1062 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
December 31. 1904. 
Roses. 
The Rose Garden 
{Concluded from page 1039.) 
Planting. —This can be carried on either in autumn or in 
spring. With the majority of Roses autumn is preferable, 
thus allowing the roots to get used to the soil and ready for 
the following spring’s growth. Wet weather is to be avoided ; 
the plants are better laid in for a time until a fine day occurs. 
With standards—and, in fact, with other Roses sometimes— 
a frequent mistake is often made by planting them too deeply ; 
4 in. to 5 in. of soil over the roots is every bit as much as 
they like, and with the standards it is very necessary to pro¬ 
vide each plant with a stout support, thereby avoiding the evil 
often wrought by strong winds. 
Watering. — In a dry summer this is as necessary out of 
doors as indoors, especially with a freshly planted bed of Roses. 
A good soaking should be given once a week during a diy 
period, and many lives might be saved if watering and syring¬ 
ing were practised with more liberality. When the plants 
have made some progress in growth and begin to form the 
flower-buds liquid manure may be used with advantage. The 
manure tub should be labelled, “ To be given weak and often.” 
Pruning. — Many and diverse are the opinions as to prun¬ 
ing, and no hard and set rule can be made, nor is it desirable. 
With autumn-planted Roses March will be the month to prune, 
and if spring-planted, the early part of April will be as early 
as desirable, unless the season is exceptionally mild. With 
Teas and Noisettes many people never start pruning until 
April; and it consists of cutting away weak and unhealthy 
wood and topping the strong shoots. In the Hybrid Perpetual 
class the strong shoots require a considerable shortening, and 
everything depends on what one desires ; if large blooms, then 
cut back severely ; if moderate blooms /md a lot of them, leave 
about eight or ten eyes on a shoot. Different varieties, of 
course, require very different treatment. Some of the Hybrid 
Teas will stand a good pruning and others require very little. 
In all pruning the maxim is : destroy the weak and leave the 
strong. 
As to the form a Rose garden should take, of course the in¬ 
dividual taste of the owner will rule this. To my way of think¬ 
ing, one should be able to wander through paths with Roses 
now over one’s head, now blossoming ’neath one’s feet, now a 
bank of Roses, now growing in the rocks. They should be 
climbing, creeping, and rambling with the freedom bom of 
Nature. Colours, too, should be mixed and harmonised. A 
pleasing effect is often obtained by beds of the same variety. 
Some of the Rose-beds in Kew have been a great success even 
in this most trying year. The pergola is a most useful method 
of growing many of the climbing Roses. I think one of wood, 
put up in the rustic style, is more satisfactory than the iron 
bars and chains we have at Kew. 
For rockwork the wichuriana Roses are excellent. Gar¬ 
denia (a yellow), Evergreen Gem (a buff), and Jersey Beauty 
(pale yellow), are three varieties which I know and can recom¬ 
mend. They have something of the Sweet Brier scent, and 
produce a mass of bloom. The rugosa Roses serve as a good 
background to dwarf varieties. Rosa rugosa atropurpurea. is 
undoubtedly the finest of the class. The seed pods of the 
single varieties are striking objects during the winter months. 
Of the Austrian Roses, Persian Yellow is a most lovely Rose. 
It is, I think, the best yellow of all. The new varieties of 
Sweet Brier are certainly worth a place in any garden ; they 
do well on a pergola. I do not intend to give a list of Hybrid 
Perpetuals and Hybrid Teas that I should recommend ; there 
are too many, and I might as well start to read one of Paul’s 
catalogues. I will just say that many of the old Roses are 
still worthy of attention, and many of the new ones are not ; 
and if one does not happen to know a Rose, the nurseryman’s 
description will not help him much. To buy a Rose without 
seeing it is like buying a pig in a bag. 
