Melbourne botan. Gardens
July 17th 1863
Sir
I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letters of the 14th inst., which have been duly laid before a Meeting of the Trustees of the Royal Park held this day.1 In reply I have been directed by my collegues2 to communicate to you the following resolution passed at their meeting.
"That the Trustees can not recognize the principles enunciated in the copies of the resolutions, adressed to the honorary Secretary of the Trustees of the Royal Park as passed by the Council of the Acclimation Society on the 14th instant and communicated in their letters of that date.
I have the honor to be
Sir
Your most obedt servant
signed F. M.
Hon. Secr. to the Trustees of the
Roy. Park
W. Archer Esq
Hon. Secret. Acclim. Soc.
Letters not found. The letters communicated the following resolutions to the Trustees of Royal Park, Melbourne from the Council of the Acclimatisation Society of Victoria: 1) 'That the Government having by letter dated April 30th 1863 approved of the sale of the Camels at present in charge of the Acclimation Society and having requested this Council to suggest such steps as they may think fit for that purpose, the matter at present rests with this Council to deal with, and any interference on the part of the Trustees would be quite uncalled for and unwarrantable.' 2) 'This Council desires to record, that the Trustees of the Society are recognized only as Trustees holding for and subject to the directions of the Society, who claims a sole and absolute right of disposal of its stock and property free from any interference by the Trustees against which this Council protests and therefore the reconsideration by the Trustees at the instance of one of their number of any resolution of the Council would be unauthorized and ultra vires.' (A345, p. 124).
At the meeting of the Trustees held on 16 July 1863, M ‘stated, that he had as honorary Secretary deemed it his duty to summon his colleagues, in order that an opportunity might be afforded to them of expressing an opinion wether (sic) cognizance should be taken of the sale of the Dromedaries as proposed by the Council of the Acclimation Society and of which proposition no intimation had been given to the Trustees. Letters on the subject from W. Wardell Esq. and Clem. Hodgkinson Esq. were read deprecating the intended sale of these useful animals. After a lengthened deliberation it was resolved, that the honorary Secretary should apply to the honorable the Chief Secretary for information wether the Trustees might regard themselves perfectly free of any responsibility of this transaction.’ See M to J. McCulloch, 16 July 1863 (in this edition as 63-07-16a)
colleagues?
Please cite as “FVM-63-07-17a,” 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