To William Henry Archer   21 September 1857

Melbourne bot. Gard[en]1

21. Sept. 1857.

Dear Mr Archer

I am much obliged for your kind attention to Major General M'Arthurs request. If I am not too much intruding on you, will you let me have one or two small parcels more of the Zuly Imphee?

I send you 12 packages of Cotton seed, which you probably can distribute without expense to the applicants for the Holcus simultaneously.

[I]2 am sorry, that your name was omitted as a donor to the gardens. You will however observe, that I said, minor gifts had been received from other gentlemen.3 Previous to my taking the responsibility of administrating this establishment, the books were but laxely kept, and thus I am aware of the incompleteness of the list of Mr Dallachi.

I have however alluded to the Holcus as distributed th[anks] to your assiduity in [the] paper on introductions of plants, […]4 at the last meeting of our institute.5

Is it not possible to get through your friends abroad occasionally a few seeds of trees or shrubs of rarer kinds, for which we would be able to offer always an good equivalent. We do not care much for annual seeds, unless from useful species

Obediently yours

Ferd. Mueller.

 

Holcus

1
editorial addition— MS damaged.
2
editorial addition— MS damaged.
3
B57.09.01.
4
illegible— MS damaged.
5
The reading of M's paper, B58.05.02, was postponed at the monthly meeting of the Philosophical Institute, 2 September, until 30 September (Transactions of the Philosophical Institute of Victoria (1858) pp. xl, xliii). In the paper M remarked: 'Amongst grains I may also briefly allude to the Chinese Sugar-grass (Holcus sacharatus), of which the Caffir variety has been lately distributed throughout the country by Mr. Archer's assiduity, under a desire of adding to the vegetable treasures of the colony' (p. 96).

Please cite as “FVM-57-09-21,” in Correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller, edited by R.W. Home, Thomas A. Darragh, A.M. Lucas, Sara Maroske, D.M. Sinkora†, J.H. Voigt† and Monika Wells accessed on 26 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/57-09-21