Parramatta
August 3/ 61
My Dear Doctor
I have just returned from Sydney after having spent a very pleasant day with Mr Macleay.2 He showed me Mr Bentham's letter to Sir William Hooker,3 and two letters of Dr Hooker to himself,4 in all of which, honourable mention is made of you. Mr Macleay sent his kind regards to you & expressed a very high opinion of your abilities as a Botanist.
It appears that the Governor5 has agreed to put £50 on the estimates towards each volume of Mr Bentham's book and His Excellency hopes that you will associate yourself as much as possible with that gentleman's labour. Mr Macleay was much pleased to find that there is a good understanding between yourself and Mr Bentham, as he says Mr Bentham wants your local observation & personal experience of the Australian plants, and you would want for the identification of many species Mr Bentham's power of referring to the classical herbaria of Brown, Cunningham &c.6 Mr Macleay says he is going to write to Dr Hooker by the next mail, in which letter he will express these views, and also point out the difficulty of describing some of our genera (Eucalyptus & Acacia for instance) from dried specimens.7
I remarked to Mr Macleay that if Mr Bentham, were to reprint all the old descriptions of Eucalypti, they would be perfectly useless, and that no one, excepting a Botanist like yourself, could throw any light on so obscure a matter.
I took the liberty of reading to him your remarks about Euodia with which he was much interested. He said you were probably quite correct, although the tree was originally referred to Zieria under the name Z. arborescens. Our conversation, and examination of insects (of which Mr Macleay has a splendid collection) occupied so much time that we had not leisure to go round the garden, but Mr Macleay alluded to the difficulty that anyone in England would have in describing Octoclinis, as it takes so many years before it assumes its final appearance. He showed me a specimen of Clathrus identical with that which the Rev Mr Clarke8 recd from Shoalhaven, and he agreed with me respecting the Symphyogyna from the Kurrajong,9 about which so many opinions had been expressed.
I am glad that I have seen Mr Macleay about this matter in which you are so deeply interested, and I hope that men of science in all parts of the world will appreciate your good feeling in assisting Mr Bentham, when you are so fully competent to publish a work on Australian Botany yourself!
With best wishes for your health and prosperity.
Every yours most sincerely,
William Woolls.
Dr Mueller &c &c &c
Govt Botanist
Melbourne
Acacia
Clathrus
Eucalyptus
Euodia
Octoclinis
Symphyogyna
Zieria arborescens
Please cite as “FVM-61-08-03,” 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 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/61-08-03