To Joseph Hooker   15 January 1858

Melbourne bot garden

15 Jan 1858.

My dear Dr Hooker

I feel proud, that the botanical collections formed in tropical Australia and the notes, which accompanied them, met with the hardly expected satisfaction from your and your venerable fathers side. This is a great relieve to my mind, for the unfortunate loss of many of the best specimens and about 50 species althogether, with hundreds of papers of seeds has greatly reduced the value of my collection.1 I have yet many notes uncopied, which were roughly written during the expedition, but shall endeavour to clear the work off as soon as possible and pass over them to the Glumaceae, which remain yet to be named.

I feel quite sorry, that Sir Williams important and interesting journal should althogther cease to appear, and Sir Henry Barkly expresses likewise his regret.2

I can fully imagine, my dear Dr Hooker, that it will be an impossibility for you to devote any great amount of time to the reexamination of my plants; nor am I so immodest to wish this.3 It only struck me, that such orders, as Stylid[e]ae, which are nearly all truelyAustralian might be issued, for the material at my command when defining these plants was quite sufficient for correct conclusions. The same might be said of Mitrasacme, where a glance over Mr Benthams simultaneously published species,4 would easy bring the few errors to light. My notes on these are the result of a very careful study of the living plants. In Acaciae I was also safely guided by Mr Benthams labours.5 The principle difficulties arose to me in the determination of the Indian not the Australian forms; particularly in Thalamiflorae & Calyciflorae, which can not be recognized from DC. prodr.6 All I wished to claim was to prove what additions had been made to the Austral flora, not to those of the world, — and to offer a full description or at least an accurate and complete diagnostic, which yet would be acceptable for a Austral. Flora, altho the adopted names might prove untenable; indeed many of them I regarded interimistic. It is a great encouragement to me to learn that you deemed some of my new genera worthy of description. I have not yet seen the number in which it appeared.7

Of the sapindaceous tree formerly dedicated to Sir W. Denison I could never get the fruit perfectly ripe, and therefore I gave the name up and took the beautiful Verbenaceous Bush from the Gulf of Carpentaria to express my gratitude in some degree for the kindness, which I experienced from the Governor General.8

It gives me great pleasure to hear of your intention to lay a share of my literary labours before the Veteran Society of the Linneans.9

I fully perceived the fall[acious] views adopted by Vriese10 in his disquisition of the genera & spec of Goodeniaceae, and trust that he will come wiser home and direct his eminent talents into better channels and save us the trouble of entering into his decimal calculus. — Still the work was useful to me for learning what was known, and I can confidently advance the charming Goodenias as new which my msc. contains!11

The heavy duties on this garden just now have prevented me from advancing the North Austr [Botany] as much as I could have wished, but I thankfully accept your kind aid at Kew hereafter. My spare hours are employed to prepare for the final work, and if once this garden is laid perfectly out and is well stocked (for which purpose I never can solicit too much aid) I can well ask for a couple of years leave of absence to publish the whole of my material under your direction and Sir Williams.

Mr Adamson has left Melbourne, and I have not heard from him for many months. He seems to have been unfortunate in his business. I offered him such pecuniary aid, as my own means enabled me to do, but he did not accept of it at the time. Rest assured, dear Dr Hooker, that to render services to any of your friends will be considered as redeeming the manyfold debts which I incurred to you and your noble father.

Duncan will bring you a large consignment of seeds specimens & pamphlets, also at least two Wardian Cases with plants, and I will send the living Polygonum platycladum

I received lately again some novelties from Moreton Bay, two species of Schmiedelia,12 one of [Cubilia] and others about which I shall communicate in my next letter. But this time I will at least define the new Sterculiaceous genus, because Mr Hill informs me, that it is under cultivation (as a Xanthoxylon) at Kew.13

Believe me, my dear Doctor,

to be your attached

and obliged

Ferd. Mueller.

 

I find in Endl. Atakta my Distichostemon phyllopterus as Dodonaea hispidula.14 It is however a well characterized genus, singular amongst Sapindaceous pl. as polyandrous. Its habit is likewise quite distinct. Fenzlia is as Naudinstates truely myrtaceous and my Lithomyrtus.15 I would never search for it in Melastomeae. Litsaea is not campanulaceous but myrtaceous.

 

Acacia

Calyciflorae

Cubilia

Distichostemon phyllopterus

Dodonaea hispidula

Fenzlia

Glumaceae

Goodenia

Goodeniaceae

Lithomyrtus

Litsaea

Melastomeae.

Mitrasacme

Polygonum platycladum

Schmiedelia

Stylideae

Thalamiflorae

Xanthoxylon

See M to W. Hooker, 6 April 1857 and A. Gregory to M, 8 April 1857 for details of the loss by water damage while the specimens were being transported to Sydney.
Hooker's journal of botany and Kew Garden miscellany ceased publication in 1857.
See J. Hooker to M, 10 October 1857.
Bentham (1857).
Bentham (1842).
A. P. de Candolle (1823-73).
See J. Hooker to M, 10 October 1857. The genera were published in B57.01.01.
Dennisonia (D. ternifolia) (B59.02.02, p. 158).
See J. Hooker to M, 10 October 1857.
Vriese (1849-50).
See J. Hooker to M, 10 October 1857. M's new Goodenia species from the North Australian Exploring Expedition were published in B59.04.04.
Presumably S. anodontaand S. pyriformis (B58.03.01, p. 2).
Probably Argyrodendron (A. trifoliolatum) which M named from specimens collected by the Brisbane River (B58.03.01, p. 2).
Endlicher (1833a).
Lithomyrtus hypoleuca is included in M's list of plants, 5 March 1857. The plants arrived in London in July 1857 (RBG Kew, 'Plant Lists. Vol 1. Europe, Asia, Africa, America, Australia, New Zealand, Polynesia, 1845-63'). See also M to W. Hooker, 9 January 1858.

Please cite as “FVM-58-01-15,” 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 28 March 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/58-01-15