462 



On the Ayrshire Rose. 



from one to five flowers only, and not large cymes ; the pe- 

 tioles are hairy, not smooth : the germen is smooth, and by 

 the figure the leaves are glaucous at the back. It is pro- 

 bably a weak growing variety of Rosa arvensis. The de- 

 scription of Rosa repens by Willdenow accords with that 

 of Jacquin, except that the former makes the shoot two 

 fathoms long ; both however refer to the plant of Scopoli, 

 which, from their accounts, is found wild in Carniola, Scla- 

 vonia, Hungary, and the adjoining countries. 



The character given of the Ayrshire Rose by Mr. David 

 Don, in Mr. Ne ill's Paper in the Edinburgh Philosophical 

 Magazine, agrees well with the plant ; but it is not sufficiently 

 extended to distinguish it from R. sempervirens. As com- 

 pared with R. arvensis, he describes the leaves of that spe- 

 cies as ovate, and of the Ayrshire as elliptic, and represents 

 the fruit of R. arvensis as globose, with peduncles nearly 

 smooth, whilst the Ayrshire Rose has ovate fruit and glandi- 

 ferous peduncles. I am not aware that the R. arvensis has 

 ever been found w r ith peduncles approaching to smoothness, 

 and therefore suppose that the description was made from 

 a plant late in the autumn, for when the fruit approaches 

 maturity the setae drop off the peduncles, and leave them 

 nearly smooth. Mr. Neill, though he considers the Ayr- 

 shire Rose nearly allied to the R. arvensis, seems to suspect 

 that it may be the Rosa prostrata* of De Candolle ; but 

 that plant, according to the description of it in the works 

 referred to, has a nearer resemblance to R. sempervirens ; it 

 is besides a week growing shrub, and has its flowers usually 

 solitary, and not in cymes. 



* Hortus Monspeliensis, page 138, and Flore Framboise, Supp. p. 536. 



