34 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
Brotero (1804) includes R. muscosa in his " Flora of Portugal/' 
while Rivers (1840) alludes to a traveller's report that the Moss-Rose 
grew wild in the neighbourhood of Cintra, but considers that most 
likely the plants were of garden origin. 
Andrews (1805) states of the Moss-Rose (R. muscosa provincialis) , 
" There can be little, if any doubt, that this beautiful variety is the 
spontaneous effusion of Nature in this country, of which we ever 
shall regard it as indigenous, since we have never heard of any im- 
portations of this species, but frequent exportations." 
Thory (1817) appears to have taken this " effusion " of Andrews 
quite seriously, and replies as follows : " A cet egard, independam- 
ment de ce qu'une conclusion de cette espece est inadmissible en 
histoire naturelle, nous ferons observer qu'il n'est pas rare de voir 
les Iconographes anglais considerer beaucoup de plantes comme 
indigenes au sol de leur pays, toutes les fois que le lieu dans lequel 
elles vegetent naturellement leur est inconnu, circonstance qui doit 
faire rejeter toutes les assertions de ce genre." 
Apparently Thory had not seen Ducastel. 
Origin of the Moss-Rose. 
We have reviewed the history of the Old Moss-Rose and have 
traced it back to about the year 1696, when it was apparently in 
cultivation at Carcassonne, in the south of France, until it was found 
there by Ducastel, and introduced by him to the gardens of three 
districts in the North-West of France. We have seen that it was 
in cultivation in Holland in 1720, in England in 1727, and in Italy 
m I 735- Andrews (1805) states that "... The origin of this beauti- 
ful Rose has ever been considered as enveloped in obscurity, but we 
have no hesitation in assigning it to the Province, to which it assimilates 
in every particular — with the addition of a rich luxuriant Moss, that 
gives it a decided superiority, and at the same time a specific dis- 
tinction. . . . There can be little, if any doubt, that this beautiful 
variety is the spontaneous effusion of Nature in this country." 
Rivers (1840) states : " The Moss-Rose or Mossy Provence Rose 
is most probably an accidental sport or seminal variety of the 
Common Provence Rose." 
Vibert (1844) of Angers, France, states, curiously enough, that the 
first Moss-Rose, the Common Moss, was discovered in England. He 
quotes the statement of Mme. de Genlis in her Botanique Historique 
that she brought the first plant of the Moss-Rose to Paris from 
England a few years before the Revolution of 1789, but he seems 
sceptical about her further statement that in Germany, round Berlin, 
the Moss-Rose grew as high as cherry trees ! Vibert proceeds to say 
that the Moss-Rose is evidently a sport of Nature, a happy accident 
that Art has fixed, and that the date of introduction has not been 
preserved in a positive manner. He remarks that in France in 1810 
only the Common Moss was known, and that the species R. centifolia 
