Mr. Rivers, in the last number of our excellent contemporary, the Florist, has successfully stripped of its rags one of the idols which the folly of collectors has set up for the admiration of simple gardeners. "Nothing in floriculture," he says most truly, "has marched so rapidly and steadily onward as an improved and common-sense taste for roses. It is only a few years since all the gardening world used to talk of the 2000 varieties of roses grown by the Messrs. Loddiges; and happy was the amateur who could beat his rival by a score or two of varieties; I mean varieties in name, and not in fact. In this we had, with our usual national weakness, copied our neighbors, the French, who will oven now say to their English visitors, 'Ah, Monsieur, have you seen my new Rose? - la voila!' and then you will have pointed out to you a seedling from La Reine, with an accidental stripe on each petal; or a seedling from Madame Laffay, with smaller flowers than its parent: then takes place the following dialogue:

"English Florist. These are of no use,Mon-sieur; they are not distinct enough.

"French Florist. Monsieur, distinct! they are new.

"E. F. New or old, they are of no use, tell you: have you a scarlet La Reine.or a yel- low one, or a white Madame Laffay?

I have fine new roses from La Heine, all suberb! Voila Perpetnelle, Coupe d'Hebe.

"E. F. Why, your seedlings are all pretty, but they are not distinct enough. But at what charge do you propose so sell these seedling**? for although of nearly the same color as their parent, I should like one or two if not too dear.

"F. F. Monsieur, they are new. What a horrible word is that 'distinct' of yours; I pray you do not use it. But for my seedlings I must have a high price, as I will deliver to you all the property in them; let me see, for No. 1 you must give 100/.: for No. 2, 125l.: for No. 3, 150/.

"E. F. Stop, stop, Monsieur! I will not give you one hundred shillings for your 'propriete;' they are not distinct enough.

"F. F. Monsieur, what a horrible word! it kills roe.'

It is satisfactory to find a man like Mr. Rivers joining us in an attempt which we have so long been making, to persuade the world to distinguish between selection and collection. We accept him as a stout recruit, from whom good service may be expected. His trade experience tells him much that we know nothing of; we suspect that it tells him, among other things, how unprofitable it is to swamp a nursery with things which only a few curious people ever ask for. Let us add that he has to some extent carried out his principle in the last edition of his sale catalogue, by cutting down the varieties with no sparing hand. For instance, he now offers for sale only 67 varieties of Hybrid Perpetual Roses: while a neighbor enumerates 110.

But why keep 67 of these varieties? Can it be said that among them there are 67 distinct peculiarities - of growth for instance, or foliage, or color, or form or season. And if there be, are the distinctions always of horticultural value? Assuredly not. No one who only re-gards the decoration of a garden can possibly want 67 sorts of Hybrid Perpetual Roses. A dozen of the best are worth all the remainder. The object of the gardener should be to obtain the finest possible result by the simplest and most unexpensive means. Let us suppose that he has space for 60 roses; if be plants 60, so called different sorts, he will produce an effect about as good as that of an old-fashioned patchwork quilt. No skill can combine such materials into a harmonious whole. But suppose he takes half a dozen of the finest growers, the longest bloomers, and the most distinct colors; with these he may really exercise what skill he possesses in creating a brilliant scene. Mr. Rivers himself points this out: - "Amateurs are not now content with mixed beds of roses; all our finer sorts are planted in masses: thus, in some rose-gardens formed this season, the beds are made to contain from 60 to 60 plants each; in olden times, these would each have distinct colors.

Thus. No. 1 is Baronne Pre-vost; No. 2, Doctor Marx; No. 3, Madame Aimee; No. 4, Geant des Batailies, and so on: now these crimson and blush and rose-colored large groups must have a fine effect." Cer-ainly they must: and an effect that not only cannot be rivalled, but cannot be even imitated by any higgledy-piggledy arrangement whatsoever. Let us hope, then, that the intelligent rose-growero will combine to carry out this principle of selection, saving themselves much trouble and loss, ana their customers endless vexation and annoyance. For who is to know what to select from a legion of queer names? or how to produce a beautiful effect with materials of whose quality he cannot possibly have any knowledge?

We have often urged this point upon the consideration of the trade, and we are glad to see that the force of our arguments is beginning to be felt. In the majority of the lists this year, issued by the most considerable nursery and seedsmen, a very appreciable reduction has been made in the names of varieties offered for sale. Men are beginning to see the impropriety of mystifying their customers, and we may add the unprofitableness of it. But nothing like enough has yet been done. Annuals, hardy plants, green-house plants, hot-house plants. Orchids, all the race of florists' flowers, ana fruit trees of every description, are quite as much in want of the weeder as roses and kitchen garden stuff. Of what possible advantange, for instance, to any one in Great Britain can be the 1,400 sorts of apples, or 677 of pears, or 89 of figs, or 182 of grapes, or 860 of gooseberries, enumerated in the last edition of the Horticultural Society's "Catalogue of Fruits." Why, fifty apples, five-and-twenty pears, half-a-dozen figs, a dozen grapes, and as many gooseberries, answer every purpose - except that of curiosity.

The remainder may as well be consigned to the rubbish heap.

We know how unpalatable these truths will prove to some of our enthusiastic friends, who cling to their collections with as much tenaeity as a lawyer to old statutes, or a venerable lady to still more ancient china; but we entertain no doubt that they are becoming rapidly acknowledged as truths all over the country, and that the interest of every man consists in their recognition. In former days, the object was to have something new; the purpose now-a-days is to obtain something better; variety is not the presnt consideration, an anxious desire for improvement has taken its place; and long may its place be thus occupied. Time is rapidly proving that the fancies of our predecessors must give way before the utilitarianism of this age, and that to maintain the former has become as undesirable as it is impossible. - Gar-diners' Chronicle.

Subject of Roman hothouses and pits, heated artificially, I omitted several quotations which proved my statements, and they have consequently been impugned. My first authority is Columella (XI., 3, 51, 53.) Tiberius being in ill health, was advised to cat cucumbers every day. The Roman gardeners cultivated these vegetables in frames, containing hot dung, and exposed to the sun in front of a wall. The frames were, moreover, on wheels, so as to be easily moved into, and continually placed in the sun's rays, and were, in addition, furnished with pieces of talc, by which they were covered at night, and by which the plants were protect-ed from frost and cold. "Thanks to this invention," says Columella, "Tiberius was supplied with cucumbers at nearly every season of the year (fere toto anno.") Martial VIII., 14,) the contemporary of Domitian, who had in his palace a hothouse, containing exotic plants, called Adonea, describes a glass hothouse, belonging to one of his patrons, which was set apart for similar plants, as follows, in one of his Epigrams: - "As you are afraid that your pale fruit trees, natives of Cilicia, cannot withstand the winter, and that a too cold wind may nip your delicate shrubs, you take care that by panes of talc the chilly wintry blast may be kept off, and that nothing be admitted but sun and a genial air; and yet I have nothing but a miserable lodging, with a window that does not fit, and where Boreas himself would not find a habitation.

Is it thus, cruel man, that you lodge an old friend! I had much rather be the guest of your tree!" The use of some heating apparatus is here clearly referred to; but Seneca (Letter 122) tells us that the Roman hothouses were heated by steam. He denounces the unbridled luxury or his contemporaries. "Do not those live contrary to nature who require roses in winter, and who. by the use of hot water, and application of heat, compel the lily to blossom in winter, instead of in the spring?" It is remarkable that the most direct evidence of the use of hothouses by the Romans should be furnished by a poet and a philosopher. - Comptes Rendus.