carmine: this variety is well worthy of cultivation. L'Eblouissante, of a brilliant crimson, and Unique Nouvelle, of a deep purplish crimson mottled, are two good and distinct new Moss Roses.

Culture and Pruning.

Moss Roses, when grown on their own roots, require a light and rich soil; in such soils they form fine masses of beauty in beds on lawns. The varieties best adapted to this purpose are the Common Moss, the Prolific, the Luxembourg, the Crimson, and Lane's Moss. Plants of these are procurable at a moderate price, and, by pegging down their shoots with hooked sticks, the surface of the bed will be covered with a mass of foliage and flowers. They require the same severe pruning as the Provence Rose. To have a succession of flowers on the same bed, half of the shoots may be shortened in October, the remainder the beginning of May, pruning closely as recommended for the Provence Roses. By this method the blooming season may be prolonged from a fortnight to three weeks. They should have an abundant annual dressing of manure on the surface in November, and the bed lightly stirred with the fork in February. In cold and clayey soils they in general succeed much better worked on the Dog Rose, forming beautiful standards. I have ascertained that they establish themselves

much better on short stems, from two or three feet in height, than on taller stems, as the stem increases in bulk progressively with the head, and the plants will then live and flourish a great many years.

Raising Varieties from Seed.

To raise Moss Roses from seed is a most interesting employment for the genuine rose amateur; such a pleasing field is open, and so much may yet be done. The following directions will, I hope, assist those who have leisure, perseverance, and love for this charming flower. A plant of the Luxembourg Moss and one of the Celina Moss should be planted against a south wall, close to each other, so that their branches may be mingled. In bright, calm, sunny mornings in June, about ten o'clock, those flowers that are expanded should be examined by pressing the fingers on the anthers; it will then be found if the pollen be abundant; if so, a flower of the former should be shaken over the latter; or, what perhaps is better, its flower-stalks should be fastened to the wall, so that the flower will be kept in an erect position; then cut a flower of the Luxembourg Moss, strip off its petals with a sharp pair of scissors, and place the anthers firmly but gently upon a flower of the Single Crimson, so that the anthers of each are entangled: they will keep it in its position: a stiff breeze will then scarcely

remove it. The fertilising will take place without further trouble, and a fine hip full of seed will be the result. To obtain seed from the Luxembourg Moss, I need scarcely say that this operation must be reversed. A wall is not always necessary to ripen seed; for in dry soils and airy exposed situations, the above Moss Roses bear seed in tolerable abundance. The treatment of the hips, sowing the seed, and the management of the young plants, as applicable to all, is given at the end of the First Part.

THE FRENCH ROSE.

(ROSA GALLICA.)

Rosier de Provins.

THE French Rose (Rosa gallica of botanists) is an inhabitant of the continent of Europe, growing abundantly in the hedges of France and Italy. In the Floræ Romanæ' of Sebastiani, published at Rome in 1818, this rose, Rosa sempervirens, and Rosa canina, are said to be the only roses growing naturally in the Papal States. It was one of the earliest roses introduced to our gardens, and is supposed by some to be the Rosa Milesiana of Pliny, so named from its growing abundantly near Miletus in Asia Minor: it has also historical claims of much interest; for the semi-double

bright-red rose grown in Surrey for the London druggists, and still cultivated extensively in the environs of Provins, to make their celebrated conserve of roses, is, according to a French author,* the red rose, the ancient badge of the House of Lancaster. "Somewhere about the year 1277, a son of the King of England, Count Egmond, who had taken the title of Comte de Champagne, was sent by the King of France to Provins, with troops, to avenge the murder of the mayor of the city, who had been assassinated in some tumult. He remained at Provins for a considerable period; and on his return to England he took for his device the red rose of Provins, which Thibaut, Comte de Brie, had brought from Syria, on his return from a crusade some years before.' The white rose of the House of York was probably our very old semi-double variety of Rosa alba.

Our Provins rose is associated with recollections of the unfortunate House of Bourbon; for when Marie-Antoinette came to France in 1770 to espouse Louis XVI., she passed through Nancy, a city about 160 miles to the south-east of Provins, the inhabitants of which presented her Iwith a bed strewed with leaves of the Provins

rose. Alas! her bed was twenty years afterwards more abundantly strewed with thorns by the

* L'Ancien Provins, par Opoix.

inhabitants of Paris.

Charles X. also, on arriving at Provins on his return from the camp at Luneville, Sept. 21, 1828, was received in state by the authorities, who deputed twelve young ladies to present him with the flowers and conserves of roses.

The inhabitants boast that no other roses, even when the same variety is employed, make conserve equal to those grown in the environs of their town they assert that, towards the end of the seventeenth century, it was sold in India for its weight in gold. 1596 is given by botanists as the date of the introduction of Rosa gallica to England; and, owing to its bearing seed freely, it has been the parent of an immense number of varieties, many of the earlier sorts being more remarkable for their expressive French appellations than for any great dissimilarity in the habits or colours. All the roses of this group are remarkable for their cómpact and upright growth; many for the multiplicity of their petals, and tendency to produce variegated flowers. Some of these spotted and striped roses are very singular and beautiful.

The formation of the flower, in many of the superior modern varieties of Rosa gallica, is very regular; so that most probably this family will ultimately be the favourite of those florists who show roses for prizes in the manner that dahlias are now exhibited; that is, as full-blown flowers,