NOVEMBER. 341 
part is the best; and I candidly say that I would not care to have a 
standard higher than 24 or/3 deet; but at) that height I think a Rose 
looks its best, it comes just. under the eye, and if the plant be well 
grown it 1s never unsightly. So do not let us discard them altogether, 
and now that the Gladiolus is, coming into fashion, it. will do famously 
to plant in, front of them., . 9 
Deal, Oct. 20. i totreny sonemt alt el oni vod D. 

He dott the ihe ates BEAD ES. 
CHAPTER IX. (continued. > 
Tag. PRESIDENT’S,, LECTURE. mom 
NExt in favour to the Protence and thé ‘Moss, the siveet little * Fairy ” 
Rose (Rosa Lawrenceana) gladdened my childhood with its tiny love- 
ness ;, and I, can jsee our, wax-doll, through the, powerful telescope of 
memory, asleep in her miniature crib, with those wee flowerets,on her 
coverlet-and pillows: '\Forishe.was a Royal: Princess; you must, know, 
of amazing beauty and of boundless wealth, and rested ‘always on a 
bed of Roses, until she died oné'day'a mélancholy’ death, slowly roasted 
before ‘the nursery firé by our brother’ Fred,’ to spite us.’ Very’ pretty 
are these Pompone Roses, and as at the great. poultry shows there are 
special classes. for the pert, charming, and. consequential. family of 
Bantams, so should I like to see at owr exhibitions, a Liliputian box of 
these mignons, decreasing; in. circumference from Lirnestine de Barente 
to the Banksic. | 
And the York and Lancaster, flaunting inits'colours, but flimsy in 
its substance, like some other gaudy, ‘swells!’ It was a delight, I 
remember, to arrange its. petals, few.as,,beautiful, upon a bit of news- 
paper, and placing over them) some broken. glass, (once ).in,a desperate 
dearth of crystal, I attacked an attic window with: my batildore, and 
never since, I give you my honour; do I'seem’ to ‘have done’ anything 
half so daring)—to call this consummation'a “flower show.”" ~ I'thought 
of these Rose leaves and of this;broken pane, when it was my privilege 
to superintend the third, National, Rose Show in the Crystal Palace ; 
and I murmured: to myself very thankfully,\.very happily, and, I am 
afraid, very proudly, ‘‘ The child is father to the man.” Poor old York 
and Lancaster, it has succumbed to New Village Maids and Quillets 
Parfaits, andato, Rerles,des Panachees and, Tricolors.of all denomina- 
tions, and, nothing remains to. remind.us.of it,now but, the: Lancashire 
and Yorkshire Railway. : 
I''can but recall,'m addition ‘to the'varieties I have ‘mentioned, a 
white Rosé; whose name I never knéw, but which bloomed in’ beautiful 
abundanée, and much ‘resembled Princesse de’ Lamballe ; the Sweet- 
briar, whose fragrance we were wont’to express, with some’ precocious 
insight ‘into the’ perfumery business, by crushing its leaves with our 
“small fingers $“and the Old’ Monthly, which looked in at our schoolroom 
‘window; ‘and tapped thereon with its buds at times, as though inviting 
us, like the Tover’of’“* Maud,” to come into the ‘garden, and be’ glad. 
