from its having been so long in our gardens the favourite of every child gardener.

Culture and Pruning.

Most of the varieties of Rosa gallica are robust and hardy, and flourish equally as bushes on their own roots, grafted or budded on short stems, or as standards; but they cannot be recommended for tall standards, as their growth is too compact to be graceful. To grow them for exhibition as single blooms or 'show roses,' the clusters of buds should be thinned early in June, taking at least two-thirds of the incipient flowers from each; manure should also be laid round their stems on the surface, and manure water given to them plentifully in dry weather. With this culture, these roses will equal anything we have yet seen in this country.

Although the varieties of this group are summer roses only, their period of flowering may be prolonged by judicious pruning, and for this purpose two trees of each variety should be planted, one to be pruned in October, the other early in May, or just when the buds have burst into leaf; these will give a regular succession of flowers. In pruning, cut out with a sharp knife all the spraylike shoots, and then shorten, to within six or eight buds of their base, all the strong shoots : by such I mean those that are above fifteen

inches in length; the weak shoots cut down to two or three buds. This is the pruning required by the Alba, Damask, and Hybrid Provence roses.

Raising Varieties from Seed.

To raise French roses from seed, they should be planted in a warm, dry border, sloping to the south, in an open, airy situation-the shade of trees is very pernicious to seed-bearing roses. The following kinds* may be selected, as they bear seed freely :--The Tuscany rose, a very old variety, with rich, deep crimson, semi-double flowers; also Ohl and Latour d'Auvergne. The two latter should have their flowers fertilised with the pollen of the Tuscany Rose, and some fine crimson roses will probably be raised. Pretty striped seedling varieties ought to be raised from Eillet parfait and Village Maid; if the flowers are deficient in pollen, they should be fertilised with that of Rosa mundi.

THE HYBRID PROVENCE ROSE.

(ROSA CENTIFOLIA HYBRIDA.)

THESE beautiful roses are exactly intermediate between the French and the Provence Rose,

*Some of the roses recommended for seed-bearing are old varieties, which may be procured from any rose nursery.

partaking, almost in an equal degree, of both parents. They have upon the long and graceful shoots of the Provence the close and more dense foliage of the French Rose; and in some of the varieties, the pale and delicate colouring of the first enlivened by the rich and deep crimson hues of the latter. The origin of these roses may be soon attested; for if the Single Moss, or Provence Rose, is fertilised with the farina of Rosa gallica, hybrid Provence roses will be produced, agreeing in every respect with the above description.

Among the most superior varieties is Blanchefleur, of the most delicate flesh-colour, or nearly white; very distinct, and even now one of the finest summer roses known.

Rose Devigne is a delicate blush rose, one of the finest roses of this colour known; it is most luxuriant in habit, and forms a fine pillar

rose.

Princesse Clémentine is one of our finest white roses, with flowers very large, perfectly double, and well shaped, and not liable, like our old favourite damask rose, Madame Hardy, to come with a bud in the centre of the flower: in habit it is most robust, and well adapted to train up a column or pillar, which, when covered with its snowy and large flowers, may perhaps, without affectation, be called a pillar of purity.

Comte Plater is a unique rose, with large and

very double flowers, finely shaped, of a delicate cream, tinted with fawn-colour, which is placed in this family, but perhaps has quite as many claims, like Rose Devigne and some others, to be grouped with the hybrid China roses. Like botanists, rose cultivators are often posed by the freaks of Nature, who seems to delight in breaking into every artificial system, and to pay no more respect to the classification of the botanist than to that of the more humble florist.

Within the last twenty years how many plants have been named and unnamed, classed and reclassed-Professor A. placing it here, and Dr. B. placing it there! I can almost imagine Dame Nature laughing in her sleeve when our philosophers are thus puzzled. Well, so it is in a measure with roses; a variety has often an equal claim to two classes. First impressions have perhaps placed it in one class, and there rival amateurs should let it remain: for the classification of roses is necessary, although in many cases imperfect, owing to the unbounded fertility of nature; rose-culture is rendered by it more interesting and attractive.

Hybrid Provence roses are very robust and hardy, useful to the rose amateur, as serving to form a most delicate group of soft colours: they also make admirable standards, as the branches of most of the varieties are inclined to be spreading, diffuse, and, of course, graceful: the pruning

recommended for the French Rose may be applied to all of this family.

The most free seed-bearing rose of this family is the Globe Hip, the flowers of which should not be fertilised if pure white roses are desired. Some few years since I raised a plentiful crop of seedlings from this rose, fertilised with the Tuscany: nearly all my plants produced semi-double blush and rose-coloured flowers.

It will, I feel assured, repay the amateur if he will plant Comte Plater, or Emerance, against a south wall, and fertilise their flowers with the pollen of Rosa Harrisonii, or the Persian Yellow: if seed can be obtained, some novel yellow roses must be originated.

THE HYBRID CHINA ROSE.

(ROSA INDICA HYBRIDA.)

Rosier Hybride de Bengale.

THE superior varieties of this fine division give a combination of all that is or can be beautiful in summer roses; for, not only are their flowers of the most elegant forms and colours, their foliage of extreme luxuriance, but their branches are so vigorous and graceful, that perhaps no plant presents such a mass of beauty as a fine-grown hybrid China rose in full bloom. They owe their