NOTES ON THE ORIGIN OF THE MOSS-ROSE. 
33 
redder ; and all the stalks are covered with a green Down, like Moss, 
which gives it its name." The drawing is said to have been " coloured 
from the* life." Willmott (1912) mentions that there is a specimen 
of the Moss-Rose in the British Museum from the Chelsea Physic 
Gardens (Miller's) with the date 1735. About the year 1735 is the 
period which Shailer (1852) quoted by Darwin (1893) gives as the 
first introduction of the old Red Moss-Rose into England. He states, 
" It was sent over with some orange trees from the Italian States 
to Mr. Wrench of the Broomhouse Nurseries, Fulham, in or about 
the year 1735. It remained in that family 20 years without being 
much noticed and circulated, until a nurseryman of the name of 
Grey of Fulham brought it into note." In 1746, as we have already 
noted, the Moss-Rose was in cultivation in France in four districts 
of the South and West. Linnaeus (1753) does not mention the Moss- 
Rose. Miller (1760) published a coloured drawing of the Moss-Rose, 
with an interesting description of the plant, and following Boerhaave 
(1720) describes it as " Rosa rubra plena, spinosissima, pedunculo 
muscosa. The most prickly double red Rose with a mossy foot- 
stalk, commonly called the Moss Provence Rose. . . . This sort 
sends out but few stalks from the root. These are covered with a dark 
brown bark, and closely armed with sharp thorns, the leaves are 
composed of five oblong oval lobes, which are hairy and sawed on their 
edges; the footstalks of the flowers are strong, standing erect, and 
are covered with a dark-green moss, as is also the Empalement of 
the Flowers. The flowers are the same shape and colour as the common 
Provence Rose, and have the like agreeable odour. It flowers in 
June or July, but is not succeeded by fruits." 
Linnaeus (1762) adds R. rubra plena spinosissima pedunculo 
muscoso of Miller (1760) to R. centifolia as probably belonging to it. 
Martyn (1807) quotes Retzius' (1779) description of the Moss-Rose, 
which is worth re-quoting for its originality and acute observation, 
" Stem very prickly and hispid : peduncles long, beset with curled 
strigae terminated by a resinous globule, as are also the whole calyxes : 
these strigae are often branched. Petioles less hispid and unarmed. 
Leaflets very large 3 or 5, smooth. The colour and smell of the 
clammy resinous glands are very much the same as in the Flowering 
Raspberry, or Rubus odoratus." (It is, of course, the fragrant foliage 
of the Rubus to which Retzius refers and not the flowers.) De Grace 
(1784) mentions the Moss-Rose in France. 
It is said (Wright, 19 11) that in 1785 the Moss-Rose was sent 
from Caen Wood, Highgate, by Lord Mansfield to Mme. de Genlis 
in France as a new introduction to that country. (Cf. Vibert's 
reference below.) We have already seen that it was in cultivation 
in four districts in France in 1746, and at Carcassonne in the south of 
France as far back as about 1696. 
Rossig (1802) gives under the name of R. muscosa the figure of 
a pink Moss-Rose, less mossy than usual, and states that it is found 
on the Alps. 
VOL. XLVII. D 