Rose Showing does not interest me. I have no sympathy 
with a man who allows Iris garden to be robbed of all its best 
blooms, and for days before each show has the buds covered 
with lamp-shade arrangements; and then, besides this, one only 
gets about half as many blooms if the plants are grown on 
show lines. If anyone shows, I think it should be the nursery¬ 
man, and then no one’s garden suffers. 
Hybridisation.- —This part of the subject is of importance, 
but time only permits a few remarks. For every new Rose 
that is put on the market a hundred or more are thrown away 
by the nurseryman who raises new Roses, and of those he 
sends out only a few are of lasting merit. It is, in fact, a 
most disappointing business. At the same time, it is interest¬ 
ing, and one never knows but that one may have the luck to 
raise a really good Rose that is quite new. When one pro¬ 
ceeds to cross two varieties one has to obtain two blooms. Both 
must be at that stage when the pollen is mature^ The stamens 
should, if possible, be cut out of the seed-bearing bloom 
before the pollen develops. After shaking the pollen out of 
the one on to a piece of clean glass, the operator proceeds to 
fertilise the other bloom, first plucking the petals off, and 
then applying the pollen off the glass with a camel hair brush. 
After crossing has been performed the bloom should be pro¬ 
tected by muslin, so as to prevent bees interfering. In prac¬ 
tice one cannot tell what influence the pollen-bearing plant 
or the seed-bearing plant will have on the offspring, and so 
there is often much disappointment. I have seen hundreds 
of seedling plants thrown away at Mr. Paul’s after being 
kept several years. Some plants flower the first year, but 
more take two years. 
1 he seeds are sown in January and February in cool frames, 
and the tenderer varieties are sown in pans. The quali¬ 
fications of a Rose are colour, scent, and habit of growth, and 
these have to be considered when judging the seedlings. 
Speaking of scent reminds me of a story, and as Kewites are 
fond of stories, I will tell it Some years ago a well-known 
raiser of new Roses happened to be in a railway accident, 
and although lie escaped without broken bones, the shock 
played on his nerves to such an extent that lie lost the 
sense of smell. As a raiser of new Roses this was a serious 
drawback, as he could not tell the merits of a new variety. 
He went to law and claimed and obtained damages to the 
extent of £2,000 from the railway company. 
At one time a Rose that resembled a spring Cabbage was 
considered to be perfection. Now, fortunately, this is changed, 
and we have many beautiful single Roses of recent introduc¬ 
tion. Dicksons, of Dublin, have given us this year a fine 
yellow Tea, calling it Irish Star. It is a good Rose and a 
good name. Among others they are also sending out a Hybrid 
Tea, Irish Brightness. This is a single crimson. I think there 
are far too many pink Teas introduced. Catherine Mermet 
dates back to 1869, and since then a great many have been 
introduced, but few have equalled, and in my opinion only 
one has surpassed, this fine Rose, and that is its own sport, 
namely: Bridesmaid. 
In Hybrid Perpetuals we have many that are not distinct, 
and when one thinks of their numbers it is not surprising. 
In 1881 Mr. Paul gives a list of Hybrid Perpetuals in which 
there are 549 names, and every year they have been adding 
new names. At the present time there is much talk of pro¬ 
tection ; truly, we need protection from the yearly crop of 
new names. While speaking of names, I have always thought 
that there is much to be desired in the choice of these. Some 
are too long, such as The Sweet. Little Queen of Holland. 
Little Queen, or Queen of Holland, would have been quite 
enough; and then many are such ugly names. For instance, 
who would associate “ Palmengarten Director Siebert” with 
a delicately-coloured Hybrid Tea ? C. E. F. A. 
Garden Allotments at Dundee.— An animated discussion 
took place at a meeting of the Ancrum Road Garden Allot¬ 
ment Association, Dundee, the other week, owing to the society 
being threatened with eviction from their grounds. It was the 
opinion of several of the speakers that the eviction could be 
avoided if the Town Council were willing to consider the same. 
If the association were compelled to remove it would be at a 
cost of £600. 
