Melbourne bot Garden
18/2/63
My dear Professor
By the mail I received on Monday Mr Maxwells plants, collected about the W. extremity of the Great Bight. He sent 3 specimens of each species & I requested Mr Heyne to put one of each apart for you & label them. This collection after about 2 days work has been put up for you now, & I have the pleasure of forwarding it, regretting only, that in the turmoils of accumulated work I had no time to put the specific names instantly to each plant, but I have given the generic names. I have under all circumstances some day to revise & enlarge the University herbarium & can then simultaneously attend to the proper naming of each species.
I trust you will find the collection worth £10, especially when considering that Maxwell had to travel with a small party for 5 months, to purchase several horses & to live upon what he is able to raise from the value of his collections. I have to remit to him by the outgoing mail (end of this week) & you would much oblige me, if you could add kindly your contribution to mine. I had a good deal of private expenses of late & would find some difficulty to make the outlay. — I trust you received the large fish all right. I had half a days heavy work to prepare it. Pray give me kindly your opinion on it, as Mr M'Haffie is desirous to learn what it is.1 I am writing to that Gentleman within the next days.
Pray let me know, whether you ever received my few rock-specimens from the Barkly Ranges? Dr Sturms2 large private museum of zoological objects, on which von Sieboldt3 so favorably reported, is to be sold. The whole is valued at £3000. I suppose there is no likelyhood of your securing any portion of it for your institution.
Pray favor me with an answer & believe me to be, your attached
Ferd Mueller
In Maxwells account only 400 specimens are charged. In the parcel transmitted are 448. I have some seeds, for which I have specially to pay, from Maxwell and will be happy to present of those of which the quantity can be diverted some to the University Gardens4
See M to F. McCoy, 28 January 1863; F. McCoy to M, 20 February 1863 (in this edition as 63-02-20c); and M to E. Henderson, 1 March 1863 (in this edition as 63-03-01a).
The natural history collection assembled by Jacob Sturm (1771-1848) and his sons was advertised for sale by the surviving son in September 1862 (Bonplandia, vol. 10, pp. 319-20. The collection had been described in 1860 (Bonplandia, vol. 8, p. 317) and, in addition to the zoological specimens advertised in 1862, mentioned a substantial herbarium including Sieber's collections from New Holland and elsewhere.
Carl Theodore von Siebold? The advertisement includes reference to the collection being judged 'ersten Ranges in seiner Art' [first class of its kind] by several scholars, including 'Dr. v. Sielbold in München'.
See also F. McCoy to M, 20 February 1863 (in this edition as 63-02-20a).
See also F. McCoy to M, 20 February 1863 (in this edition as 63-02-20a).
Please cite as “FVM-63-02-18,” 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