with their liberal efforts to give you pleasure. Pinch off one-half, or two-thirds, of their flowerbuds as soon as they are perceptible, and your reward will be Roses in November.

CHRISTMAS ROSES.

Every cultivator of the Rose is well acquainted with the difficulty of having Roses in bloom in the "dark and dreary" month of December. I feel, therefore, much pleasure in giving the result of some experiments ending in perfect success; so that, in future, a bouquet of roses on Christmas-day may grace the festive board in company with the holly, rivalling in brilliancy the colour of its berries.

The Bourbon Rose, Gloire de Rosomanes, is now well known by every lover of this favourite flower as a most brilliant and beautiful variety; but, like many other roses remarkable for the brilliancy of their tints, its flowers are deficient in fulness; in fact, they are merely semi-double; and, like all roses of this description, they fade very quickly in hot weather; it is only in the cool cloudy days of autumn, when their flowers never fully expand, that they are seen in perfection. This quality induced me to turn my attention to this variety, as well calculated to give a crop of very late autumnal or winter flowers.

Nothing can be more simple than their management. Towards the end of May, young plants from small pots should be shifted into six-inch pots, in a good compost of two-thirds loam and one-third rotten manure or decayed leaves, and plunged in sawdust or old tan in the open ground, fully exposed to sun and air; they may be allowed to bloom freely all June and July, but in August and September every blossom-bud should be pinched off; this will make the plants stout and very robust, and towards the end of October an abundant crop of incipient flower-buds will be apparent; the plants may then be removed to a light and airy glazed pit or greenhouse, and placed as near the glass as possible: no fire-heat, unless frost is very severe, should be employed, and abundance of air-they cannot have too much should be given: it will also be much better to place the pots on slates or on a layer of sand, rather than on a dry wooden shelf. I am induced to recommend sand from the perfect success I have had with my plants, which, after being taken from the bed in which they had been plunged all the summer, were placed on sand: they put forth roots from the bottoms of the pots into the sand, grew luxuriantly all November, and commenced blooming in December. On the 4th of January I cut a most beautiful bouquet of flowers. I may add, that if large plants can be procured, they may be potted into eight-inch pots,

and, in process of time, into twelve-inch; so that large bushes covered with flowers may ornament the drawing-room in that month above all others,

in which roses are "rich and rare," Decem

ber.

At present I know of only one other variety equal to the above as a Christmas rose, the Hybrid Perpetual, Géant des Batailles, which, under the same management, will bloom very nicely, but is scarcely equal to Gloire de Rosomanes for blooming in winter. In addition to this valuable quality, I had almost forgotten to add that its flowers, although almost odourless under the bright sun of June, in winter exhale a delicate and agreeable perfume.

EARLY SPRING ROSES.

The Hybrid Perpetuals are the only roses adapted for this mode of culture, which is very simple. About the end of August select some plants in a bed of roses, that you wish to bloom very early in spring; then cut all the weak shoots and shorten all those that are strong and vigorous to within five or six buds of their base. A moderate-sized tree, whether dwarf or standard, will furnish from five to seven of these vigorous shoots. They will, soon after being pruned, put forth numerous young blooming spurs; in October thin out these spurs so that the tree is not crowded, and

pinch off the bloom buds, giving no other pruning, and, in spring, they will reward you with a crop of flowers, earlier by ten days than roses managed in the usual way. I have seen them from a fortnight to three weeks earlier; in 1848, they were in full bloom on May 14th.

AN ABRIDGED LIST OF ROSES.

Adapted for Amateurs possessing small Gardens, or for those beginning to form a Collection; selected so as to give the leading Variations of Colour.