@5he Moss Roses 
“It seems to me there 1s nothing lovelier in the whole flower kingdom than a spray 
of Moss Rose Buds,” Louise Beebe Wilder, 1916. 
Nothing we might say today about these delightful Moss Roses 
could equal the rich words of the old writers. We will let them 
picture for you this sweetheart rose of the last century. 
You who received recent catalogues, will forgive us if we repeat, 
once again, the Calvados Legend of the Birth of the Moss Rose too 
good to be omitted— 
©. ..and the Angel, with dew-laden wings, being weary, begged of the 
Rose a night’s shelter. Awakening refreshed, she asked how such hospitality might be 
repaid. ‘Make me even more beautiful, replied the Queen of Flowers. ‘But what 
grace can 1 add to the most beautiful of all flowers, said the Angel; and then, glanc- 
ing at her mossy bed, she gathered some and placed it on the Rose’s young buds. 
Thus was born the Moss Rose.” 
We cannot resist including here, (remote to rose cataloging as it 
may be), the incident described by the famous Dean Hole, in his 
“Book about Roses,” first published in England 1869, an extract 
from Chapter X, as follows,— 
*« |. . It is, nevertheless, as true an incident in my history as it may 
be a strange statement in the reader’s ears, that, once upon a time, hard 
on fifty summers since, I was driven out of London by a Rose! And 
thus it came to pass: Early in June, that period of the year which tries, 
I think, more than any other, the patience of the Rosarian, waiting in 
his garden, and vexing his fond heart with idle fears, I was glad to have 
a valid excuse for spending a few days in town. To town I went, 
transacted my business, saw the pictures, heard an opera, wept my 
annual tear at a tragedy, visited the Nurseries, rode in the Park, met 
old friends, and was beginning to think that life in the country was 
not so very much ‘more sweet than that of painted pomp,’ when, 
engaged to a dinner-party, and to enliven my scenery, I bought a 
Rose. Only a common Rose, one from a hundred which a ragged girl 
was hawking in the streets—a Moss Rose-bud! But as I carried it in my 
coat, and gazed on it, and specially when, waking next morning, I 
saw it in my water-jug—saw it as I lay in my dingy bedroom, and 
heard the distant roar of Piccadilly instead of the thrush’s song—saw 
it, and thought of my own Roses—it seemed as though they had sent 
to me a messenger, whom they knew I loved, to bid me ‘come home.’ 
... And I arose, reflecting; and though I had taken my lodgings and 
arranged my plans for three more days in London, I went home that 
morning with the Rosebud in my coat, and wandering in my garden 
at eventide, armed with a cigar in case I met an aphis, I exulted in my 
liberation from smuts and smells, and in all the restful peace, and the 
fragrant beauty, which glowed around me.” 
35 
