They can certainly look attractive and do provide early colour and one not found in the rose family, but as they make mulching, weeding, spraying and dead-heading much more difficult if the bed is of any width at all, they can be of more trouble than they are worth. An edging of the bed with something else is another matter, and without doubt the best of all for this is dwarf lavender, both its grey foliage and the flowers setting off the roses remarkably well. ROSES WITH OTHER PLANTS The belief that roses should not be mixed with other plants dies hard. Probably it dates from Victorian times when flowers for cutting were confined to a special part of the garden and tucked well out of sight, but nevertheless it is undoubtedly true-though difficult to be precise about the reason-that large-flowered bush roses and most cluster-flowered ones, do show to greater advantage in isolation. Their guardsman stance may have something to do with it, and, on the practical side, if they are growing in close association with other plants in a mixed border, their cultivation will be much more difficult. Sprays which the roses need may cause havoc elsewhere, for instance, but there are kinds of roses which need little if any protection from disease, that have a less formal habit of growth, will not get too large, and which will mix very happily in any border. Pre-eminent among these are the China roses, practically all of them recurrent, and the polyantha types like 'Yesterday', 'Cecile Brunner' and 'Perle d'Or', the soft colours of which will blend with practically anything. As was the case with bedding roses, a large and bushy old garden rose such as the soft pink damask 'Ispahan' at one end of a bed of other plants will look well and form a point of special interest. Mixing shrub roses and old garden roses with other shrubs can, particularly in the case of the latter, be of distinct advantage to the roses. Some, like the enormously vigorous 'Complicata' or 'Scarlet Fire', welcome the support of an evergreen such as holly and will weave their way into its branches. Others like the large alba cultivars will stand on their own, and their attractive grey-green leaves will add distinction when the flowering of the other shrubs is over. However, many of the old garden roses do look rather untidy towards the end of the summer and not all their foliage ages well. Something else close by will help to divert the eye, though an exception must be made of those wild and old garden roses that bear orange or scarlet hips and which can light up a shrub border and give it a second life late in the year. SHRUB AND OLD GARDEN ROSES ON THEIR OWN A planting such as this needs considerable care in its planning and patience over several years before its full glory will be achieved. Concentration on the less rampant growers like the gallicas and most of the damasks will allow for relatively close planting and there will be quicker maturity, but with the larger roses it is very difficult to picture in the mind the ultimate spread and, in fact, the sheer bulk (if one can use so inelegant a term for a rose) that will eventually be reached and to make adequate allowance for it.