188 ORIGIN OF SEVERAL VARIETIES OF MOSS ROSES. 



" Not a tree, 

 A plant, a leaf, a blossom, but contains 

 A folio volume. We may read, and read. 

 And read again, and still find something new. 

 Something to please, and something to instruct." 



ORIGIN OF SEVERAL VARIETIES OF MOSS ROSES. 



BY MR. H. SHAILER, CHAPEL NURSERY, BATTERSEA FIELDS, LONDON. 



On the first introduction of the old red moss rose, in or about the year 

 1735, it was sent over with some plants of orange trees, from the Italian 

 States, to Mr. Wrench, then a nurseryman and gardener, at Broom- 

 house, Fulham, the same land being now in the occupation of the 

 descendants of that family, the Messrs. Fitch, extensive market gar- 

 deners, &c. It remained in that family nearly twenty years, without 

 being much noticed or circulated, until a nurseryman, named Grey, of 

 the Fulham nursery, now Messrs. Osborn's, brought it into note. The 

 first production of the white moss rose, which took place in the year 

 1788, was from a sucker, or underground shoot. My father, Henry 

 Shailer, nurseryman, of Little Chelsea, an extensive grower of moss 

 roses, perceiving it to be a lusus natures, from a stool of the red moss, 

 cut it off, and budded it on the white Provence, or Rose La Blanche 

 Unique. The buds flowered the following season a pale blush. He 

 budded them again the next season, when the flower came much whiter. 

 It was then figured in Andrew's Rosary, under the name of Shailer's 

 White Moss. He then sold it out, the first plants to Lord Kimbolton, 

 then to the Marquis of Blandford, Lady de Clifford, the Duke of 

 Gloucester, &c., at five guineas per plant, lie continued to sell at that 

 price for tiiree years ; he then entered into a contract with those highly 

 respectable and extensive nurserymen, Messrs. Lee and Kennedy, of 

 Hammersmith, they taking as many plants as he could grow for three 

 years, at 20s. per plant, binding him not to sell to any one else under 

 42s. per plant. After cutting down the shoots which produced the 

 white moss, the plant threw up two weak shoots, which he budded 

 from ; they flowered the second season from the buds, and that was the 

 birth of the striped moss rose, a most beautiful and delicate variety, 

 but when grown very strong, apt to go back to the original parent. 

 The first production of the single red moss rose, 1807, was a sport of 

 nature. My father sent some plants of moss roses to a nurseryman, 

 named Essex, at Colchester, and on the receipt of a letter from that 

 person, 1 went with my father to see the plant when it Mas in bloom. 

 I took some cutiings away with me to bud, and the following autumn 

 fetched the original plant to our nursery, at Little Chelsea, from whence 

 we sent the first plants out, at 5s. The old scarlet moss rose, which is 

 a semidouble, first flowered in 1808, on a plant given by my father to 

 his brother, F. Shailer, of Cook's Ground and Queen's Elm, Chelsea. 

 The first production of the Moss de meux was from a sport of the old 

 De meux, in the neighbourhood of Bristol, but brought into a high 

 state of perfection by Messrs. Lee, of Hammersmith. The Sage-leaf 



