52 
The Garden Magazine, March, 1923 
gardens to be truly gentle, whether 
he was a truck-driver or a million¬ 
aire. —J. Horace McFarland. 
The Rescue of Forgotten Roses 
“THE PARENT OF THE ORIGINAL ‘RAMBLERS’” 
Rosa multiflora, a dainty-flowered belle of bygone days rather over-shadowed 
bv her more flamboyant progeny such as the Crimson Rambler and its kin 
have ever played golf. I disposed of my golfing some years ago 
when my son Chandler won the National Tournament—(he won the 
national championship for two years). The Exmoor Club gave him 
a medal and presented him with a life membership. I was called 
upon to tell how it felt to be the father of a ‘Champion’. I said 
that I found this club a matter of local pride and so my boys could 
play. 1 also felt that 1 would like to have at least one good golfer 
in the family and that I naturally picked out my oldest son Brad¬ 
shaw, but I soon found out that he was more proficient at afternoon 
teas than he was on the golf links, so 1 turned to Chandler and gave 
to him my natural abilities as a golfer, which in addition to his own, 
made him the golfer that he is. When he is playing around it is his 
game he is putting up—but when he reaches par it is his pa’s game he 
is playing.” 
One of the astonishing things, and yet it is not so astonishing, about 
these straightforward garden experiences is that their utterance al¬ 
ways brings a response. Garden society is not only democractic 
but it is selective. For 1 have found the man or woman interested in 
To the Editors of The Garden 
Magazine: 
Y SPECIAL thanks are due 
L. M. H. of Longmeadow, 
Mass., for giving in the November 
number the name and address of a 
nurseryman who lists certain of the 
really good and all too rare old- 
fashioned Roses. 1 , too, find no 
modern Rambler or Climber so sat¬ 
isfactory as the Baltimore Belle, no 
white Rose with the charm and deli¬ 
cate elegance of Madame Plantier. 
Will L. M. H. allow me to set her 
right as to Rosa multiflora? This 
surely is not the Hundred-leaved 
Rose, but the Climber known in 
England as the Bramble Rose and 
the parent of the original Ramblers. 
Like many another good thing it is 
looked upon with contempt by most 
professional gardeners in this coun¬ 
try where it is only used as stock 
for budding or grafting, but it has 
a loveliness and distinction all its 
own with its beautiful habit of 
growth, its clean foliage and its mul¬ 
titude of tiny single flowers about 
the size of a Blackberry blossom, 
which are produced in great pyra¬ 
midal clusters. It is charming for 
arbor or pergola or trained on the 
trunk of a tree and it well repays a 
judicious pruning and thinning. I 
am fortunate enough to possess two 
or three good plants of this Rose 
and it is a great favorite with me. 
I have also the true old pale pink 
Maiden’s Blush, rescued from an 
abandoned farm; the white climbing 
Rose which used to grow beside the 
front door of nearly every house in 
New England villages fifty years 
ago; Harison’s Yellow; the little 
white and pale pink Scotch Roses 
and that dear old deliciously scented 
half-double red Rose which is only 
now to be found, I think, in the uncut 
grass of some farmhouse dooryard. 
And alas! I have rose beetles! 
Can any one tell me of any succes- 
ful antidote to this pest? 1 have 
tried everything I have ever heard 
advocated and the creatures thrive and wax fat on them all—even on 
arsenate of lead! 
Why cannot G. M. enlist a Crusade for the Rescue of Forgotten 
Roses, as well as for the destruction of their arch-enemy? I could 
write pages of special pleading for the old flowers which have been 
pushed to the wall—or out of existence—to make room for so-called 
“improved” varieties, but space (and possibly the Editor) forbids !— 
Marcia E. Hale, Elisabethtown, New York. 
—We are entirely sympathetic to the plea for these old-time Roses, and 
it was our delight to renew acquaintance with many of them in the 
collection of old-fashioned Roses in Highland Park, Rochester, N. Y., 
last summer—of which some account was noted in our issue of Sept., 
1922, p. 41. Here at Garden City a Rose garden in which many of 
these old-time gems will be gathered is now being added to the other 
gardens already established around the home of The Garden Maga¬ 
zine. This garden will welcome visitors this season, but more of 
this in due time. By the way, is the old red Rose referred to above the 
old R. gallica?— Ed. 
