages of letterpress, 
however ably written, and the cases being under my own eye, I 
had every opportunity to witness the result. 
In the autumn of 1858 I planted two beds of standard and 
dwarf Roses of different sizes, which had been worked the tallest 
on the Dog Rose and the dwarfs on the Manetti. The ground 
was fresh ; in fact, it was a spot where some recent alterations 
had raised it from four to six feet higher than it had previously 
been—the material, though not all such good top spit soil as 
would satisfy the fastidious plant-grower for the potting-bench; 
it u r as, nevertheless, not amiss. These plants, about 150 in 
number, consisted of most of the popular kinds of Hybrid Per- 
petuals—as Auguste Mie, Geant des Batailles, Caroline Sansal, 
William Jessie , and others of more recent date, were all planted 
in November ; and I expected they would have done some 
service last summer, but they flowered very indifferently, made 
little progress in growth, and three or four of them died. I do 
not deny feeling disappointed; but I will detail my next ex¬ 
periment, which is on the other side of the question. 
In January, 1859, I bought 200 dwarf Hybrid Perpetuals that 
had been struck as cuttings, many of them at the time I got them 
having very little roots at all; but circumstances prevented my 
attending to them until the end of March, or it might be April, 
when some beds were got ready for them and they were planted 
out. They having been merely laid in the ground rather thickly 
| for the long period just mentioned, so that everybody predicted 
a failure; and certainly many of them looked so withered and 
[ bad, that 1 had not much hopes myself. But we lost very 
few, and the bulk of them grew luxuriantly and flowered in due 
time, the blooms being much finer than the same kinds on 
worked stocks. Baronne Prevost, Alexandrine Beclmetoff, Jules 
Margottin , Baronne Sallez, and others being remarkably good, 
J and that without any extra assistance, as they never received 
a drop of water except in a natural way all the season, and a little 
leaf mould only was dug into the bed at the time of planting. 
Now I need hardly say that this strong case, added to others, 
less decisive, perhaps, in their results, that I had witnessed in 
years gone by, confirmed my previouslyarrived-at conclusion— 
that no roots were so good as their own for out-door work, where, 
of course, the Rose is most at home, and where its beauties are 
most legitimately admired. 
In saying this much on Roses rooting on their own bottoms, I 
by no means deny the utility of stocks for the quick propagation 
of species, as the example of our worthy correspondent, Mr. 
Ruddock, so fully explains ; and so long as the buyers of Roses 
insist on having new ones, the nurserymen must adopt the 
working system (as budding is called), to supply the demand. 
But there are some well established good kinds, which it would 
j not be difficult to propagate from in sufficient quantity to meet 
the public demand, that I hope to hear of more Rose-growers 
turning their attention this way than they have hitherto done. 
And do not let us hear complaints of the shoots of Manetti being 
mistaken for that of the variety worked upon it, which mistake 
more often occurs than many are aware of. Neither shall we be 
annoyed by the perverse suckers which rise up from the roots of 
a Dog Rose; and if our beds or Rose-plots do require renewing 
with a little good material, there is the consolation that when the 
plants are on their own bottoms the waste by the sucker and 
side-slioot system above alluded to will be avoided. True, it will 
be more difficult to obtain standards three feet high and upwards 
of many of the kinds; but I cannot see any beauty in a standard 
Rose when growing in a bed. On turf, when it is placed to give 
effect to some particular design, it is more admissible; but a bed j 
of dwarfs arranged so as to have the strong-growing ones in the J 
