This section is from the book "Landscape Gardening", by Andrew Jackson Downing. Also available from Amazon: Landscape Gardening.
Mrs. Bosanquet, exquisite pale flesh color.
Madame Breon, rose.
Eugene Beauharnais, bright crimson.
Clara Sylvain, pure white.
Cramoisie Superieure, brilliant crimson.
Virginale, blush.
The tea roses, most refined of all roses, unluckily, require considerable shelter and care in winter, in this climate; but they so richly repay all, that no rose-lover can grudge them this trouble. Tea roses are, indeed, to the common garden varieties what the finest porcelain is to vulgar crockery ware.
Safrano, the buds rich deep fawn.
Souvenir D'Un Ami, salmon, shaded with rose.
Goubault, bright rose, large and fragrant.
Devoniensis, creamy while.
Bougere, glossy bronze.
Josephine Malton, beautiful shaded white.
We thought to give noisettes the go-by; but the saucy, rampant little beauties climb up and thrust their clusters of bright blossoms into our face, and will be heard. So here they are:
Solfaterre, bright sulphur, large.
Jaune Desprez, large bright fawn.
Cloth Of Gold, pure yellow, fine.
Aimee Vibert, pure white, very free bloomer.
Fellenberg, brilliant crimson.
Joan Of Arc, pure white.
"Girdle of Venus! does he call this a select list?" exclaims some leveller, who expected us to compress all rose perfections into half a dozen sorts; when here we find, on looking back, that we have thirty, and even then, there is not a single moss rose, climbing rose, Provence rose, damask rose, to say nothing of "musk roses," "microphylla roses," and half a dozen other divisions that we boldly shut our eyes upon! Well, if the truth must come out, we confess it boldly, that we are worshippers of the everblooming roses. Compared with them, beautiful as all other roses may be and are (we can't deny it), they have little chance of favor with those that we have named, which are a perpetual garland of sweetness. It is the difference between a smile once a year, and a golden temper, always sweetness and sunshine. Why, the everblooming roses make a garden of themselves! Not a day without rich colors, delicious perfume, luxuriant foliage. No, take the lists as they are — too small by half; for we cannot cut a name out of them.
And yet, there are a few other roses that ought to be in the smallest collection. That finest of all rose-gems, the Old Red Moss, still at the head of all moss roses, and its curious cousin, the Crested Moss, must have their place. Those fine hardy climbers, that in northern gardens will grow in any exposure, and cover the highest walls or trellises with garlands of beauty, — the Queen of the Prairies and Baltimore Belle (or, for southern gardens, say — Laure Davoust, and Greville, and Ruga Ayrshire); that finest and richest of all yellow roses, the double Persian Yellow, and half a dozen of the gems among the hybrid roses, such as Chenedole, George the Fourth, Village Maid, Great Western, Fulgeus, Blaneheileur; we should try, at least, to make room for these also.
If we were to have but three roses, for our own personal gratification, they would be — Souvenir de Malmaison, Old Red Moss, Gen. Dubourg.
The latter is a Bourbon rose, which, because it is an old variety, and not very double, has gone out of fashion. We, however, shall cultivate it as long as we enjoy the blessing of olfactory nerves; for it gives us, all the season, an abundance of flowers, with the most perfect rose scent that we have ever yet found; in fact, the true attar of Rose.
There are few secrets in the cultivation of the rose in this climate. First of all, make the soil deep; and, if the subsoil is not quite dry, let it be well drained. Then remember, that what the rose delights to grow in is loam and rotten manure. Enrich your soil, therefore, with well-decomposed stable manure; and if it is too sandy, mix fresh loam from an old pasture field; if it is too clayey, mix river or pit sand with it. The most perfect specific stimulus that we have ever tried in the culture of the rose, is what Mr. Rivers calls roasted turf, which is easily made by paring sods from the lane sides, and half charring them. It acts like magic upon the little spongioles of the rose; making new buds and fine fresh foliage start out very speedily, and then a succession of superb and richly colored flowers. We recommend it, especially, to all those who cultivate roses in old gardens, where the soil is more or less worn out.
And now, like the Persians, with the hope that our fair readers "may sleep upon roses, and the dew that falls may turn into rose-water," we must end this rather prolix chapter upon roses.
 
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