-ROSES. 
237 
recurrence once a year will be found highly beneficial, as it induces 
a number of small fibres or rootlets to be formed, and these 
increase at every shift, so that in a short time there is a complete 
wig of roots to plants that, had they remained in one position, 
would have had scarce any; the tendency thus given to form 
roots may be increased and regulated by shortening the ends of 
the strongest at the time of replanting ; indeed, it should receive 
the proper attention as an important operation, for, besides the 
foreshortening mentioned, all dead, bruised, or decaying parts, 
together with suckers, should be taken out, and as the plants are 
o 
taken to their places the ground should be made up again for 
them, adding manure or soil as the case may seem to require; 
and, above all things, taking care to spread out the roots equally 
on all sides, that the full benefit of the new earth may be felt by 
the plant. 
Having last year a number of China roses in pots beyond what 
I could accommodate in pits, and still being anxious to preserve 
them, if possible, I adopted a mode of protecting them similar to 
that sometimes used with strawberries for forcing ; the strongest 
shoots were shortened in November, and the pots carried to the 
foot of a wall, and there laid on the sides one on another until 
a pile four feet high was formed, having the heads of the plants 
towards the wall, indeed touching it; outside the pots and close 
to them was built a wall of turf sods, packed firmly together, and 
continued the length of the row of pots and round the ends to 
the brick wall, thus inclosing the roses on all sides except “the 
top, where a wide board was laid in a manner to throw off wet. 
This protection was found fully sufficient to keep them all alive, 
and there were fewer cases of mildew among them than might 
reasonably have been expected, the worst of them being confined 
to the bottom rows ; in the spring, when taken out and cut down, 
they broke amazingly well, on the whole, more vigorously than 
those which had been nursed in the usual way in brick pits with 
glazed sashes, where damps prevailed to an alarming extent. I 
shall never again limit my stock in regard to the pit room I may 
have, since they can thus easily be preserved. 
Franciscus. 
